I've never worked in my own office without other people, unless you count that time I worked from home alone in my bedroom with only a few crows and a spider for company. All other times, I'm in low partitioned pods or big open spaces - never in small confined spaces. The social aspect is great, and I often pick up bits of knowledge that I can use in my work or to help others. But most of the time it's just noise I don't need to absorb. Open plan offices must be great for headphone sales.

In small teams of 2-8 people I used the free ear buds you get with super expensive smartphones, and that was fine. But this year my team has doubled in size and suddenly it went from sometimes not hearing people I was speaking to on the phone to me not being able to hear myself think. Using my mobile phone to make calls fixed the first issue. The second issue required big, on-ear headphones.

Considering I studied music & sound recording at university, you'd think I'd know something about headphones but I don't. I don't remember anything from university, except I met some most excellent people in my film class, and I've managed to keep in touch with one even though she lives in Kuwait these days. Yup, the HECS debt I'm still paying off was worth it.

A little browsing at electronic stores - I know shopping that's not in my pyjamas on the couch is so foreign to me these days. And then some googling brought me to House of Marley. A brand run by Bob Marley's family. They create headphones, speakers and accessories using recycled and repurposed materials. I was sold on those two facts alone.

I got myself the Positive Vibrations headphones because the name is so me, and also the colourways are super cute. Since I haven’t owned on-ear headphones since 2007, I have no idea where these sit on the sound quality scale apart from the fact they are better than the Sony headphones I had a decade ago. The sound is nice, crisp and light. I hate bass-heavy headphones like Beats since I prefer to hear my music not feel it shaking my skull open. Best of all these babies block out my teammates. Ideal!