For reference, Laura Mercier Chai reads warm/orangey on me — I pair it with a bronzer when I wanna look sunkissed!
But my goal is to achieve a toasty, rose-gold look that isn’t orange, if that makes sense?
You know what they say about men with big noses…
But also, he seemed like a rather interesting figure to be around with; in his portraits (especially the ones later in his life) he seemed always on the verge to making a witty remark. A scintillating fellow, I should think!
Wellington famously maintained a lukewarm relationship with his wife, Kitty Pakenham, and he was said to be attracted to the highly intelligent women of the day: Caroline Lamb, Harriet Arbuthnot, Harriet’s cousin Georgiana Fane, Princess Dorothea von Lieven, his future sister-in-law Marianne Patterson (he even commissioned a painting of her, and kept a miniature portrait in the Breguet pocketwatch he bought from Napoleon’s brother!), etc…
He sought platonic female companionship even in old age, even receiving a proposal from a 25-year-old Angela Burdett-Coutts when he was 70, but he rejected her, writing: “I entreat you…not to throw yourself away upon a man old enough to be your Grandfather, who, however strong, hearty and healthy at present, must and will certainly in time feel the consequences and infirmities of age.”
(Yes, I’m entirely aware of the TikTok account dedicated to thirsting after Wellington!)
Also, he was played by Christopher Plummer in the 1970 film Waterloo, so that’s extra sexy to me…!
Word vomit ahead!
To start off, I just want to say that my problems are so incredibly trivial compared to what I’ve read in this sub. I understand maybe I’m just wallowing in self pity, but sometimes everything just feels so overwhelming.
I’m 28, and I’ve never had a boyfriend. Never had sex, never been on a date. Never been asked out, never been hit on.
I feel lonely. Everywhere I go, I see couples around me — happy couples, unhappy couples; couples getting married, couples on their first date. I’m befuddled and bewildered all at once. Why does it happen so easily for so many people, except for me?
I have much to offer. I work at an art institution. I was an editor in my previous job. I have opinions about Heifetz, and Szeryng. I like Mary Renault, Elizabeth Bowen, and John Banville. I enjoy perfumes, fashion, knitting, crocheting, charcoal drawing, writing, and I go to the gym semi-frequently.
I’ve been told that I’m well dressed, well spoken, and polished. I can hold a conversation, ask questions, and make people laugh. I can talk about almost anything: baseball, tennis, Wittgenstein, Old Hollywood gossip, pop culture, and celebrity blind items from 20 years ago that nobody else remembers.
Every acquaintance I’ve spoken to is surprised that I’m single — although perhaps it’s because of society’s expectations of what a woman should achieve by 28.
But I don’t know what I’m doing wrong. Everyone tells me to put myself out there, so I’ve tried dating apps, mixers, hobby classes, classical music concerts, wine tasting sessions, tea appreciation classes — but I never seem to find anyone who piques my interest. And vice versa, those who I find interesting, rarely reach out to me in the same way.
Please don’t tell me I’m so lucky to be single; that I should focus on myself, or not be so male-centred. Knowing that not every relationship is perfect and happy doesn’t make this feeling of being undesired and unwanted any better. In fact, it makes me feel lonelier, as if I’m standing outside a window, looking in at a party I’ve supposedly been invited to, but not being able to find the door or do the secret handshake. It’s shallow, but it’s how I feel.
And if it helps, I don’t really think I have anyone I can call a BFF either. Acquaintances, yes — I have tons. People I can chat casually with. But when it comes to someone I can confide to? Nada. I’m always the one reaching out, asking questions, wanting to learn more about their interests, but nobody ever does the same.
I have so much I want to share, but when I do, I can see it in their eyes that they’re not interested in listening. I’m resorted to chatting about things like makeup, fashion, and skincare in order for people to have something to talk to, which I do like, but then they form this shallow impression of me and never look deeper.
Case in point: my closest “friends” from high school laughed at me, for one, when I told them I wanted masseter botox to fix my jaw clenching, and they started laughing at me before I even finished what I was saying, because all they think of me is makeup, skincare, whatever surface level thing I’ve shared with them because they’ll glaze over when I want to talk about anything else.
Naturally, when I’m really upset, I just fixate on the physical things. Am I (1.7m) too tall? Am I (55kg) too skinny? Am I wearing clothes suited for my Kibbe type? My colour season? How can I glow up? Should I get a boob job because I’m a 32A? Etc etc…
I don’t know. Will I ever find a boyfriend? Or even a good friend? Everyone seems paired up already…
Yell at me, downvote me, tell me I’m being stupid. I just feel that at this age, I should have some things figured out.
Lunch alone: Ippudo Bonito Tonkotsu ramen + an onsen egg.
My previous post received a bit of love, so I went back and found a few more hi-res photos! ♡
I’m a light-medium cool olive, but I can’t seem to find my Goldilocks shade!
I feel like I’ve tried all the usual recommendations: Haus Labs 260, Giorgio Armani Luminous Silk 6, Estee Lauder Double Wear in 2W2, Dior Backstage 2WO, Maybelline Fit Me 128, NARS Punjab and they are all too deep, orange or saturated.
But if I dial back a shade, and go for Dior 2.5N, Rare Beauty 230, Maybelline Fit Me 118, Estee Lauder Double Wear in 2W1, Lancome Teint Idole 240W and NARS Fiji, they are either too light or too pink…
At this point, I’m just genuinely confused. My best match in terms of depth is 3CE Mesh Fitting Cushion in W4, but it’s just a touch pink. Am I going about this wrongly? Which stone have I yet to turn?
Please let me know! 🥹
Listen, I’ve heard to so many times: “Sexy is mindset!”, “You need to feel comfortable in your skin!”, “Confidence is sexy!”
Let me lay the goods out. I’m East Asian. 28. 1.7m, 55kg. My measurements are, from shoulder to bust, to waist to hips: 36.5-32-26-37. I wear a 32A on a good way and I keep a spare 32B for the three days before my period when my boobs swell for a bit.
I keep hearing about how bigger boobs is a body halo. I wish I had bigger boobs! But I don’t, and I likely never will. Even when I was 5-10kg heavier, I was just a 34B. Nothing ever worked!
Not to mention — my face is incredibly plain. It’s not ugly; I will be very objective and say I could be a 7 on a good day with makeup and lovely outfits, but I’m neither on Jennie nor Gong Li’s level of stunning. They are goddesses, and I respect that. I’m nice-looking, but that’s it.
My features are very balanced (aside from my monolid eyes, which I feel are too small for my face, but also think double eyelid surgery will throw things off). Perfect thirds, which I realised when I learnt anatomical drawings. A normal sized nose, and a normal sized mouth. Nothing stands out. I’m a Libra Rising too, btw.
So I’m just… meh. A Kibbe Dramatic Classic, true and true. Most of my wardrobe are business casual and I do look good in them, but god is it boring! I want to dress flirty! And sexy! But every time I wear something with a low back or front I just think: nah, I don’t have the goods for this, and it’s back to Ann Taylor I go.
I’m so, so envious of y’all ladies with the curvy hourglass figures — you fill out dresses so nicely! And it doesn’t help when someone like RuPaul looks at Hannah Waddingham and goes, “You are a lot of woman!” and I just look down at my (non-existent) tatas and think: “Well, I guess I’m not woman enough!”
But I digress…! I suppose I just need help feeling a little better when I realise I don’t have the hyperfeminine body that health textbooks and Cosmopolitan were talking about, as well as some practical tips!
Backless dress? Saving up for a boob job? Fenugreek supplements? Covering all the mirrors in the house? Upper body workouts?
Thank you! 💗
Obviously, the correct answer is “Both!” but I really just need one dress as a month-end treat, unfortunately. I feel like the first is really soft and pretty, but second is so classic and feminine too. It does have a faux lace-up back (Img 3) which is a little iffy, but I’m cool with it.
Which do you think suits my figure better? (170cm; 55kg)
Context: I’m 28, have never dated nor had intimate relations with any man. I don’t usually have crushes; but I do find plenty of men IRL to be handsome, if that makes sense.
However, there is exactly one man who interests me right now — his team is working together with our museum on an upcoming exhibition. He’s their AV lead. I’ve seen him around, fixing immersive screens, setting up interactive games in the galleries.
Aside from a few smiles exchanged and one time when I made a quick remark about the screens he was fixing finally working, to which he replied with a, “Yeah!” — we had very little interactions thus far. I’m in an administrative role (almost like a Moneypenny for the team), and there’s very little reason for me to head down to the galleries whilst the project leads and curators are handling the installations.
Still, I’ve looked him up on LinkedIn and saw his professional experience. Already, I can easily envision what sort of questions I could ask him: how long he has been with his present company, what he was doing before, and perhaps a nice little segue into something casual.
And yet — the elephant in the room is still the fact that I have little reason to be in the galleries. Not only that, I am beset with a ton of self doubt and anxiety about approaching him:
Will he find it strange or sudden for an admin to talk to him, apropos of nothing?
Will my colleagues find it strange that I was talking to him?
He’s not wearing a wedding ring, but what if he was attached? Are there any questions I could ask?
Would a man like him even be attracted to me? He seems really successful on his CV, and I feel like a mere functionary…
I don’t think I’m unattractive, albeit only women and gay men have complimented me. I’ve been told I’m polished, eloquent, well dressed, and that I smell good. An Asian shop lady once told my mum I was “很美、很有氣質” (very pretty and elegant) when I left the store before her.
I have little issues socialising. I was a journalist previously, and my current job requires me to chat with museum directors, artists, etc. I can chat with anyone about almost everything, even if it’s a subject I don’t know.
But I digress.
I have only three days to speak with him — the first two being the last days of installation, and the last being our media preview and opening night. I will be the emcee for the opening reception — and I would hope to speak with him first, after which my emceeing would give him reason to notice me more.
Then — he might never return to our museum again, although I have a feeling he might return once in a blue moon to check on the immersive screens and interactive games for repair and maintenance.
I know, I’m probably overthinking when all I ought to do is take it easy and chat with him, instead of painting him as The One. But I just don’t know if I’m doing the right thing. I have absolutely zero experience in this area, and my sister and mum don’t have any good advice besides scaring me. Don’t shit where you eat, is what they all say…
In other words, I finally learned how to access the National Portrait Gallery for hi-res images!
A true vintage lady boner, darlings. An Old World white, if you will. 🥂
“Destined to be overshadowed at both the beginning and end of his life by a member of his own family” — first by his father Joseph Chamberlain and then by his half-brother Neville, Austen Chamberlain studied History at Cambridge, held junior posts under Salisbury, then served in Balfour’s cabinet as postmaster general.
Austen greatly resembled his father Joseph, was considered his natural successor, and yet was distanced from him for more than twenty years due to the death of Austen’s mother shortly after she gave birth to him. Joseph remarried, and had three more children, one of which was Neville.
Etc etc, amongst other things: becoming the Leader of the Conservative Party despite being one of the few Liberal Unionists left in Parliament, serving as foreign secretary, authoring the Locarno Pact, for which he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1925.
(In the last photo, from left to right, standing: Neville Chamberlain, looking like a man for whom I would cross the street if I saw him at night; Austen Chamberlain, Joseph Chamberlain. Sitting: Beatrice Chamberlain, educationalist and Austen’s formidable older sister who dominated his shy personality as children; and Mary Crowninshield Endicott, the third and very young wife of Joseph Chamberlain.)
My first job was as a journalist for a dead-end trade publication immediately after graduation. I stuck with it through COVID, and stayed on for a few years until it became apparent that the company’s financial situation was unsustainable and I had to leave. By then, I had only one title on my resume. I went from journalism to administrative work, and my current workplace is so political that it feels dangerous to even ask my boss for opportunities to change titles and job descriptions.
I’m well-liked by my colleagues and people I meet in real life. I’m told that I’m funny, have a flair for words and witty jokes, but somehow, I was never popular in school nor at work. People look to me to hold things together at group projects, but they drift away to their friends and never invite me outside of those interactions. I’m always the second-to-last person to be picked; an afterthought, almost.
Also — does having my Libra Ascendant at 29° mean anything?
Full disclosure: I say “Southeast Asian/East Asian girlie” in my title because I’m a Chinese person living in Southeast Asia. All I’m trying to understand are these intersecting ideas of what beauty is, and it’s all so overwhelming.
Seasonal colour analysis is, in my experience, so different depending on where you do it, and who you ask. Ask a Korean or Japanese stylist, and their emphasis is on making you look bright (ahem pale). Ask a non-Asian stylist, and they’ll maintain that your natural dark hair and slightly lighter complexion is contrast, and therefore there’s little chance you have low contrast. I’ve been told on Reddit I’m a Deep or Cool Winter when those colours age me, and a Summer by a Japanese stylist in real life when those colours grey me out.
Then there is Kibbe. I’m 1.7m, 55kg, which I guess makes me automatically a Dramatic, except that Dramatic silhouettes seem to swallow me up and overwhelm my frame. I guess I’m overall rather balanced so I would have been a Dramatic Classic if that category still existed, but I’m too tall for it, and I don’t like how the clothes make me feel. So I’m stuck neither here nor there again.
The general advice that I see here is: “Look at the beautiful women of your ethnicity” — and the problem is that if I looked to China, Japan, and Korea, most of the celebrities are either too fair, too petite, or too slim. If I looked to Thailand, Vietnam, and the Philippines — again, they’re smaller than me, and my features don’t look like theirs.
I can’t really use Thai beauty products because they’re mostly warm toned and I’m a cool olive, and I can’t use C-, J-, and K-beauty products because they’re too light and I’m a light-medium. My only option seems to be Asian beauty standards in Singapore, Taiwan, and the West, but I feel such a great disconnect from them all. None of them feel like me. So once again: neither here nor there.
And lastly, I just feel like my features are so… mid. I guess “balanced” or “elegant” is how my mum would describe it, but most days, it just feels meh. I look terrible and washed out without makeup, and I don’t know how people can mange to look so put together in minimal makeup and simple clothes.
I’m not particularly well endowed (34-25-36; with 30A bust), I don’t really see my body in Western media because everyone is either lush and curvy or toned and slim. I don’t see my body in Japanese, Korean, or Chinese media too. The only compliment I’ve ever gotten is that I’m tall, that my teeth are very naturally white and even, and that I have thick and very dark hair… and that’s it.
So yeah. This is a rant, I suppose. I guess I’m just in luteal and feeling a little shit, but I suppose it would help if anyone had any tips for escaping this “mid” zone. I just feel like nothing helps. I wish I had a celebrity stylist that would tell me what to do!
Film was a solid 7/10 — if you enjoy epic battle sequences with the scale and likes of which will never be seen again, and see this more as a documentary film than a drama, then yes, it is quite good. The costumes were delightful, although rather masculine with the exception of the ball at beginning.
Personally, I felt (along with many critics) that the rivalry between Napoleon vs Wellington could have been better explored, as well as the meaninglessness of war, conquest, and bloodshed. What wouldn’t I have given to see the party they threw for Wellington afterwards (where Caroline Lamb infamously shattered a glass and threatened to end her life)!