Coffee cocktails! Bed skirts! Salmon sperm! Don’t panic - you haven’t been dreaming of Princess Margaret again. It is, instead, what the HTSI team has been writing about this week. Don’t say we don’t offer you some refuge from the madness of the outside world…

First up, the coffee cocktails. The omnipresence of the espresso isn’t news: coffee shops in the UK are set to outnumber pubs within the next few years. It’s only natural, then, that caffeinated drinks themselves have proliferated and morphed too. Grace Cook reports on the growing trend for “spirited coffees”: spiced cold brews with cinnamon, lattes with pear syrup and a “honeybun latte” made with Irish honey. In other words, the Pumpkin Spice Latte isn’t just basic, it’s positively passé. One barista in Brooklyn says it isn’t allowed in her café, which made me feel a bit sorry for Starbucks’s much-mocked, much-memed classic. Surely the pumpkin spice latte walked so that the “toffee apple pie latte” could run.

It’s St Patrick’s Day this weekend. You may be planning to glug a Guinness or three in celebration, but do note that there has been a Guinness shortage, and supplies are still shaky now. Alice Lascelles has gamely tried out some of the best alt-stouts on the market. As ever, I’m drawn to the names, many of which sound like failing prog rock bands. Do you dig Big Drop Galactic Milk Stout, for instance? Or are you more Siren Broken Dream? I know I’ll definitely be ordering one of those, just to see the look on the barman’s face.

Next: does your bed look good in a skirt? Rosanna Dodds wants to assure you that it does. She writes about the return of the valance, that hanging piece of fabric, often heavy on frills, which conceals the lower parts of your bed – and often the storage you’ve shoved beneath it. This is a matter of necessity. “It’s almost the only thing you need in your room,” one interiors expert tells Rosanna. “A bed looks naked without it.” Please preserve your mattress’s modesty and get a striped ticking valance asap.

Finally, the salmon sperm. This is in fact a “natural Botox” derived from the DNA of said semen and turned into an injectable, and it’s especially helpful for your eyes. This might, at first, sound like the kind of wacky beauty trend you’d like to giggle at, but beauty professionals, including our own columnist Adeela Crown, think that polynucleotides are the next big thing. Hannah Coates does a deep dive. And for anyone who’s still squirming, don’t worry – it is apparently harvested “humanely”.

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THREE MORE STORIES TO READ THIS WEEK

CloudFit – the AI-powered PT in your pocket The new fitness system that counts Kit Harington as an investor. . . I tried glass skin and became a living doll Pat McGrath’s cult catwalk look is now available to all. How does it look in real life? A woman’s guide to wearing ties Try a little neckwear this season

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