My High 5 Latest Suggestions

Oooph. It has been a month of seemingly fairly random on-line and in-person purchases however by God have this stuff tickled the collective fancy of my Instagram followers. From a pressure-relieving seat-pad to a face contour wand that creates on the spot cheekbones, listed here are the bits and items that folks have gone wild for.

I imply we should always clearly go in with the sexiest merchandise: this Gel Seat Cushion “for lengthy sitting” has a particular honeycomb design that helps to unfold load and relieve stress on the decrease again, hips, sciatic nerve and – crucially – on the outdated fanjita. The undercarriage. Sure, mates, I purchased a seat pad particularly to cease my thrupenny bits from going numb when writing at my desk for lengthy durations of time.

I can hear you all now, screaming away, “you shouldn’t be sitting for that lengthy at a time anyway!”. “My Apple Watch makes me rise up and do leaping jacks each twenty minutes!!”. “GET A STANDING DESK!!!”.

Calm yourselves. If I want to sit at my desk churning out phrases till my total fanny loses all feeling then I’ll. And the brand new gel seat cushion permits me to go even longer than earlier than. What an accolade to earn!

Jesting apart, the cushion is definitely sensible when you have decrease again ache and discover each single workplace chair uncomfortable. It doesn’t make it really feel all smooth and squidgy, as if you’re sinking into a settee, it simply kind of…helps. In a very forgiving method. It additionally permits air circulation between arse and chair, which is useful, and you’ll choose up the cushion by its particular deal with (only a regular deal with, however I’m in QVC mode) and take it to make use of within the automobile or at The Globe theatre. (If you realize, you realize.)

I purchased mine from Amazon right here* – it was £24.99

*denotes an ad-affiliate hyperlink. Which means that a small proportion is earned with each buy by the hyperlink.

Look, I do know that is subjective, however I’ve tried a lot of earplugs – I can nearly safely say most of them in the marketplace – and these are those which are nonetheless inside my ear come morning.

Most others are plucked out, blearily, at round 3am as a result of they’re so massive that they’re about to burst by the wall of my ear canal, or they’re protruding an excessive amount of and stopping me from sleeping on my facet, or they’re too inflexible and giving me ear-burn.

Earlier than this specific kind of ear plug, the very best I’d discovered had been the Alpine Sleep Tender (sure, I’ve tried Loop and all the opposite ones that regularly pop up as solutions) as a result of the smooth silicone plugs had been simple to tug out and in (no rolling or twisting obligatory), had been sufficiently small for my dainty ear canals (fairly positive most ear plugs are made to suit giants) and fashioned an excellent noise-seal that lower out loud night breathing however nonetheless allowed excessive pitched noises to penetrate.

(Alarms, foxes mating, owls screeching.)

After attempting almost each kind of ear plug other than the bespoke ones the place you need to have a mould product of your ear canal (I’m simply not that dedicated) the Alpine Sleep Tender had been the easiest. However then – then – alongside got here the Alpine SleepDeep!

These are oval and appear to only match that bit extra snugly inside (you give them an excellent additional push together with your thumbnails they usually suction into place as if you’ve entered some kind of outer house satellite tv for pc airlock) they usually additionally are available two sizes. Which is vital. I like to recommend the small, until you have got a really giant head. Or giant ear canals.

As talked about, these are the one ear plugs I can put in at evening and get up nonetheless carrying within the morning. I feel that they’re fairly phenomenal.

I purchased mine right here* – I purchased the combined pack with each sizes, however in the event you simply need “small” then go for the model labelled (confusingly) “50 pack”. That appears to be the small dimension by itself.

One thing of a cheat entry, as a result of I lined this wonderful vest prime final week, however nonetheless one of the crucial well-liked suggestions of the month. This can be a smooth, beautifully-cut vest prime that requires no underwear beneath it as a result of it has it inbuilt. I’m a convert.

You possibly can learn the complete rave about this prime right here, or purchase the Uniqlo Ribbed Bra High, £19.90 right here*

Some contouring on-line is an excessive sport, with folks altering their total bone construction and magically reshaping their noses by way of intelligent optical illusions. I can inform you that this appears spectacular on movie however completely unhinged when seen up shut in actual life, so don’t really feel as if you’re lacking a trick in the event you’ve not but lined your total face with stripes and squiggles of darkish brown paint and buffed all of it in to a doubtful end.

What I can recommend, if you’d like the aforementioned “supermodel cheekbone chisel” is a fast swipe of the e.l.f. Magnificence Wand in Contour (I exploit medium/tan) straight beneath your actual cheekbones after which a fast mud over with a fluffy brush to mix. The sponge applicator appears to use the color in a extra forgiving method than a stick – much less waxy, simpler to buff in – and the shades are properly thought-out, non-orangey and stick round till you wash your face off.

It’s a great way to dip your toe into the sculpting world in the event you don’t need to spend money on an expensive contour product and I really like that the plastic tube packaging is properly light-weight – good for my on-the-go make-up bag.

I purchased mine at Boots and it’s additionally on-line right here* – it prices £9 and is each bit nearly as good because the pricier merchandise it’s up towards.

I’ll bore you with a narrative: I’ve some actually beautiful Tiffany earrings. A gift, years in the past. Ten years? In all of that point I’ve tried and didn’t put on these diamond studs for various days at a time. The screw thread appears to only tear up the insides of my piercing holes when I attempt to feed the posts by and I find yourself with sore, swollen lobes each time that take days to go down once more.

I made the chief resolution to promote the earrings and purchase myself some “new” ones (truly pre-loved, so new to me however to not the world) and this time I selected the usual “push on” backs. All properly and good, and my ears massively respect them, the sleek posts simply gliding on by, however I’ve to say that the woman within the jewellers put the concern of God into me about shedding the earrings. She was all for the screw submit for safety.

I set to some critical analysis, which took me all of about eight minutes on the practice house from London, and got here throughout a possible resolution: Lox lockable earring backs.

These intelligent backs enable the submit of the earring to enter it, however then it locks in place so that you could’t slide the again off even in the event you apply Hulk Hogan ranges of drive. There’s simply no budging it. Marvellous! To undo, you merely squeeze the prongs collectively (slightly fiddly however nothing too irritating) and off they slide.

To date, so superb. I’ve been wanging round with the backs, taking them on and off a couple of hundred instances, nonetheless no signal of the LOX power depleting.

It’s nearly a tenner for 2 units of lockable backs, which make these probably the costliest small issues on the present market in the event you disregard MI5-level hidden spy cameras and nano-robots and the like, however by their very nature they need to be laborious to lose and so hopefully you’d solely have to purchase them as soon as for every pair of fancy earrings…

I purchased my LOX on Amazon right here* – £9.99

I didn’t need to self-promote (or did, however thought I’d depart it till the very finish!) however my most-purchased suggestion this month has truly been my new guide, How To not be a Supermodel. I can’t inform you what number of messages I get each day from individuals who have completed the guide and really feel the necessity to inform me instantly how a lot they liked it. Or from individuals who have simply began it and might’t put it down. Or who can’t cease laughing out loud in public.

Dozens and dozens of sensible, heart-warming messages and mini-reviews, usually with complete passages quoted again at me. It’s massively gratifying listening to how individuals are devouring it after which shedding the guide to their family and friends as a result of they’ve banged on about it a lot!

If you happen to haven’t but learn it (or listened – the audiobook is accessible on Audible and Spotify and the entire ordinary locations) then you could find it in your native bookshop or order on-line right here*. I can promise you that in the event you even remotely like what you learn right here on Substack then you’ll love the guide.