Pause in the blog

There’s going to be a little break from the blog for a bit while I’m away.  I suppose I could write a bunch of posts and schedule them while I’m off, but I don’t feel right about doing that.

See, what I love the most about this blog is the interaction with readers.  I love to read the comments, reply to them, and have discussions – and I wouldn’t be able to do that.  So instead there won’t be any new posts until I get back.

I hope you understand and don’t abandon me.  I’ll be back soon, writing more about all things curvalicious – I promise!

A question men are dying to know the answer to

There’s something that all guys would love to know the answer to, so I’m going to post it here to see what the feedback is.  It has to do with low-cut blouses and dresses.  They’re especially popular this time of year with the heat of summer, but there’s a strange phenomenon that occurs when women put them on.

Maybe it has to do with the conservative area that we live in, maybe it doesn’t, but the women around here that wear these types of outfits are extremely self conscious of their chest for some reason.  For instance, there’s a woman in my office that wears these types of tops almost every day.  However, the entire time, she’s constantly putting her hand over her cleavage, pulling the shirt to try to cover it up, or has a sweater over her shoulders so she can pull it over her exposed skin.

Can someone please explain this to us men?  This isn’t an isolated incident – it’s like that for a lot of the women I see wearing them.  Is it because they’re insecure?  Is it because they don’t want men oogling their chest?

I thought perhaps it was me.  Maybe my gaze is lingering a little too long.  Nope.  I started paying attention and they do it no matter who comes around.  What is up with that?

I would think that as a woman, if you’re going to sport a top that’s cut to show off your assets, then you know good and well that people are going to notice.  If you don’t want to be noticed, then why spotlight your cleavage (or lack thereof if you’re minus-sized).

It draws way more attention to yourself by trying to tug and pull to cover your wide-open chest that you’re baring to the world than if you just went about your business.  There was a lady we used to go to church with that wore low-cut tops every week.  She spent the entire time walking around with her hand over her chest.  Very strange.

Let’s talk specifically about dresses for a moment.  Now definitely if you wear a hot little number like Scarlett Johannson is up there, you’re going to get looks at your chest.  Please don’t wear something like this out in public, then be offended that people are staring at your boobs.  That’s like wearing a string bikini to a pool and being upset that guys are checking you out.

And it’s not only guys that will look.  My wife wore a dazzling little low cut black dress to a fancy wedding reception last weekend that showed off her girls in glorious fashion.  The biggest oogler of the bunch was my old 8th grade history teacher – who is a straight woman.

If a woman wears a dress or top like this one…

Isn’t she saying something to the effect of, “I’m confident in my body, the way I look, and I feel a little sexy”?  Or is it more along the lines of, “This is what’s in fashion right now so I’m going to wear it, feel horrible about myself all day, and be disgusted at all the looks I get from people”?

Humans’ eyes are just attracted to skin and to cleavage.  We just are – it’s our nature.

So, the bottom line is – Why do women purposefully dress in outfits that show off, but feel so uncomfortable in public when doing so?  Inquiring male minds would love to know.

Robin Meade – Really?

I haven’t done a “Really?” segment in a while, so I thought I’d do another one when I remembered something about HLN’s news anchor Robin Meade.  I hate to admit it, but I do really like Robin Meade.  If I’m up early, I turn it on HLN to watch the news tidbits being delivered by the beautiful woman.

However, something really struck me last year when I saw her promoting her new book, “Morning Sunshine! How to Radiate Confidence and Feel It Too”.  So everyone – welcome to the latest installment of “Really? with noskinnywomen”.

Really Robin?  You really wrote a book about how to exude confidence?  Isn’t that pretty easy to do when you’re a gorgeous beauty queen with blinding white fake teeth?

Isn’t that kind of like a shady car salesman writing a book on business ethics?  I mean, really?  What other useful tips will you give us?  Maybe one on how to land a hot guy?  I’m pretty sure that would be a short chapter for you.  It could go something like “Show up at a place where hot guys are and wait for them to drool over you.  The End.”

And Robin, you claim to have had anxiety in the past.  It couldn’t have been too bad because you didn’t seem to have any trouble strutting your stuff in front of everyone during the swimsuit portion of all those beauty contests you won.  Now you’re trying to cash in on shy, anxious women by thinking their trials are anything like yours?  I mean really?

Robin, I’m not trying to be mean, because I really do honestly like you, but this narcissistic ego-trip of a book that you wrote might as well be entitled, “How To Be As Awesome As Me (If You’re Gorgeous, Slim With Big Possibly Fake Boobs, and Have Extensive Dental Work”.  Really?  Come on now.

Hopefully there are some normal or plus-size women out there that have written books along these lines that can truly help women feel confident in their skin, because I don’t see how this book could be read with a straight face.

So Robin, let’s work on keeping our ego in check shall we?  Martha Stewart let hers get out of control and we all know how that ended up.

Reader recommendation – Sophie Dahl

A reader named Gorgonzology left this comment the other day:

Attractive woman.

You’re doing yeoman’s work here.

Here’s a name for you to check out, Sophie Dahl.

So I did just what they asked me to do, especially since I’d never heard of her.

They didn’t steer me wrong.  That’s quite a beautiful woman, even though I prefer brunettes and redheads!  I love the softness of her belly and thighs there.

Here’s Sophie flaunting some dangerous curves on a staircase in an elegant gown.

And again in a slightly more casual little number.

However, as I started looking through images, it was like I was watching a woman slowly waste away.  What in the world happened to her?  She used to be so lovely and curvy, then all of a sudden she’s a lollipop.

That’s her husband and jazz/pop artist Jamie Cullum with her there.  I sure hope Jamie isn’t to blame for the wasting away of a lovely woman.

Look at how skinny her legs have gotten there… such a shame.

So thanks Gorgonzology for the Reader Recommendation.  You broadened my horizons and also helped me bring to light a woman that once had a figure to die for but decided to succumb to the pressures of society and slim down.

Wanna keep your man… let him stray?

I was on CNN’s website a few days ago and came across this article entitled “Sugarbabe favors negotiated infedelity“.  I thought, “Negotiated infedelity?  What exactly are they talking about?” so I checked it out.

The article is about author Holly Hill (her pen name) and her new book entitled ‘Sugarbabe’.

It’s her personal account of how she spent a year with “Sugar Daddies” to support her lifestyle.  By “Sugar Daddies”, she’s talking about married men that she has affairs with.  I won’t get into all the details – you can read the article if you’re interested.  However, I’d like to pull out a few points from the article for discussion.

The first being this quote from her:

“One of the main things that I have learned is that a woman that negotiates infidelity with her partner is far more powerful than a woman who is sitting home wondering why he’s late from the office Christmas party,” she says.

“It’s better to walk the dog on a leash than let it escape through an unseen hole in the back fence.”

Now, I know my readers are sitting there thinking, “What the what does this have to do with no skinny women?”  Well, it does.  Just hang with me; I’ll get there I promise.

From what I understand, Hill is not calling “negotiated infidelity” the same as an open relationship or swinging.  There are rules to it.  For instance, she explains her view when discussing her boyfriend Dean:

“[Dean] can have sex with the Australian women’s basketball team for all I care, but he can’t spoon any of them,” says Hill. “For me, spooning is cheating.”

I’m really having trouble wrapping my brain around this.  So, her boyfriend can go bang whoever he wants (as long as she says it’s okay), but he can’t have sweet, intimate moments with them such as spooning.  That sounds like the old cliche hooker line of “No kissing on the lips.” (Thank you Pretty Woman.  I knew being exposed to that date movie would eventually come in handy some day.)

Call me a hopeless romantic, but I don’t buy into this at all.  For a woman, there are way too many emotional aspects when it comes to sex.  I would think this would blow up in their faces eventually.  I’ve always thought of men and women as spaghetti and waffles when it comes to sex.

Let me explain that.

A woman’s brain works differently than a man’s (not being sexist and not saying it’s a bad thing, it’s what we were taught in psychology, which I have a degree in).  A woman’s brain can be thought of as spaghetti.  Nothing exists on its own.  Everything is intertwined.

Let’s take sex for example since that’s the topic we’re on.  Sex for a woman is (most of the time) directly related to how she feels about herself that day, how the day at work was, how close she’s feeling to her partner, and if she had a good hair day.

A man’s brain on the other hand is more like a waffle.

See how the waffle has its own individual compartments?  That’s how our brains work.  We have a compartment for work, sex, family, sports, beer, and all kinds of other useless tidbits like every lyric to every Led Zeppelin song ever written.

In other words, we can wake up, accidentally trim off a sideburn, have a fender bender on the way to work, get fired, come home to find a foreclosure notice in our mailbox, but still can flip on the switch and be rarin’ to go and mix it up between the sheets.

So how does all this apply to the noskinnywomen blog?  Well let’s take a look at Holly Hill for a moment.

She’s fairly attractive I guess.  More importantly, if she used to be a mistress, then it can probably be assumed that she’s quite confident in herself, her body, and her umm… abilities in bed.

From my experience, these types of women are pretty few and far between.  More specifically, let’s apply this to the full-figured woman that’s already apprehensive about her appearance.  Remember the spaghetti?  It would be quite difficult for that woman to compartmentalize sex away from everything else in her life and just write it off as making her relationship stronger.

There would be all sorts of questions in her head.  “Why does he need to be with anyone else?”  “Is it because he thinks I’m fat?”  “Is it because she’s better in bed than me?”  “Is it because of that one time I had a headache and didn’t feel like it?”  I can see quite the downward spiral taking place.

Again, call me the hopeless romantic, but for me I can’t see anything other than complete monogamy being healthy for me and my wife.

Why?  Because I know she’s already fragile when it comes to her appearance, and if I strayed (even with permission) I know what would follow would be an outbreak of anorexia/bulimia, and a deep, deep depression.  I love her too much to do anything like that to her.

I’m not judging those who choose to pursue other lifestyles.  Hey, if it works for you then more power to you!  I’m just saying that a book marketed to the masses like this that encourages women to let their men go shag whoever they want could be quite damaging to the majority.

Also, please don’t write me off as a prude.  I’m far from it.  I definitely enjoy looking at women – heck look at this blog for example.

But I leave it at just that.  Looking.  Every man does it, and I don’t see anything wrong with it as long as it’s not leering, or making the woman feel uncomfortable.

Wow, looking back now I’ve just realized how long this post is.  Sorry about that.  I’ll try to wrap it up now with just a final comment that if your man truly loves you… I mean deeply, deeply loves you, then even if you tell him it’s okay to go have a fling with that Hooters waitress, then he’ll take your face in his hands, kiss you, and tell you that you’re everything that he’ll ever need.

There’s a skinny woman I adore

Actually there are two.  First of all there’s my wife of course (today is our 15th anniversary!!!), but second would be Nancy Botwin.  She’s the character on Showtime’s series Weeds played by Mary Louise Parker.

As you can tell, she’s a skinny mini – or “minus size” as I like to call them.  So what is she doing on this blog called “noskinnywomen”?  Well, I wanted to illustrate how a woman’s sexiness many times has absolutely nothing to do with their appearance.

My wife and I love Weeds.  I mean, we love love love the show.  We don’t smoke pot and we don’t condone the use of it, but we’ve never laughed so much as we have while watching the show.  When we finish the episodes, we just start all over and watch them again.

So what is it that makes her so attractive if she doesn’t have all those lovely curves?  It’s quite an enigma actually, but I’ll try to explain.  First of all, she has great style and is always in clothing that looks great on her little stick figure.  In other words, she dresses (or is dressed) according to her shape.

Also, a lot of it has to do with her mannerisms and whimsical attitude.  For instance she has lovely hair, but isn’t afraid to be funky with it from time to time.  There are many times she’s in dog ears or puts the dog ears up in these little Princess Leia type things on the back of her head (hard to explain).

Also notice how her mouth is open in the above picture?  Her lips are hardly ever together, even when not speaking.  Men find that incredibly alluring.  Take a look at any fashion magazine photo shoot – the women almost always have their lips slightly open.

Not only that, but she does a great job of portraying the chaos that is her character.  It’s like she never knows what she’s going to do next and is just flying by the seat of her (tiny little) pants.

We were watching the “Brick Dance” episode last night and my wife said, “Oh, here’s your favorite part of the whole series.”  It’s where Nancy does this sexy dance to get the goods that she needs.  Here’s a clip of it.  I hope you watch it all because it will help flesh out what I’ve been trying to describe.

Embedding is disabled on the video so you’ll have to click the link to watch it.

I informed her that it actually wasn’t my favorite scene.  My favorite is the episode prior when she completely flips out.

Again, embedding is disabled so you have to click the link.

My wife thought it was because in the second link she strips down to her bra and panties.  I told her that her body has absolutely nothing to do with it.  It’s just that confidence that she has in that scene.  She knows what she wants at that moment (caffeine… she’s hooked on caffeine like crazy).  She gets her fix from the Diet Coke, then starts to contemplate her dire situation and for some reason decides jumping in the pool to scream her lungs out is what she needs.

Her expression, the yanking out of the ponytail, her assertive stride… all unbelievably sexy – even if she was fully clothed.

Speaking of expression – look at this photo of her.

Now tell me there isn’t some mischief behind those eyes!

So what’s my point in all of this?  Well, I was hoping to convey by using a skinny mini “minus size” lady that there are so many things that make a woman sexy other than her appearance.  Your man may find the way you put on your makeup in the mirror is his achilles heel, or perhaps how you order your food in a restaurant.  He may love the way you roll a straw across your lips when you’re drinking a soda or the way you crease your eyebrows when you’re trying to be angry.

In short, regardless of your size, weight, or figure, there are things that make you attractive to someone.  These are the things we cherish as we grow old together.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go watch Nancy flip out a couple more times.

Most men aren’t naturally ripped

Okay, let’s talk about men for a second.  I’ve spent this entire blog discussing women and how men truly love their curves and shouldn’t starve/exercise themselves into sticks.  Men on the other hand have a different struggle.  Women love to see shirtless guys with their ripped physiques.

The problem is that in today’s society, for a man to maintain a physique like that is near impossible unless they work in a strenuous job or make huge sacrifices.  How do I know?  Because I tried.  I tried hard.

I spent over a year waking up at 5:00 AM (which sucked because I’m a night owl), working out, eating right, and not partaking of wonderful French wine or ice cold martinis.  I was on a solid workout regimen (not something I just made up, a tried and true workout regimen) and I ate things like baked fish, brown rice, and steamed vegetables around the clock, which is excruciating for a foodie like myself.

I really wanted to get a body like this guy.

I spent hundreds and hundreds of dollars on supplements – creatine, nitric oxide, protein powders, blah blah blah.  If there was something out there to take to try to reach my goal, I tried it.

After a year of busting my butt, I sat there in my recliner about to fall asleep at 7:00 PM because I was so exhausted and began to wonder if what I was going through was worth it.

I got up and went in the bathroom and took off my shirt.  Guess what.  I looked exactly the same as I did a year before.  Exactly the same!  I decided right then that waking up at 5:00 AM and eating nasty food wasn’t worth it anymore.  Not only did I not look like the guy above, I certainly wasn’t anywhere near this guy below.

I toyed with the idea of switching my workouts to the evenings, but I have a young son and wife at home that I actually enjoy spending time with – so I certainly wasn’t going to sacrifice t-ball games or catching up on the day with my wife so that I can go sweat in the gym.

The truth is, I just don’t have the genetics for that physique.  I’m a tall, average built guy, and I just had to come to terms with that.  I felt bad for a long time until I really got to thinking about it.  All these ripped shirtless guys in People Magazine each week aren’t “real” people.

They don’t have 8 to 5 jobs where they sit at desks all day.  They don’t have to sometimes eat just whatever they can because the day is crazy.  They spend countless hours with personal trainers and dietitians and drink things like wheat grass smoothies.  I’m not that guy (and every guy I know isn’t either).

I decided that I’d much rather get a healthy amount of sleep, eat my wife’s scrumptious gourmet cooking, drink fabulous French wine, and spend valuable time with my family.  To me, that’s way more important than beating myself to death trying to obtain some seemingly unattainable goal.

So ladies, the next time you see the latest “it” guy in a magazine, running down the beach with his rock hard abs and chiseled chest, don’t look at your man and let out a disappointed sigh.  We have real jobs, real families, and real obligations.

We’re not proud of the fact that you can’t see our abs, and we most definitely would love to have pecs that could dance for you.  We just hope that you love us anyway and that our jobs as fathers and providers help make up for what we lack.

Women should be soft

A reader named JoAnn left a comment on my blog about Sara Rue that I wanted to make sure everyone saw.

I have to agree with you. I LOVED Sara’s figure before she lost the curves. I don’t like her slimmed down look. I think most women look better with some curves, some softness.

That reminded me of something from back when my wife and I were dating as teenagers.  There was this sign (except the one I saw said “Soft Shoulders” instead of “Soft Shoulder”) that I passed all the time.

I wanted to steal that thing sooooo bad and give it to my wife… well technically she was my girlfriend at the time.  Why?  Because when I thought about her, I thought about her softness.  When I would hold her hand, caress her face, and put my hand on her leg, I was always overwhelmed by how soft her milky white skin was.  It was intoxicating as a 16 year old, and still just as intoxicating 20 years later.

JoAnn’s comment reminded me of that quality that I love so much about my wife (and women in general).  Of course as guys we love it when our women can slap on a ball cap, watch the game, go fishing with us, or chow down on some wings and beer… but we still love that you’re still completely feminine while doing it.

It’s kind of like watching women’s softball.  These women are serious about their game and quite good at it, but they still have on their glittery headbands, their shirt sleeves tied up with cutesy ribbons, etc.

What I’m confused by is all the hooplah now over women wanting hard bodies.  I see women like Jillian Michaels all the time on TV advertising this or that to help women get “sexy arms”.

Umm… are those arms sexy?  I think not.  Those would be the opposite of sexy.  Those would be very, very manly in my opinion.  Which leads me to a phenomenon that no man on Earth can seem to figure out – women’s bodybuilding.

I’ve never once met a man that thought these types of women were attractive.  Ever.  I personally know a woman that’s into this.  She’s doesn’t have as much mass as the lady above does, but she’s definitely shredded.  She even got her body fat percentage so far down that she had to get breast implants to have any sort of a bump there.

I also know another lady that teaches two aerobics classes every day.  Every.  Day.  And when she’s not in those classes, she’s out jogging.  She looks completely wasted away.  She looks drawn, hard, rigid, leathery, and worn.

All those qualities are the exact opposite of soft, which is what JoAnn’s comment was about.  So I’m going to post a picture of Sara Rue again.

Now go back up and compare her to Jillian Michaels or steroid lady.  I think every man I know would agree that Sara is the picture of softness and femininity there.

My wife is not overweight and not plus size, but she’s soft – and I love that.  When we wake up on a Saturday morning and I see her sleepy smile peeking through her long tussled hair, there’s nothing I love more than to cuddle up next to her and feel her soft warmth against me.

It’s moments like those that I’ll remember for the rest of my life… which wouldn’t happen if there were bony knees or elbows jabbing me in the side.

Now if I could just remember where that Soft Shoulders sign was located.  Think I could talk her in to working it into our home decor?

I had a great conversation with my dad

This past weekend over breakfast.  He’ll be turning 70 in September and somehow we got on the subject of women.  Oh, I remember now.  We were watching women’s golf and there was a wicked cute lady about to putt.  We were talking about how she’s got some curves where she’s supposed to, and I told him about how I used to always watch the LPGA when Hilary Lunke was playing.

She always wore her hair in a ponytail with a big cute ribbon on it.  I even skipped an afternoon of work one time to watch her in a playoff on a Monday.

This spurred some conversation about women these days.  Dad said, “I can’t stand these women now that have legs like ‘this big around” as he put his fingers in a circle about the size of a bread plate.  I said, “Oh I know… don’t get me started!”

He then went on to say things like, “Give me a 50′s woman like Marilyn or Elizabeth Taylor any day over these skinny women that everyone thinks is so great.”

I told him that my son feels the same way.  I guess it’s in our genes.

Dad continue on for a good while, basically reciting everything I’ve ever written here (which he knows nothing of – he doesn’t do the internet thing).  He talked about how women deprive themselves, diet, and exercise, just so they can get in a smaller dress size than their friend.  (Sound familiar?)

It reminded me of a vintage ad I found and that I stuck in my sidebar over to the right.

Oh how I wish we could go back to those days!

I was reminded of that conversation with my dad today when I was watching a baseball game.  They were showing a bunch of people on the beach in California, and of course there were the stick figure girls running around and I thought – “Why are they even wearing tops?  There’s absolutely nothing there to cover up!”

As they panned across the beach though, I spotted something.  There was a stunning brunette walking along the beach with curves in all the right places.  But guess what she was wearing.  A cover-up. I had to just sigh and shake my head.

I guess I don’t blame her though.  If I were a woman in California on a beach surrounded by women with the figures of 12 year old boys, then I guess I’d be self-conscious about my curves.  I really hope she has a wonderful and loving husband/boyfriend/partner at home that appreciates her for what she is and doesn’t drool over the stick girls like the other knuckle dragging morons on the beach.

So I guess I’ll leave you with this.  Ladies – the next time you put on a swimsuit and look in the mirror and frown because you have hips, real boobs, and supple thighs that don’t show every ligament in your leg – remember that “Skinny girls don’t have oomph!”

I’m mad at Jenny Craig

The Jenny Craig ad campaigns are nothing new.  They find someone who they think could lose a few, throw them some cash, and tell them to eat their food and exercise so they can make even more money later as a spokesperson.  Big whoop, right?

I’m obviously fine with obese people wanting to lose some weight so that they can be healthier.  I think I’ve made that clear on this blog.  Obesity is a killer, and if we’re really overweight, then we should take strides to live a healthier life.  I’m not knocking that.

However, what I have a HUGE problem with is how they use women that look perfectly fine as they are but want them to get down to their “bikini bodies”.  That always infuriates me.

Let’s take a look at a before and after of Valerie Bertinelli for instance.

Did she really need to lose any weight?  I certainly don’t think so.  One thing’s for sure, I don’t find the “after” shot of her in the bikini flattering.  I see her ribs there and that’s a no-no in my book.

What really got me going though was when they signed on one of my favorite women in the world, Sara Rue.

Beautiful auburn hair, pale skin, and curves that can make grown men blush.  To quote Rachael Ray, “Yum-O!”  Then Jenny Craig got a hold of her.  Here’s her before and after.

As with Valerie, I liked her better “before”.  She’s not in a bikini so I can’t see if she lost too much weight, but I can definitely tell she lost her hips.

Jenny Craig needs to stop doing this.  They should go after women that are truly carrying way too much weight and quit showing women that are perfectly gorgeous as they are and try to convert them into sticks.

I used to watch that horrible show Sara starred in on TV called “Less Than Perfect” just because I enjoyed seeing a curvy woman in a starring role.  It’s too bad that the show wasn’t better… maybe she wouldn’t have had to have signed up with Jenny Craig.

I hope that Sara regains her classic figure and lands some great acting jobs.  She’s too beautiful and has too much of an unbelievably cute personality to not be on the screen somewhere.  Until then, I guess I can see if there are episodes of that crappy show on Netflix somewhere.