What's Your Fitness Style?

Nope!, I am not getting up at 5 am to go for a run.  I’d much rather hit the snooze button on the alarm and get my last winks of sleep before starting the day off.  I ‘aab-soo-lutely hate working out with others because they tend to slow me down or break my concentration.  And Oh how it pisses me off when someone tries to give me fitness tips when they have never worked out with me… How do you know that I don’t already do that?  What I do love is going high intensity on the elliptical machine, zoned out, music blasting in my ear with an up-tempo beat!  My favorite time to go to the gym is after everyone else has gone home so that I can concentrate on me.  What does this all mean?  I know my personal fitness style!  I am highly competitive with myself and am self motivated to beat my personal best.   I am The Competitor.

 

Compromise in the Kitchen

It’s Sunday afternoon and frankly I am tired of eating out and I am tired of eating grilled chicken and fish in support of this yucky diet!!  With my oldest daughter off in the Navy and my youngest away visiting her dad for the summer, it’s just me and Chris at home.  Been pretty wonderful but I’ll have to let you in on a little secret… THIS MAN’S EATING HABITS ARE PLUCKING EVERY LAST ONE OF MY NERVES!!! He is not Muslim, nor is he of Islamic faith… so why the heck does he not eat beef or pork?

Hmmm...Exercise Triggers Orgasm???

According to an article by Bonnie Rochman in a Times Magazine Healthland report, up to 15% of women apparently experience orgasm as a fringe benefit of physical exertion. Crunches, anyone?  Count me in and start counting them out!!

Read more: http://healthland.time.com/2012/03/21/what-a-workout-women-report-exercise-triggers-coregasm/#ixzz20o1z4qIf

On the floor doing pilates, yoga, crunches and lunges trying to get to the O!


Ms. Me

Passion for Travel: Episode #1 Day Trip to Historic Charleston, SC

TLJ Supporting American Tourism

Wentworth Mansion, Charleston SC

PASSION

[pash-uhn] noun

 1.      any powerful or compelling emotion or feeling, as love or hate.

I love to travel: Scoping out interesting places, the planning, people watching in airports or train stations, arriving and seeing new cities and exploring different cultures!! I love it all! Places I have been include Jamaica, Puerto Rico, Mexico, Turks and Caicos Islands, St. Thomas, Germany, Amsterdam, Iraq, Kuwait, Bahrain, Ireland and more! I also love blogging, so I have decided to merge the two in a new segment called Passion for Travel!!

It has been amazing finding a life mate/fellow blogger (U-Topix)/future husband (#hint-hint), that shares my passion. We woke up early Saturday morning, both feeling restless, and decided to make a quick day trip to Charleston, SC. I am so glad that we did, because Charleston is an amazingly beautiful place full of rich history. It is a symbolic place particularly for my family's history. My brother began tracing our family lineage some years ago and was able to find documentation that details where my family, and many other African American families ,were first brought over on slave ships to America through ports cities like Charleston and Savannah, GA. I look at this trip as a sojourn into my families history! ...Let us never forget our past, but learn and grow from it to create better tomorrows. See the slideshow below and go on the journey through the picturesque streets of Charleston with us!!

Good Will Hunting

It was a sobering experience to see the latest Census Bureau data showing that the economic crisis has been especially crippling for women and their families.  Poverty and extreme poverty among women, men and children in the United States increased significantly in 2010, with the overall poverty rate among women rising to 14.5 percent – the highest rate in 17 years with incomes less than half of the federal poverty level.

Seeing these statistics makes me angry because  media outlets aren’t telling these stories.   In the age of reality TV and celebrity gossip columns, it appears that reality is being swept under the rug!  Even in my own blog, The Lipstick Journal, we cover fashion and beauty; talk about latest fashion and trends, however,

Shhh...Gonna Get Some Work Done

The Black Health Zone, 2011

Work out, Check.  Eat healthy, Check.  Try not to overindulge, Yep.  So then, why is it so hard to achieve the body that I want?  This is the question that many women have after spending hours in the gym, paychecks on fruits and veggies, and splurges on countless other over the counter diet and weight-loss products.  After carefully evaluating my genetic makeup and my own fight with mother-nature, I am beginning to think that the surgeon’s knife may be the only way to achieve that illusive perfect physique.  A lot of recent research on this same subject reveals that I’m not alone in this thought.  According the article, “Beauty: To What Extreme?”, by Kay Harris, “39 percent of women are dissatisfied with at least one facial or body feature and 25 percent of the women surveyed would consider cosmetic plastic surgery. “

Wine-Oh? Wine's in Review: Chocolate Shop's Chocolate Red Wine

Wine-o? Not!  But oooh do I love a good glass of wine… My neighbor and good friend Candice and I try new wines every chance we get (nightly!, O_o No Judging)… A good glass of chilled wine + great food =  Head tilted towards the heavens, eyes squinted in bliss;  umph, a perfect evening at home.  I love both red and white wines, fruity or spicy, dry or sweet.  We mix it up so much that it is only befitting that a proper dedication be made to the spirits!  TLJ will post once a month (more like 2 posts per week, lol) in honor of new wines that we have tried and love.  If it gets a ‘(O_O)…really?’ rating from our taste testers, then you won’t find it reviewed here!! Only those wines that make us smile will make a review on TLJ…. So without further ado, Chocolate Shop’s Red Wine, The Chocolate Lovers Wine!!!

 

Got That Snapback!!!

Concert Review: Jill Scott’s Summer Block Party

Saturday night, I along with my boyfriend and good friends, Candice and Gina, went to the Jill Scott Summer Block Party concert at Chastain Park Amphitheatre in Atlanta, GA!!  Though the evening was a lot less than perfect (…a tale worthy of its own blog post), Ms. Jill did not disappoint.

The Review:  Kem opened up the concert and was a little less than exciting in my opinion (not really a fan), however, his true fans thoroughly enjoyed the show.  DJ Jazzy Jeff got it in though!!  He kept the party hype in anticipation of the headliners appearance.  The crowd went wild throughout his entire collage of classic old-skool hip hop spins: Summertime (Will Smith), Rock the Bells (LL Cool J), Real Love (Mary J. Blige).  And then there was Jill…

She shocked the crowd when she stepped out on stage with her new hair cut; yep, boy short and still she was fierce.  Jill’s voice stirred my soul and according to my friend/neighbor, Candice, her sexy lyrics mixed with the 104 degree Hotlanta heat had her wanting to come out of her panties, and church fan herself!!!  If we had popped another bottle of wine, we would have been outside at Chastain panty-less and church fanning together!!! 

I score this concert 8 out of 10 so if you weren’t there, you missed out and if you haven’t picked up Jill’s latest CD, The Light of the Sun which dropped last summer, you are slow!  Go get it and take the lessons in love and loss, redemption and reaffirmation that Ms. Scott sings in soft lullaby and soaring big notes wrapped up into some of the best music out today.

Check out TLJ’s Photos from the concert and tell us about your favorite Jill Scott song! 

Signing out,

Ms. Me

P.S. my favorite is A Long Walk from her debut album, Who is Jill Scott!!

How To Be an Adult in Relationships: The Five Keys to Mindful Loving

Book Description
Publication Date: June 18, 2002

"Most people think of love as a feeling," says David Richo, "but love is not so much a feeling as a way of being present." In this book, Richo offers a fresh perspective on love and relationships—one that focuses not on finding an ideal mate, but on becoming a more loving and realistic person. Drawing on the Buddhist concept of mindfulness, How to Be an Adult in Relationships explores five hallmarks of mindful loving and how they play a key role in our relationships throughout life: 1. Attention to the present moment; observing, listening, and noticing all the feelings at play in our relationships. 2. Acceptance of ourselves and others just as we are. 3. Appreciation of all our gifts, our limits, our longings, and our poignant human predicament. 4. Affection shown through holding and touching in respectful ways. 5. Allowing life and love to be just as they are, with all their ecstasy and ache, without trying to take control. When deeply understood and applied, these five simple concepts—what Richo calls the five A's—form the basis of mature love. They help us to move away from judgment, fear, and blame to a position of openness, compassion, and realism about life and relationships. By giving and receiving these five A's, relationships become deeper and more meaningful, and they become a ground for personal transformation.

Who Moved My Cheese?

Book Description
Publication Date: September 8, 1998

With Who Moved My Cheese? Dr. Spencer Johnson realizes the need for finding the language and tools to deal with change--an issue that makes all of us nervous and uncomfortable. Most people are fearful of change because they don't believe they have any control over how or when it happens to them. Since change happens either to the individual or by the individual, Spencer Johnson shows us that what matters most is the attitude we have about change. When the Y2K panic gripped the corporate realm before the new millenium, most work environments finally recognized the urgent need to get their computers and other business systems up to speed and able to deal with unprecedented change. And businesses realized that this was not enough: they needed to help people get ready, too. Spencer Johnson has created his new book to do just that. The coauthor of the multimillion bestseller The One Minute Manager has written a deceptively simple story with a dramatically important message that can radically alter the way we cope with change. Who Moved My Cheese? allows for common themes to become topics for discussion and individual interpretation. Who Moved My Cheese? takes the fear and anxiety out of managing the future and shows people a simple way to successfully deal with the changing times, providing them with a method for moving ahead with their work and lives safely and effectively.

Why Women Mean Business

Book Description
Publication Date: November 3, 2009

Never before has there been such a confluence of international attention to the economic importance of women and the need for policies to enable them to fulfil their potential. The position of women - as employees, consumers and leaders - is seen as a measure of health, maturity and economic viability. Why Women Mean Business takes the economic arguments for change to the heart of the corporate world. This powerful new book analyses the opportunities available to companies that really understand what motivates women in the workplace and the marketplace. Find out how companies that learn to adapt to women will be better able to respond to the challenge of an ageing workforce and the demands of the next generation of knowledge workers. The authors compare policies and approaches in countries around the world, that offer surprising and envious results. The optimisation of women’s talents will boost the bottom line. Taking action to achieve this will require sustained courage and conviction from today’s corporate leaders. Reading Why Women Mean Business will be an important first step.

Sun Tzu for Women: The Art of War for Winning in Business

Description
Publication Date: January 14, 2011

For twenty-five centuries, men have used Sun Tzu's classic The Art of War as a guide to conflict. In recent years, it's been a guide to climbing the corporate ladder. But this book shows that there are more paths to winning than frontal assault. You can learn from the ancient Chinese strategist how to apply the feminine principle to the business world--and win every time. Whether it's relying on networking skills to win allies or maneuvering to gain a decisive advantage, the author shows through dozens of case studies from prominent women in business how to overcome the odds, defeat opponents, and forge successful careers. The tenets of Sun Tzu lend themselves to women's natural strengths in diplomacy and relationship-building. With this interpretation, you'll learn to leverage these valuable assets to trump your male colleagues every time.

The Go-Getter Girls Guide

Book Description
Publication Date: September 1, 2009

Every office has one – a Go-Getter Girl – someone who seems to just know certain stuff about how to get the plum jobs/lifestyle she wants and damn, always looks great while she's at it. Magic? No, it’s about strategizing--and The Go-Getter Girl’s Guide shows you how. Born out of interviews with hundreds of successful, stylish young women--including award-winning journalist Soledad O’Brien, Spanx founder Sara Blakely, and bestselling novelist Emily Giffin--The Go-Getter Girl’s Guide provides a no-excuses, big-picture way of thinking about your life and career, as well as day-to-day strategies for how to:

Navigate the tricky terrain of office politics
Find and use a mentor
Figure out when it’s time to get a new job (or career)—and have the courage to act
Dress (and groom!) for success
And take care of yourself physically and emotionally

Combining the practical career wisdom of What Color Is Your Parachute? with the savvy fashion guidance of The Little Black Book of Style, this dynamite guide is sure to bring out the Go-Getter in generations of women to come.