I wrote a Poem after a long while

I slept pretty early yesterday and woke up to many missed calls. But I needed that sleep and I'm glad I got it. Only challenge now is that I'm awake at this awkward hour. I have been thinking of a reasonable strategy to reach more audience with my project which I'm involved in full time [This baby here >> www.elearn.ng].

I get a lot of "wow, nice concept", "we need this". If for every "wow", I got a Naira, I will be rolling with Uncle Aliko right now.

*inner voice screams* "Stop lying Michael!"

Whatever. *shrugs*

So, the other awesome part of this well deserved rest is that I was actually woken up by the muse. When this happens, I know something cool is popping. Right there in my half-awake mode, at 1:30am, the first few lines came into my subconscious...It was beautiful. I shrugged it off. Then more lines...No way...I woke up and penned typed it up in my phone's notepad.

Earlier in the day, I had read something beautiful around the same theme from the awesome Somto. We did an awesome collabo sometime ago on a poem about Nigeria. It was really cool. In case you want to check it out, it's still available, although it could use some editing.

This time last year I was in Venice, Italy and I happened to stay there for a couple of months. July is usually a month where one of the amazing festivals called 'Redentore' happens.  So they practically build a bridge every year that links one part of Venice to another island called Giudecca. Then close to midnight, there is a display of fireworks and people camp out till late, out in the open, eating, drinking and soaking in the beautiful night view of Venetian waters. Sigh. I hope to go next year as I was told by my friends that this year's was even more awesome. Anyways, fingers crossed.

So, when you read this poem you will understand where the inspiration came from...here you go.

 

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Crazy Schedules + more food pictures

I think I may have just spent a full hour catching up with blog posts I missed. I have actually had one heck of a stressful day yesterday but it was worth it. I really had mixed reactions to the numerous posts I read.

First, I was vexed for Atilola's ordeal, then smiled at Toinlicious mention on her post last year and giggled at her new love while wondering where Relentless has been.

My schedule has never been crazier yet I have resolved to keep God at the center of everything I go through cos that's the only way I can stay sane.
So, I resolved to do something which as simple as it sounds has worked magic. I noticed that what I do most times when I wake up is to pick up my device and then check notifications (welcome to 2015). From doing that, I end up clicking one interesting link which leads to this juicy news article that talks about some trending video that I must quickly watch before I'm jolted back to reality by a friend's chat notification...Voila! half the day is gone.

So what I do now is just talk to God first (not like I've been so disciplined to remember always though). I just speak into my day and command how it should go and then plan it. It's been so helpful and you should try it. There are also tools that help you stay disciplined if you have a task at hand such as Stayfocusd , a browser web extension which blocks selected sites from your browser that may be time consuming to you within specific time periods/days based on what you configure  (did I hear you say Linda Ikeji, or Facebook) and also another app is Time Doctor which helps you keep track of what you do per time on your PC and present's a daily report. You can also add users and track their time spent of certain activities (for the Entrepreneurial ones who feeks a need to measure staff downtime, you may like this)

Sincerely, my usual paper to-do list does the trick most times and I rarely use the apps but if you're into them, then cool . :)

By the way, here are more food pictures below. Oh yes! I just discovered the tasty goodness of grilled carrots. It started with some random thoughts on what I could do with left-over carrots and I decided to Google about them and I saw a recipe. Those things are awesome!

Grilled plantain (Boli), Grilled carrots, tuna sauce and titus fish

I found out that cooking makes me kinda relieved when I feel stressed and maybe in my subsequent posts I'll show you what I made one time I was really really stressed. I took it all out on food. Turned out good (surprisingly. Haha!)

The picture below reminds me of when I used to have time to cook over the weekend and dish in packs but right now...no breathing space.

Just normal spaghetti and fish sauce

Then last Christmas was amazing! God really favoured me cos I had like 3 crazy deadlines to meet up with so I practically worked all through Christmas yet had time for some fun with family. But this picture below was one of the highlights which was a family dinner event I was invited to. Maybe in my next post I will share my reservations with huge looking turkeys and fine looking bananas. *sigh* All the same, it tasted awesome!

The huge Christmas turkey, pork slices, etc.

What do you guys think of the Grilled carrots? Have you tried it before?

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MIA Series: Pt 3 - Beach Resort Trip

So this will be the final in the series I started in my last two posts.

You guys totally have given me another name based on the forgetful act I executed on my friend's wedding. Hehe, it's not as bad as it may have seemed though. And don't change your mind of inviting me to your wedding. Noooooo! Jellof wice must not pass me by.

Throughout last month, I was operating on a funny dimension where I engaged in a lot of activities but just couldn't find reasonable time for the things that mattered. I felt exhausted almost everytime when I just think of the fact that I had blogged over a month ago.

So I had this opportunity to join a group of people in church for a trip to Eko Tourist Beach Resort (a.k.a. Akodo beach) which lasted for 2 and a half days. Twas the definition of F.U.N.!

Day 1
The hyper side of me couldn't wait to extract all the fun so I dashed to the football pitch as we arrived...in hot Akodo sun...
25 minutes later, you should have seen me panting like a goat that just drowned.

On the pitch few minutes after arrival

Just so you know, the picture below shows how hyper I was...:-D



Me on ze right in ze air catching ze wind!

At evening time, my tummy had started singing the Symphony of Beethoven in Waffi language. Luckily, lunchinner (lunch + dinner) was about to be served...

Me with ze striped Tees...

Day 2 (Saturday)
Early morning aerobics, Beach jogging, team build activities and many more took place. I learnt one aerobic routine that dealt with my thighs for a week. Gush! Exercise is gewd I must say!

One of the Team build activities on 'Trust'

Here you had to blindfold someone who was your partner in front and the person was meant to fall backwards with the assurance and trust that you'll catch him/her.

I learnt a lot from this exercise. Sometimes in life we just have to learn to trust people...over time.

In the night, we had camp fire, ate barbeque (stole from people's plates while being chased around), danced through the night, sat on the sand with new-found friends, gisted a lot and collected contacts.(Yes...contacts *wink*)

We visited the site where Obafemi Awolowo was kept under house arrest in those days (before independence I guess, not sure). But I saw the clothes he wore, his shoes (nice leather ones), the bath tub he used then...everything well-preserved.


The Fashola-refurbished site where Awo was kept

Asides the fun and visits, we also had the chance to give stuff to the people around the Akodo community. Things like school bags, food, blankets, mosquito nets and the Word was shared with them. I felt fulfilled atr this point. The high point was where I was selected to conduct an interview with the Onilekki of Lekki alongside the organizers. I held the mic with a camera facing me and delivered. Hehe, I hope I can have access to the video to share with you guys.

The sea-side

 

 

The goodies shared

Day 3 (Sunday)
Departure :-(

Saw a movie, packed our bags and set out for our various homes. I HAD FUN.

As a follow-up to this nice experience, I would be visiting the Equity Resort (Ijebu-Ode) soon and visit somewhere I've never been to outside Lagos. *fingers crossed*

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