Nine in 10 women 'cheat' to look good

Jennifer Lopez recently revealed her magic pants during a performance Photo: AP

A survey has found the vast majority of the female population are happy to resort to tricks such as wearing "magic pants" to appear slimmer.

The study found the most common cheats were push-up bras, with almost half of women using them to boost their cleavage.

More than four in 10 admitted they have worn oversized Bridget Jones-style pants because they help hide unwanted bumps and give the impression of a flatter stomach and a more pert bottom.

Even celebrities resort to slimming underwear, with Jennifer Lopez recently revealing her magic pants during a performance, and Susannah Constantine, from Trinny and Susannah showing off her own push-up corset during a charity event this week.

The survey of 1,300 women, carried out by the Lakeside Shopping Centre, also found more than a third of women dim lighting to enhance the romantic mood, while others admitted to more unusual methods.

Some said they used vaseline on their eyelids to appear more awake, while it was also suggested haemorrhoid cream under the eyes gets rid of dark circles and bags.

And one in 10 admitted using breast-enhancing "chicken fillets".

Personal shopper Angela Poplett said: "Feeling and looking sexy is high on UK women's list of priorities but it's surprising how many women try to cheat their way to a sexier look.

"It's amazing to see how popular magic pants have become considering they were only launched a couple of years ago.

"I often recommend them to clients."

The poll also revealed the perils of attempting to look beautiful.

Top of the list was the visible panty line, followed by smudged mascara and unshaven legs.

Others included lipstick smudged on teeth and streaky fake tan, while falling over in high heels was also embarrassing.

Men meanwhile were asked what outfit they believed women to look sexiest in.

While women believed a classic black dress or snug fitting jeans was the best, men thought short skirts and low-cut tops were the way to go.

How Many 'Bogus Coal Moments' Will There Be At Tonight's US Presidential Debate?

The coal industry wants to buy your love.

Having sponsored nearly every debate in the presidential primaries, the coal industry is stepping up its $40 million election advertising bombardment starting today with an ad blitz of the upcoming general election debates.

The Sierra Club's national coal campaign director, Bruce Nilles, just let me know that his team will be watching the debates like a hawk, keeping an eye out for "bogus coal moments" and ferreting out their attempts to spread misinformation.

That's where you come in. Sign up to receive a mobile alert when a "bogus coal moment" occurs during the debates. Get "real time" alerts via a mobile reality-check text message every time the coal industry tries to spread more lies. You can either use our online form to sign up or, heh, text DIRTY to 69866 using your mobile phone.

Coal corporate fat cats are desperate to stop our progress toward a clean energy economy. They will spend as much money as they can to convince us that coal is a more important investment than renewable energy.

That's why they've spent tens of millions of dollars on slick advertising to mask the facts about coal. The truth couldn't be simpler: coal is expensive, detrimental to our health and communities, and is a distraction from real comprehensive clean energy solutions that include wind, solar and greater efficiency practices.

Where Do Satellites Go When They Die?

Images by: European Space Agency

No matter how often we hear about the developed world becoming more like Big Brother every day, it’s not until you see images that these from NASA that you get creeped out. How much are we being watched, traced, listened to, recorded? Anyone who has ever read George Orwell’s novel, 1984, might have seen it coming.

The computer-generated image above was released by the European Space agency earlier this year, which shows the Earth looking more and more like our hula-hooping buddy, Saturn. The image highlights trackable objects orbiting the Earth; all 12,000 of them, and that’s just an estimation. Around 11,500, floating at an altitude of 800 to 1,500 kms, are thought to be military, scientific, commercial and navigational in nature but only around 7% are in working order. The rest are mostly telecommunications satellites and orbit in the direction of the Earth’s rotation, or geostationary orbit as it’s known. They sit about 35,786 kms high.

Another image shows the differentiation between the satellites more clearly. Red depicts debris; the white dots are operating satellites and the outer ring is composed of satellites in geostationary orbit, which means they always sit of the same spot over the Earth.

North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) has been tracking objects in orbit since 1961 but now there is real concern that, with so much material floating around up there, it may cause damage to existing satellites and, worse still, working astronauts. Even though much of the debris is too small to follow, their velocity can cause untold damage. Once a tiny speck of paint that had come loose from a satellite punched a quarter-inch hole in the window of a space shuttle! Imagine going all the way into space, carrying out your given mission and then succumbing to the wrath of a speck of paint. Nightmare.

More of a worry though is not just what’s going to happen to the existing unwanted bits and bobs orbiting our planet but what about all the rest they’re planning to put up there? There’s a real danger of the space above our planet turning into the largest dumping ground in the ‘verse. And, what’s worse is, when all those aliens that people are expecting to visit to finally pop round for a chinwag, they’ll never be able to tell the difference between Earth and Saturn with all those rings.

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