gym-face-ium

Face exercises are not new (see www.facercise.com) but they are pedantic and demand a tedious regime. The Gym-face-ium Kit is fun and activity based. When you open the kit you are confronted by a series of numbered boxes each of which contains a separate item or task which will illicite an expression calculated to sequentially exercise every single facial muscle.

The first of these are the instructions themselves, which are tiny, causing you to squint your eyes and furrow your brow. These are followed by the manipulation and assemblage of an intricate set of components, causing the muscles to be set on concentration mode and the tongue to protrude and move around subconsciously. There are fine needles to be threaded with hairy thread, and fiddly springs to be compressed and fitted, that suddenly leap free and shoot across the room.

Then there are various odours to sniff leading to contortions, neck twisting and head jerking. These are accompanied by alternating images of humour, horror and conundrums, arising expressions of fear, laughter and the look of quizzical incomprehension. Penultimately there is "the nut to undo". This leads to a horrible contortion of the whole face as you set about trying desperately to release a captive nut, frozen into position with rust - and finally there is "The Scream" as the nut suddenly and unexpectedly frees itself, causing your unprotected knuckles to be skinned against an upright protrusion.