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 these items tickled the collective fancy of my Instagram followers. From a pressure-relieving seat-pad to a face contour wand that creates immediate 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 strain on the decrease again, hips, sciatic nerve and – crucially – on the previous fanjita. The undercarriage. Sure, buddies, 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 whole 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 you probably have decrease again ache and discover each single workplace chair uncomfortable. It doesn’t make it really feel all delicate and squidgy, as if you’re sinking into a settee, it simply type of…helps. In a extremely forgiving approach. It additionally permits air circulation between arse and chair, which is useful, and you may decide 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 automotive or at The Globe theatre. (If you recognize, you recognize.)

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

*denotes an ad-affiliate hyperlink. Which means a small share 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 virtually safely say most of them available on the market – 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 aspect, or they’re too inflexible and giving me ear-burn.

Earlier than this explicit kind of ear plug, the very best I’d discovered have been the Alpine Sleep Comfortable (sure, I’ve tried Loop and all the opposite ones that regularly pop up as options) as a result of the delicate silicone plugs have been straightforward to tug out and in (no rolling or twisting vital), have been sufficiently small for my dainty ear canals (fairly positive most ear plugs are made to suit giants) and fashioned a superb noise-seal that reduce out loud night breathing however nonetheless allowed excessive pitched noises to penetrate.

(Alarms, foxes mating, owls screeching.)

After making an attempt almost each kind of ear plug aside from the bespoke ones the place it’s a must to have a mould fabricated from your ear canal (I’m simply not that dedicated) the Alpine Sleep Comfortable have been the perfect. However then – then – alongside got here the Alpine SleepDeep!

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

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

I purchased mine here* – I purchased the blended 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 measurement by itself.

One thing of a cheat entry, as a result of I lined this wonderful vest high final week, however nonetheless probably the most common suggestions of the month. It is a delicate, beautifully-cut vest high that requires no underwear beneath it as a result of it has it inbuilt. I’m a convert.

You’ll be able to read the full rave about this top here, or purchase the Uniqlo Ribbed Bra High, £19.90 here*

Some contouring on-line is an excessive sport, with folks altering their whole bone construction and magically reshaping their noses through 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 whole face with stripes and squiggles of darkish brown paint and buffed all of it in to a doubtful end.

What I can counsel, in order for you the aforementioned “supermodel cheekbone chisel” is a fast swipe of the e.l.f. Magnificence Wand in Contour (I take advantage of medium/tan) immediately 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 approach than a stick – much less waxy, simpler to buff in – and the shades are nicely 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 put money into a dear contour product and I like that the plastic tube packaging is properly light-weight – excellent for my on-the-go make-up bag.

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

I’ll bore you with a narrative: I’ve some actually pretty Tiffany earrings. A gift, years in the past. Ten years? In all of that point I’ve tried and did not put on these diamond studs for various days at a time. The screw thread appears to simply 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 determination 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 nicely and good, and my ears massively admire them, the graceful posts simply gliding on by, however I’ve to say that the girl within the jewellers put the worry of God into me about dropping the earrings. She was all for the screw put up for safety.

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

These intelligent backs permit the put up of the earring to enter it, however then it locks in place in an effort to’t slide the again off even in the event you apply Hulk Hogan ranges of pressure. There’s simply no budging it. Marvellous! To undo, you merely squeeze the prongs collectively (a bit fiddly however nothing too irritating) and off they slide.

Up to now, so excellent. I’ve been wanging round with the backs, taking them on and off a couple of hundred instances, nonetheless no signal of the LOX energy depleting.

It’s virtually a tenner for 2 units of lockable backs, which make these probably the most costly 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 exhausting 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 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 e-book, How To not be a Supermodel. I can’t inform you what number of messages I get day by day from individuals who have completed the e-book and really feel the necessity to inform me instantly how a lot they cherished it. Or from individuals who have simply began it and may’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 fulfilling listening to how individuals are devouring it after which dropping the e-book to their family and friends as a result of they’ve banged on about it a lot!

For those who haven’t but learn it (or listened – the audiobook is out there on Audible and Spotify and all the common locations) then yow will discover it in your native bookshop or order on-line 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 e-book.