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!!!