The Beauty Brains, as part of their series of posts leading up to Valentine’s Day, discuss the possibility of a scientific reason behind the color red as the symbol of love. According to an article in NewScientist, our ability to see colors may have evolved to help us spot emotional cues, such as blushing in the context of mating. Prior research had suggested that humans developed the acute ability to see colors in order to identify ripe fruit and edible leaves, but a new study now points to our need/desire to access a potential mate’s emotions as the driving force behind this trait.

Blushing is caused by an increase in oxygen content to the blood, with the color difference most dramatic in the 540 to 560 nanometer range, “the same part of the light spectrum at which the cone cells of primates’ eyes are the most sensitive.”

My question: Is red the color of love in most parts of the world?

Why do people always send us tips about vibrators? Could it have anything to do with the controversy over the ShePhone, supposedly designed by our editor Mia?

Well, whatever the reason, these products do tend to come our way at regular intervals. Today, there’s one for the environmentally conscious — the solar-powered bullet vibrator from Libida (hmm, I wonder when that domain name got taken up), that charges in sunlight or artificial light. Priced at $29.95.

One user on the Libida site suggests keeping it on your window sill so that it’s always charged up and ready (and meanwhile can satisfy any mild exhibitionist urges).

Thanks for the tip, Charlie!

When I was in college, my friends used to laugh at me whenever they saw “rent” written in permanent marker on my hand each month. Strange as it may have looked, it was the only surefire way to remind myself that rent was due. I didn’t refer to a calendar often enough to ever know what day it was and anything I wrote in the margins while in class were promptly forgotten about, so my hand was really the only sensible option.

To-Do Tattoos don’t just understand what I mean, they validate my idiosyncrasy. Who knew the line between abnormal and normal was made up of twelve temporary tattoos and a skin-safe gel pen.

Via Crave.

Some ideas take a little getting used to, but this one – a spa that offers treatments where little fish eat off dead skin – is just a little too weird for me. This Spa Fish Pool Dip starts at $35 per treatment – if you go to Sentosa Island off the southern coast of Singapore.

Via honeyee.com, by way of Cool Hunting.

I know this must have happened to you a million times as well . . . you’re just about to go down the catwalk at the Paris fashion show, but you’ve cut your cheek on one of the crystal champagne flutes. What to do?

Slap on one of these high-fashion bandages over your boo-boo, adjust your outfit (which is the size of a bandage anyway), and off you go! Now you’ve started another fashion trend, though rapper Nelly may claim that honor.

Blinged out bandages with 4 Swarovski crystals are available in three colors (white, red and pink), and one little tin sells for $12 at Charles and Marie.

Designed by Fabian Seibert, who also created the trendy ace-type bandage replacement in 5 bright colors.

For accident prone style-setters.

Your aerobic exercise routine may not be a bust, but it will be more efficient and productive if you monitor your heart rate and keep it in the target zone that’s right for you. But those chest straps that measure electrical voltages from your heart . . . so ugly and geeky. And using a wrist-only device to measure your pulse instead just doesn’t work as well.

But suppose they made a pre-wired sports bra with tiny electrodes knitted right into the fabric, electrodes that could sense your heart’s electrical signals? Suppose a tiny transmitter, snapped into a small pocket in the front of the bra, radioed readings from the electrodes to a digital heart-rate monitor/watch on your wrist? And suppose this wired device looked pretty much like a regular sports bra?

That’s what NuMetrex has done with a sports bra wired to send your heart-rate data to a digital readout for real-time monitoring. Prices for the bra alone start at $49, not much more than a wire-free brand-name sports bra. An entry-level package featuring bra plus transmitter and watch (with time, date, stopwatch, alarm, and heart rate limits) is $99.

OK, now the crucial question. A sweaty sports bra can get funky pretty fast. Is this, miracle of miracles, a washable electronic device? Yes. And you don’t even have to hand-wash; machine will do fine. The company says you can rack up 100 machine washings with no effect on performance, and even after that their electronic boob job continues to work with only slight error readings. Order one in red or a pretty deep pink called razzleberry before the end of February, and NuMetrex will send $5 to the American Heart Association.

In the beauty realm, collagen, a protein that acts as the support structure for the skin, seems to have maintained its standing as the most valuable resource of the body. If you don’t have enough of it, you can get it injected or use methods for tricking your body into producing more.

Now, you can also drink it. Toki, a Japanese product, is a supplement, that claims to replenish the collagen in your skin. Now, how does collagen that you drink make its way through your digestive system to replenish collagen in your skin? I thought this would be a good question for our friends over at The Beauty Brains website (real scientists who answer questions about beauty products). The reply I got back says there’s no evidence that drinking collagen has any effect on the skin, since digesting the protein breaks it down into its constituent amino acids, just like when you eat any protein.

Here’s what the Toki website has to say about how their product works: “Toki contains Active Collagen, Calcium, and Hyaluronic & Dermatanic acids. These nutrients have been combined with 47 amino acids from Hijiki seaweed to promote absorption. Unlike topical creams, Toki supports internally. ”

Has your door key gone walkabout once more? Or maybe you were able to find it yesterday but know in your heart that the Night of the Mislaid Key will come because it always does? Do you have a locksmith on speed dial because you’re pretty sure you’ll need one eventually–again?

You could make one more try at promising yourself that you’ll do what the memory experts advise: establish a homeplace for your key and remember to put it there faithfully every single time. Or you could just give up and bypass a door key completely. One less thing to remember. Install a lock that opens at a touch–but only your touch.

Your finger is the only key you’ll ever need for the the biometric fingerprint door lock. This one is not bad-looking, and the price ($199) is pretty reasonable. A bonus: you’ll never leave your door unlocked again because this puppy is a guard dog that locks automatically.

Uses 4 AA batteries; no PC connection needed. Fingerprint verification and door lock are combined in single unit for easy installation. It’s available for doors that open either from the left or the right. Fingerprints can be registered or erased directly with the lock on your door – and, if your circle of trust is wide, the biometric lock will accommodate prints from up to 120 of your closest friends.

It was a sad childhood moment for me when Mom figured out that the reason I got carsick on trips was that I passed those long hours in the back seat with my nose in a book. She loved books, but she was also fed up with cleaning vomit off the seat, the carpet–and me. So the rule when the car was moving: no reading. I played the license-plate game for endless boring hours and tried not to spend precious gas-station moments in the bathroom instead of with a book.

It wasn’t until decades later, after some serious barfing in a glass-bottomed boat, that I learned the secret cure for motion sickness from a tour guide. It’s simple and completely free. Lift your eyes to the horizon. Focusing on something close can bring on motion sickness. Stare into the distance and it usually disappears.

The makers of the ReliefBand say their wristwatch-like device helps with motion sickness (and also morning sickness if you can’t tough it out until week 12). But the main target is chronic severe nausea like nausea from chemo. It’s nerves in your wrist, they say, that are responsible for throwing up.

The word “vegan” in relation to shoes conjures up images of boxy, blister-making eyesores on the feet, unless you’re talking about Stella McCartney vegan shoes, which are in a league of their own. For those of us without movie star budgets, there are some stylish options, believe it or not, like those from Mooshoes.

Brazilian shoe company Melissa Shoes makes vegan shoes out of a plastic material called “MELFLEX” which molds to your feet. Presumably, this makes for less friction between shoe and skin once the shoe molds to your foot. Dedicted to sustainability, the company recycles last season’s shoes to make this season’s styles.

The shoes shown above are $58 from Kaightshop.

Via Inhabitat.