#but then I got a sample of La Mer last month

[lihikainanea]

Tiger's plans a girls night in for her friends and they cancel on her last minute, but Bill steps up and lets her do whatever she wants to him, like face masks are a must, but she also gets to paint his nails and stuff. Even better, she gets head every hour and she's seriously loving a night of self care with Bill.

oh GOD this is sweet. Look, I fully, fully think Bill is pretty into skin care. A lot of dudes in Hollywood are, and they’re used to wearing makeup on the red carpet and getting ~glammed~ up before big events too so I think Bill lacks a lot of that gross toxic masculinity when it comes to things like gettin’ really pretty and having a pampering day.

and maybe-MAYBE OH GOD--maybe tiger sometimes steals his skin care stuff, because Bill is fucking rich and buys all the shit that she just won’t. $400 for a moisturizer? What the fuck. But Bill has an array of very expensive products and tiger has mastered the art of stealing just a little at a time, so that he doesn’t notice.

Let the record show that tiger has NOT mastered that art, and Bill very much notices. But he also knows that she won’t buy it for herself, and if HE bought it FOR her she’d be even more mad. So he just buys the big jar, leaves it in her bathroom, knowing full well she’s using it. And being smart enough to shut his damn mouth about it.

In any case, right, there’s this whole sleepover girl’s party planned, right? And Bill is mildly offended when the morning of, tiger tells him to get the fuck out and that she’ll see him tomorrow. Bill wants to be part of the party, offers to just stay in the kitchen and keep making the girls cocktails and food, but tiger tells him no. And he’s actually a little hurt, a little sad, and she can’t help but feel a little guilty when he pouts.

“Why do you even want to stay?” she asks curiously, “It’s going to be a totally girly night.”

He shrugs bashfully, digs his toe into the ground as he shoves his hands in his pockets.

“I don’t know, growing up there wasn’t a lot of...feminine energy in the house,” he mumbles, “I only have the one sister. It’s nice sometimes to just...be surrounded by...I don’t know. Gentle energy.”

“Weren’t you afraid of your sister when you were growing up?”

His head snaps up, and now he looks defensive, angry.

“I was not afraid--” he stops, taking a deep breath in when he realizes how shrill and loud his tone is, “Tiger I was not afraid of my sister.”

“Yes you were,” she accuses, “Alex said you were terr--”

“Alex is a dick,” he snaps, “Maybe he was the scared one.”

“Didn’t she used to chase you with--”

“Are we done here?” he snaps, makes a show of checking his watch, “I better get going. Your friends will be here in....12 hours.”

But she latches on to him, because now her big dude’s pride is all offended. She makes him hang around a bit more, help her get a few things ready, but over the course of the day some of the text messages start coming in. Two of her friends are sick with the flu going around, so they can’t make it. A third one has a migraine and is out. A fourth one was flaky to begin with, and ended up cancelling because her boyfriend was being a shithead about it. And tiger is bummed--she’s so bummed, because she was looking forward to a night of gossip and wine and fun girly things.

“This sucks,” she grumbles, and Bill pulls her in for a hug.

“Come on, we’re still going to do it.”

“How?” she pouts, “Everybody was supposed to bring something for the group. I only have a few eye masks.”

Bill smirks, grabs her hand, pulls her into the bathroom. He reaches up on a top shelf and pulls down a basket of luxury treats--truth be told, he was going to put a bow on it and leave it on tiger’s bed with a note to enjoy the night with her friends. She’d be less inclined to be angry with him if it was something he got to share amongst her group of friends, and she’d forget her anger as soon as they started gushing over it. Because man--it’s fully stocked. A beautiful little basket full of high end items, from scrubs and exfoliants to micellar waters to eye creams and moisturizers and jade rollers--it has everything.

“Bill, what the fuck,” she asks, pilfering through some it, “What is all this?”

“A basket of pampering,” he smiles, “Now come on, go uncork the champagne. We’ll start with a steam bowl to open up our pores.”

And it’s so ridiculous, right, but these two idiots just spend hours doing this. Cucumbers on the eyelids. Bill tells tiger all of the skincare secrets that a few of his make up artists have shared with him--like the jade roller. Tiger isn’t convinced, until he sits up on the couch and drags her to sit in front of him, between his knees. He tilts her face up gently, tells her to close her eyes--and then just starts running the little roller all over her face. And god--what a delicious image--tiger with her face craned up, her chin still in his hand, as he just slowly and soothingly rubs the wand all over.

Bill paints her toes as he waits for his exfoliating mask to dry, one of tiger’s headbands in his hair to keep his floppy locks from falling onto his forehead. She picks through the basket some more, and furrows her brow at some of the smaller items.

“Bill these are like, luxury samples from Sephora. How did you even get these?” she holds up a decent size bottle of an expensive shampoo, “These are only for Rouge members.”

For the first time that night, Bill’s cheeks turn a little pink. And it’s imperceptible thanks to the face mask, but his big ole shifty eyes are not.

“Oh god,” tiger rolls her eyes.

“Tiger it is a great points system,” he defends, “It would be irresponsible not to take advantage of it.”

She just sighs, takes a cucumber from the pile and flings it at him.

[wsmith215]

Early Coronavirus Immunity Data Fuel Promise for a Vaccine

As the world grapples with how to safely reopen society in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, scientists have been racing to understand whether COVID-19 infection confers immunity—and how long such immunity might last. A lot hangs in the balance: A strong immune response could mean people who have already been infected would be able to safely return to work. And it would also bode well for vaccine development efforts.

A small but suggestive new study finds that individuals who have had COVID-19 produce a robust response in immune cells called T cells. The adaptive immune system contains several main components: antibody-creating B cells, helper T cells and killer T cells. The latter two are important for recognizing and destroying a particular virus, respectively. Alessandro Sette and Shane Crotty, both professors at the La Jolla Institute for Immunology, and their colleagues found that of a group of 20 people who had recovered from COVID-19, 70 percent had killer T cells and 100 percent had helper T cells that were specific to the SARS-CoV-2 virus, which causes COVID-19. Importantly, the researchers observed a strong T cell response to the “spike” protein the virus uses to bind to and infect cells (and which most vaccine candidates target). They additionally detected a helper T cell response to SARS-CoV-2 in about half of blood samples they examined that had been drawn before the virus began circulating. This observation, they say, hints that exposure to seasonal common cold coronaviruses may confer some protection against the new pathogen.

The findings build on earlier studies showing that infection with the novel coronavirus produces protective, or “neutralizing,” antibodies. Taken together, these results suggest that people who have had COVID-19 possess at least some immunity—an encouraging sign for the dozens of vaccines under development. Separately, this week the company Moderna announced early results from a trial of its coronavirus vaccine candidate: eight individuals who have received the vaccine produced antibodies to the virus at levels similar to those of people who had the disease.

Scientific American spoke with Sette and Crotty about what their study means for immunity to COVID-19, possible protection from seasonal cold infections and the prospects for a SARS-CoV-2 vaccine.

[An edited transcript of the interview follows.]

What do we know so far about immunity to COVID-19? And why is it so important?

CROTTY: There’s just been a huge amount of uncertainty about immunity to COVID-19. And that question about immunity has two major implications: one, for just understanding the disease itself, and two, for vaccine development. It’s clearly been a world-on-fire type of situation. And so it has made sense for these 100-odd different vaccine programs to get going and just try moving things forward. The normal way you would try and make a successful vaccine would be to look at what gets you good protective immunity to that disease and copy that. A disease such as COVID-19 is normally an acute infection, and most people control and clear it without a lot of problems. That’s a good sign that indicates that the human immune system normally makes a good response to that virus and controls it.

But the immune system is a big, complicated place, with lots of different cell types with lots of different functions. And some are useful or important in one context versus another. For a vaccine, you’d want to know which components of the immune response are the important ones for protection against this disease. And without that information, you can very much go totally in the wrong direction with a vaccine program, either in terms of the type of immune response you’re trying to get or the [vaccine’s molecular] target. And both of those have been things that worried [Sette] and me and other people about these ongoing vaccine efforts. We really wanted to generate information that would help [us] understand the disease itself—and also generate information about which vaccine strategies are likely to be better or worse ones and whether people are getting the right [molecular target] or not. Our goal was to look at essentially average cases of COVID-19—ones where people definitely are making successful immune responses—and ask, “Okay, what does that immune response look like?”

Can you describe the different parts of the immune response and how they work?

CROTTY:Quite a few labs around the world have looked at antibody responses. Those are generally easier to measure and look at. But really, there are three parts of the adaptive immune system: you’ve basically got antibodies, you’ve got helper T cells, and you’ve got killer T cells. The T cells are tougher to measure, but they do really important things. You’ve got to have the helper T cells to get an antibody response. For example, in animal models, [helper T cells] are important for protecting against [severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS)]. And the killer T cells are important for most viral infections. You don’t want to go forward without understanding anything about the T cell response. And [Sette] is the world’s expert in predicting and identifying T cell [targets], particularly in humans. So we collaborated to get COVID-19 patient blood samples as quickly as possible and to try and get information about those questions. We mostly have concluded it’s good news: things have largely looked the ways we would expect.

Do we know how long the immune response to the new virus lasts?

SETTE:What we certainly can say is that the infection induces a robust immune response, and this is in people that successfully deal with the virus and don’t get very sick. The question [of] how long this response lasts obviously takes time, because we have been dealing with this virus for only a few months, and we cannot possibly know what is going to happen a year down the line. But what we’ve seen thus far is encouraging, because these T cells look healthy, look happy. They are not exhausted, and they don’t express some of the molecular features that are associated with cells that are about to die.

In general, immunologic memory is like any other memory in the sense that the intensity of the event dictates how strong the memory is. Pretty much like any event in your life: if it was a life-threatening situation—for example, you almost got run over by a truck—you remember. If it was instead what kind of socks you wore, you might not remember. It’s the same for the immune system, in the sense that a very strong infection with a microbe that reproduces to high levels generates a strong level of immune response, which then creates a long-lasting impression. I would speculate that the memory generated by SARS or [Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS)] could be somewhat different from one generated from a common cold, which is fairly adapted to not cause much trouble in the human host.

You also saw some T cell responses, or “cross-reactivity,” to the new coronavirus in blood from people who were never exposed to it, correct?

SETTE: We looked at the COVID-19 patients, and then we looked at a control group. We purposely went after blood donations that were obtained in 2015 to 2018—before any SARS-CoV-2 was around. Surprisingly, in about half of these people, we could see some T cell reactivity. And we looked at the data hard from the left and from the right and convinced ourselves that this was real. We do not know, at this point, exactly what this cross-reactivity means, but it’s reasonable to assume that it is the result of people having been exposed to common cold coronaviruses that are different from SARS-CoV-2 but have some similarity [to it]. This potentially has very strong implications, because one of the things that is unknown and everybody wants to gain more information about is why there is such a spectrum of different COVID-19 outcomes: some people are totally asymptomatic, whereas other people die. Of course, age and other health issues are factors, but one element could be immunological: If someone has some T cells that can cross-react to SARS-CoV-2, their immune system has an advantage. They can get going to generate antibody responses faster, maybe, and that could give a better outcome. In the context of vaccination, this is also very important, because imagine that you have a group of people, and half of them have this coronavirus cross–reactivity, and half of them don’t. Now you give these people a vaccine. It could be that the people that have the common cold cross-reactivity will respond a lot faster and a lot better to the vaccine, compared with the other ones.

One piece of data that is encouraging, in speculating that some preexisting immunity may be beneficial, is data from the 2009 H1N1 “swine flu” pandemic. You might recall that in that case, older people did better than younger people. And in fact, it turned out that the age of the people that did better correlated with when another H1N1 strain, a cousin of the swine flu pandemic strain, had circulated—so that the people that had been exposed in the 1950s to this other strain, their immune system still remembered a bit. Not that the people didn’t get sick, of course, but they got less sick. And they fared better than people who were totally naive and had never seen this particular subtype of influenza.

Do we know whether people that had asymptomatic COVID-19 infections might be less protected against reinfection than people who had a very severe case?

CROTTY: We did this study with people who didn’t have bad diseases—sort of average cases who definitely got well. Asymptomatic cases are definitely a big unknown. We have no idea [if they will be protected against reinfection].

Can you comment on the Moderna results from the phase I trial of its coronavirus vaccine candidate and the prospects for a vaccine in general?

CROTTY: There are actually three human vaccine candidates that have been tested in monkeys that gave what seems to be pretty good protection: one’s an inactivated-virus vaccine; another is a chimpanzee adenovirus vector [a type of double-stranded DNA virus used to harmlessly deliver genetic material to a host]; and a third one is a DNA vaccine [a DNA sequence that stimulates the host to produce part of the virus and mount an immune response against it]. And then there’s the Moderna vaccine, which hasn’t been tested in monkeys but has been tested in a mouse model and in humans to measure their immune response. So those are the three examples of interesting vaccine candidate data that are available as of today. And I think if we combine those with the data from our paper showing that the T cell responses generally look good and data from a number of papers about people making neutralizing antibody responses overall, I would say those vaccine studies—particularly the two that were done in monkeys—suggest, so far, that it’s not that hard to protect against this virus. I’m certainly encouraged, based on the magnitude of the immune responses to the vaccines—and the magnitude of immune responses we’re measuring in people who actually have disease and what happens in protection models. So far the available data are positive here.

SETTE: One encouraging thing is that there are so many different vaccines that are being developed. So our hope is that there is not going to be a winner, but there are going to be many different winners. The one thing that is important from our study is that the vast majority of these different vaccine concepts rely on one particular protein, which is the spike protein. And we saw very good responses, both in terms of killer and helper cells against the spike, which is really good news, because this was not a given. In this particular case, it so happens that it’s a good target for all three different types of immune response—which bodes well for people that are developing the spike-based vaccines. At the same time, our data found that there were responses also against other pieces of the virus, which opens the way to thinking that maybe these other pieces could also be included to further fortify a vaccine concept.

Read more about the coronavirus outbreak from Scientific American here. And read coverage from our international network of magazines here.

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[boxyladies]

I was thinking about doing my top skincare of 2017 and then I realized it was essentially my skincare routine so I thought I would share. And I honestly thought I posted this whole blog about two months ago, but as I went to go link to it, I realized it was still in my drafts. Whoops. But hey – at least I didn’t have to write a blog today. Thanks, Past Lauren.

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Morning Cleanser I honestly do not have a consistent morning cleanser. When I’m washing my face at the gym, I tend to rotate subscription box samples. Right now, I’m really liking the Tatcha The Deep Cleanse, which I got from a Sephora gift with purchase. However, I’m not sure if I’m going to buy the full-size. Tatcha is expensive, y’all.

Evening Cleansers For the majority of 2017 (and I think even part of 2016), I have been ride or die for the Julep Love Your Bare Face Cleansing Oil ($22.40/Maven Price but you can also get it at Ulta for $28). I will use this to sort of melt off my face and some of my eye makeup.

After that, I move into Glossier’s Milky Jelly ($18) to get the rest of my skin clean since the makeup was removed by the oil.

I tend to wear a lot of eye makeup (shocks no one) so I usually have to follow this up with a makeup wipe to take care of the residual mascara and liner. I tend to either get the Neutrogena Makeup Removing Towelettes ($6.99) and the generic Target version of those. I was using the Face Halo like Jill, but I found that it was hard for me to get the Face Halo around the contours of my eye, which is where I have the most trouble removing makeup. So I ended up stopping using them after awhile, and went back to the wipes. I know they are wasteful, but that’s where we are.

Essence I didn’t start out using an essence. I actually got the Amore Pacific Vintage Single Extract Essence ($145) by accident, because I received it when I was supposed to receive a Tatcha product in a box. Jill has been trying to get me to use essences forever and now of course I like one that is $150. THAT IS TOO MUCH MONEY. So while it is def something I have been using daily for the past several months, I’m not sure if this is something I will purchase a full-size version of. I mean, I am def not going to purchase a full-size version of it. I’m thinking about trying a small size of the Tatcha essence to see if I like that at all. That one is also expensive but still not AS expensive and the small version is BASICALLY free. (Not free at all, but it’s in this set which I am going to get. Again – Not free. Money is hard.)

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Morning Serum This past year, I got back into Vitamin C serums for day-to-day, and I have been super into the Drunk Elephant C-Firma Day Serum ($80). I am also now using the Sunday Riley C.E.O. Rapid Flash Brightening Serum that I got in my January Allure Beauty Box, but I have been using the Drunk Elephant version longer. So I’ll be real with you: it smells like hot dogs. It does not have a good scent. But that is OK. I would rather my skin smell like science than flowers, ya know?

Evening Serum If you’ve been here awhile, you KNOW my fave is the Estee Lauder Advanced Night Repair Synchronized Recovery Complex II ($95). Longest. Name. Ever. I will forever be indebted to this serum for really repairing my skin when I was dealing with some really awful cystic acne that was caused by a variety of fun hormonal issues I had a few years ago. Then, I picked at the situation and made it way worse. I tried all sorts of different products and this was sort of a last resort and honestly, OVERNIGHT, I saw a huge difference. I was in shock. I don’t believe in “overnight” fixes. I understand the marketing game of the beauty industry, so I don’t believe in miracles but this was truly a miracle product.

I also started using The Ordinary Lactic Acid 10% HA 2% in December. I’m not sure I’m seeing any major differences quite yet but I’m using it a couple times a week instead of the Estee Lauder. I decided to get it because it’s $6.79 (yes, you read that right) whereas a serum by Sunday Riley with similar ingredients is $105. It’s obviously not exactly the same but I thought this would be a good way to start experimenting with lactic acid quite inexpensively.

Eye Cream 2017 was the year I discovered the incredibly bougie La Mer The Eye Balm Intense ($205). It’s esspensive. So expensive, y’all. But it lasted me a really, really long time. I am almost out of the one jar I purchased last year and it pains me to think I need to get another one soon. But it works. It really made my crows feet/ fine lines less apparent (even before I experimented with Botox) and will be a product I will repurchase for sure. I don’t really care for the La Mer face cream at this point in my life, but the eye cream is bomb.

Moisturizers I honestly rotate through a variety of moisturizers. I think I am going to write a future blog about these, so I can go thru each one and why I like them all! Stay tuned!

[line]

So that’s it for now! What are some of your holy grail skincare items that you think I should check out in 2018? Do you have any miracle products that I should know about? Let me know in the comments below!

  Lauren’s Top Skincare of 2017/Current Skincare Routine I was thinking about doing my top skincare of 2017 and then I realized it was essentially my skincare routine so I thought I would share.

[male-emporium]

11 Products For Glowing Skin

Beauty Products:

Arcona Triad Pads, Arcona White Tea Purifying Cleanser, Glossier Rosewater Spray, First Aid Beauty Moisturizer, Ole Henriksen Truth Serum, Sunday Riley Face Oil, Korres Wild Rose Moisturizer, La Mer Revitalizing Mask, Arcona Night Worker, Boscia Detoxifying Black Cleanser, First Aid Beauty Wake Up Wipes

  It’s been a while since I last did a skincare post, so I thought it was about time I put it all together and share what I’m currently using. My skin hasn’t changed much since moving, but I have introduced a few new lines into my skincare routine. I’ve been using Arcona, First Aid Beauty and Korres for years, while a few new favorites are Ole Henriksen and Sunday Riley. My skin is definitely on the dry side, so I’m always looking for new products to bring more hydration and dewy-ness. And as much as I am loyal to my favorite lines that I re-stock up on every few months, I do like to switch it up and try new products to see what results I might get from them.

    Let’s start with cleansers. I use a few, and I switch them up depending on my needs. Two of my favorites are Boscia Detoxifying Black Cleanser and Arcona White Tea Purifying Cleanser. Both are good for sensitive skin, which mine tends to lean more to. After doing a little bit of research for a new cleanser online, I decided on Boscia Detoxifying Black Cleanser after reading so many great reviews. I’ve loved it and have been using it since last spring. It’s gentle and effective and doesn’t leave my skin feeling tight or dry. And I have yet to try an Arcona product that I don’t love. This White Tea Purifying Cleanser is a new one to my routine (after I ran out of this) and I really like how refreshed it leaves my skin. I’ve also been using Arcona Triad Pads for a long time and can’t say enough great things about them. I use one after I wash my face as a toner and to remove any excess makeup. Another makeup remover/cleanser wipe that I’ve been using a lot is First Aid Beauty’s Wake Up Wipes. The reason why I really like these is they have a stimulating sensation from the matcha green tea that really wakes up my skin in the morning.

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  For serums and masks, I use a mix of Ole Henriksen Truth Serum, Sunday Riley Face Oil, La Mer Revitalizing Mask and Arcona Night Worker. I have a few others that I’ll mix in (like Arcona’s Magic Black Ice Mask), but these are the ones that I have been consistently using for a while now. The Night Worker has been another Arcona product that I’ve been using for years (I got turned on to the line by an esthetician in SF when I first moved there). If I’m feeling like my skin is looking a little dull or I might break out in a certain spot, I’ll apply a thin mask of this before bed. I always wake up to glowing, clear skin. I bring this with me everywhere just in case! Using oils has been something that’s definitely new to my routine, but it’s really a game changer (I actually have this on as I’m typing!). I don’t use Sunday Riley Face Oil every day, but usually around once a week to really re-hydrate my skin. I’ve also become a huge fan of the Ole Henriksen line. It started with a sample at Sephora and then I went back the next day and bought the full-size versions of everything. My favorite being the Truth Serum and their Brightening System, which REALLY works. You can see the difference in your skin immediately.

    The one product I always run through quickly is moisturizer. I use so much of it, so it’s easy to be able to test out new ones monthly. I almost always have a jar of Korres Wild Rose Moisturizer on hand and I use it most often at night before bed. It gives a deep hydration, which I’m always looking for and it smells amazing, too. I also love First Aid Beauty’s Priming Moisturizer, especially for the day-time because it’s a great two-in-one with the mix of being a moisturizer/primer. If I’m not wearing any makeup, this is a great base to give just a slightly enhanced glow to my skin. Lastly, I’ve been hooked on using Glossier’s Rosewater Spray. I actually apply a few sprays once I’ve done my makeup, I love the slight dewy-ness it adds. It’s also great if your skin gets dry throughout the day while you’re wearing makeup- you can just use a few spritzes to bring some life back to dull skin.

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In this photo

Sleepy Jones Blush Pajama Set

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First found here: 11 Products For Glowing Skin