imPress - Press-on Manicure

I received my August Glossy box today and inside contained “imPress” – a press on manicure. It is advertised as a "salon-perfect manicure in seconds". I wouldn't have said 'salon-perfect' personally... At first glance it comes in a neat nail varnish bottle and although the pattern isn’t to my taste, could see how some people would pick up and have a look (packaging is key). On closer inspection, it looked like something that you would buy in Poundland, and it is definitely something I wouldn’t use over the age of 15, but I still gave it a go (as I had nothing else planned for the evening apart from television catch-up).

It’s a fairly simple technique to putting on these false nails:

Step 1. Open Packaging.

Step 2. Pick out nails to fit natural nail.

Step 3. Wipe nails with “prep” pad – aka a wet wipe.

Step 4. Peel off adhesive tab and place on to nail

Step 5. Apply firm pressure.

Ta-da.

Now I have used false, stick on nails when I was younger and I remember them being absolutely rubbish and stuck for about 2 hours as long as you didn’t do anything that involved using your hands. Those white little tabs that you had to stick on the false nail first, and then peel off the backing, and then place on nail? Remember. Yeah, rubbish.

These however, in all fairness to this company, aren’t like that. The adhesive is actually covering the entire nail rather than just the middle section, and have stuck them on with some force. I imagine they would possibly fall off if I decided to do some gardening but for the fashion sense, they are acceptable.

As somebody who never wears false nails, or has gels, I find the feeling of having these stuck on weird and I am very aware that they aren’t my nails. To someone who regularly has this feeling, and probably feels weird having only natural nails, these would no doubt feel “comfy”. By comfy, I mean that they don’t feel loose and as the pack says “Lasts up to a week*”. I don’t believe they would last up to a week, and there is a * printed, directing me to the back which follows on with “if applied properly”. What properly means, I don’t know because as I stated, it’s a pretty straight forward motion, I don’t see how you can do it wrong.

To me, these look very false; they are long, plastic looking and make my nail look extremely wide. Again, I am more a fan of the natural look so to someone who likes the false look, these would be perfect. It probably took me about 10 minutes, no mess and hassle-free.

I don’t think I will be rushing out to Superdrug to purchase the range of these nails, and I don’t think they will catch on as a trend, but if you’re having to pull in your purse strings and don’t really have the pounds for a luxury manicure, then this could be your solution to a cheap penny manicure.

http://impressmanicure.com/ - In the photos of Nicole Scherzinger, I am 99.9% positive, she is not wearing these false nails. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=859cpqAOjmg&feature=player_embedded In this video, she is definitely not wearing these false nails, hence the lack of real closeups and very fast cutting.

NB. No offence to imPress - but I will be taking the nails off before this even gets 10 views so won't be able to see if they do last the entire week as stated.

Long live Boris.

Boris Johnson is literally one of my all time favourite people. I honestly do not understand how you cannot love someone that calls ping-pong "whiff-whaff", uses words such as Olympomania and has that hair.

The whole world have their eyes on London at the moment, and our Mayor gets himself stuck on a zip-wire in Victoria Park. This has to be one of my favourite stories of the Olympics so far. Obviously the photoshop wizards got to work the second the photos poured in of Johnson and here are a collection of my favourite.

Please note. I am not the creator of such amusing photos, I have merely found them on the interweb and wanted to share the hilarity. All credits go out to the original owners. Enjoy.

Long live Boris.

Jillian Michaels 30 Day Shred - Day 4

This exercising thing is a lark. Jillian Michaels has transformed me in just 4 days. I am exaggerating slightly, but the difference in 4 days is astonishing.

Last night my Mum and I did our 20 minutes exercise for Day 4 (before Greys Anatomy so we could skip through the adverts, clever) and everything went perfectly. On the reverse crunches, I really felt the pull in my stomach for the first time which I’m guessing means my body has started to find the muscles that were buried deep and have woken them up. I didn’t feel like my calves were going to rip (as much) during the skip rope cardio, though forward lunges does put strain on my knees slightly. It’s good to know that all the reviews I read in reference to this routine weren’t lying; you really do feel a change in yourself.

I should explain that before this, I did no exercise. I’m not unfit, I played Hockey in my last year at university, and I regularly take the dog for long walks but I’ve never been a fan of exercise, I don’t have the stamina to keep it up. That, and I physically can’t run.. My body/legs do not actually allow me to run. I’ve tried going running on the street and my lungs literally feel like they are going to collapse as well as my legs jumping on that bandwagon. I can’t go to the gym, 1 because I cannot afford it, and 2 I have no motivation. I think that is my downfall, I would much prefer to get in my pajamas and just nap on the sofa with a blanket. This is in fact what I have done for the past 8 months since leaving university and not being able to find a full time job. It wasn’t until I got my full time job a month ago that I realised I wanted to get healthier and tone up to meet my beach body criteria. So now I am doing 2 jobs, working 7 days a week and doing this 30 day shred. It’s a breeze. (ahem)

I highly recommend this DVD to anyone. If you are trying to lose weight/tone up/ get a healthier lifestyle or all 3 then this is brilliant for you. If you don’t like other people seeing you exercise, or like me cannot afford the gym or your legs won’t allow you to run, then what’s better than doing an exercise DVD in the safety and comfort of your own home. Get an exercise whim, put on the DVD. Feeling guilty about having 4 ice creams (you should be), whack on the DVD. You can wear what you want, look as silly as you want, and get the body that you want. It will become your best friend (and obviously, your worst enemy at the same time)

Bring on level 2!

Jillian Michaels 30 Day Shred - Day 3

I am superwoman!!!! 

I felt brilliant this morning. A few creaks as I bent my knees and when walking up and down escalators but apart from that, I don’t ache at all! I have got one over on the 30 day shred!! Yesss. Now I know this is probably going to be short-lived as come tomorrow morning, the pain will probably come back, as I feel there was just little pain from last night’s workout as I was extremely tired, I couldn’t even brush my teeth without yawning. But at the moment, I’m back to that good exercise feeling again.

I worked until 10pm, and didn’t get home until 10.30pm and I was umming and aahing about doing day 3, and as my mum said to do it, I couldn’t exactly let the side down so at 11o’clock at night, my mum and I were doing our exercise DVD with the dog watching on the sofa (she tries to join in if you don’t put her on the sofa) (Y). I struggled to keep up with the forward lunges, and skip rope literally made my calf’s feel like they were going to rip – was quite a scary feeling as I had visions of my calf’s ripping in half and then that’ll show me for trying to exercise! But clearly, they didn’t, and I pushed through. I can see me moving on to Level 2 (*gasp*) on perhaps.. day 6/7?.. maybe.. 

The most amazing thing was that I managed 15 push-ups in a row! In 3 days of regular exercise, I have managed to build up enough strength to do 15 push ups when I couldn’t even do 1, 3 days ago. A-maze-ing. Jillian Michael’s says during the workout that by day 5-7 you will see a difference in your stamina which there is already evidence of. I’ve got a very slight definition in my arms, and I had quite muscley legs anyway (they just were on an extended holiday). I probably should measure my waist to actually have evidence that this exercise routine works, but I’ll be able to notice and that’s the main thing. On to day 4!!!

Jillian Michaels 30 Day Shred - Day 2

Ooft, Eeek, Aah, Aah, Frick. These are the sounds I made getting out of bed this morning, sitting down on my sofa, walking down stairs & walking up escalators. Day 2 has officially taken over my body.

My mum and I actually did Day 2, the day after Day 1 and not a week later. Perhaps this will be a 30 day shred and not a 30 week shred like I had originally suspected. 

This does not mean that it hasn’t come at a price though. My thighs are punishing me today. The 20 minutes exercise went a lot quicker than Day 1, though I struggled to carry on with the jumping jacks. My legs just didn’t seem to want to jump! You know it’s bad when you’re relieved to get to the abs part of a workout. I did find that I managed to do a few push ups; considering the day before I couldn’t push myself up, this is a good sign. Maybe by the end of the week I’ll be able to do more than 10...

Today, the pain in my thighs and knees doesn’t feel as good as it did yesterday. Yesterday I felt like I’d done my body some good, today my body is angry at me, clearly quite content at having no muscles and my lazy lifestyle. However I do feel a lot more motivated to do Day 3 tonight, I only have an hour in between my day job and my evening job so we’ll see how motivated I am come 5pm but fingers crossed we do push through. 

Supposedly you start to see the benefits of this routine after 5 days, so that’s only 3 days to go.  Eager beaver.

Panorama - Euro 2012: Stadiums of Hate

This post is about football, the Euro 2012 championships to be more specific, and as I’ve never been a huge fan of football, I apologise if some of my facts are incorrect.

Tonight I watched BBC's Panorama which investigated in to the racist violence in Polish and Ukrainian football and in the frankest way, I was disgusted. I have never been one for violence, in fact I hate it with a passion and anyone that I call a friend, will never be involved in mindless, day to day violence. I understand that maybe after a few drinks, things can get a bit heated in a pub or club where somebody accidentally knocked in to someone else, and that person got a bit mouthy to which the other person retaliated so on, so on, but even then, I will always walk away. I hate it.

Panorama called the programme: Euro 2012: Stadiums of Hate and it is truly what these places are. The first 15 minutes of the programme was eas(ier) to watch, horrible to listen to though that these people in these countries treat football players, and innocent fan’s the way they do. Monkey chants at black players and their families, anti-Jew language, Hitler salutes and beating up random Asian men that were merely watching their home team play a game to name the obvious.

About half way through the programme, they showed a clip of a group of fans, bored of chanting and abusing players who saw a group of Asian boys (I use the word boys to describe them because they looked as if they were in their early twenties, not men that might defend themselves). They ran over to this group of boys and pulled them down from their seats and started kicking and hitting them, only for people that had been sitting around them the whole time, to join in. To make things even more sickening, is that these Asian boys were supporting the same team as these thugs that took it upon themselves to make the decision that they shouldn't be in the stadium. I found it so disturbing to watch, that I had to leave the room – seeing their faces of fear about what was happening to them brought tears to my eyes and I couldn’t watch the rest of the programme.

If this is clearly public knowledge that the fans in these countries act like this on a regular basis how have UEFA allowed these nations to host this huge football event? They have sent out a public warning to all black and Asian fans to keep a close eye on each other and to stay out of trouble as they will be targeted, or better still, stay at home. If you have to send a message like that out, what is it saying about these countries.

Even if they up their security for the games in the stadium (which doesn’t seem to help their local games as they just turn on the police when they have abused everyone else in the stadium), there’s no saying what could happen outside away from the games. Would you want to spend your time away constantly looking over your shoulder?

With football already being a rowdy sport as it is with players such as John Terry and Joey Barton under investigation for racism and violence, this behaviour should not be added to the equation. Fans are going to go over there and get riled up and join in with the fighting. Football fans already have a bad rep compared to other sport fans such as rugby, and I feel this is just going to blow up in UEFA’s faces.

To anyone that uses their fists to start or finish an argument, or because someone looked at you the wrong way, or aren’t the right colour in your eyes, then you are a thug. You are scum and it really upsets me that there are some people out there, who feel it is an acceptable thing to do. 

Jillian Michaels 30 Day Shred

 Day 1

Last night I completed day 1 of the 30 day shred. My mother and I decided it was about time we started it after the DVD had been sitting in the kitchen for over a week (it was on top of the crisp cupboard, exercise or crisps, tough decision...) Turns out I have no upper body strength and can just about handle 1 push up.. Technically, I can go down but can’t push myself up so it’s more of a push down and stay there for me.  

It felt good doing it though; it was only a 20 minute workout (I did have to check to see if it was almost 20 mins when it was only 11!) – and was a mixture of Cardio, Strength and Abs workout. Unlike other exercise DVD’s I have tried, there is no stopping to watch her do the exercise and then you copy – it’s a non-stop workout, which is clearly more beneficial as the second you stop, it’s hard to get going again. 

We built up a sweat doing the exercises which is always a good sign that you are actually doing them correctly and not cheating and I did have to sit down for 10 minutes with a bottle of water upon finishing, plus my knees felt like they wanted to pop out their sockets. This is surely a sign that I have had a “work-out”. About 3 hours after completing Level 1, my legs felt like jelly whilst walking down stairs and my knees were still a bit achy, but it was that good achy that exercise fanatics always talk about, like you know you have done some good with your body. 

Waking up in the morning wasn’t too bad; normally when exercising I skip the warm-down part and only do some brief stretches as at the time, you just want to collapse, but from what I have heard from other people, the morning after can be a bitch so I wanted to minimize that as much as possible. It must have worked, because I didn’t feel any different really, until I started walking down the escalator to the train that is, ouch. I thought my leg was going to give way and I would roll down the escalator taking innocent passengers down with me. As much as that would be entertaining if you were watching from the top of the escalator, being involved however would not. The real pain I am feeling is in my shoulders, neck and armpits, stretching behind to crack my back is a no-no. This is probably from where I got over enthusiastic at the start of the warm-up doing the windmill motion with the arms (swinging them in circles like you used to when you were younger until they went numb). My thighs are also wincing a little like I said previously, walking up and down stairs (or moving escalators which you would think would help ease the pain?) that is definitely from the squats, which even though they hurt, are always my favourite.. mainly as you can actually feel the burn of exercising.

I don’t like weighing myself (as I am part of the larger chest percentage of women, I like to believe that however high my weight is, it’s down to my chest. It’s much easier to blame boobs right). However I will be able to notice the difference in my stomach/legs/arm area to see if I am benefitting from this routine, I’m not doing it to lose weight, I just want to tone. Obviously, no matter how much Jillian will tell me I can get abs like hers, that’s a lie, she’s a machine. But to start my way to the beach body I have always desired will suit me nicely.

Here’s hoping I don’t collapse half-way through.

Buy Jillian Michaels 30 Day Shred here