A Fruit President Story

Once upon a time, in a land where fruits were not just edible but audible, a president had to be chosen. The date for a presidential election was set and Tromp the big Orange, Binion the teary onions, Paul the hard pawpaw, Benny the soft berry, Alp the proud apple, and Hannah the sweet banana all decided to run for president.

You can't be bored!

I know you are bored especially with the new stay at home rule, but what kind of boredom are you experiencing? Are you so bored that you are becoming depressed and/or unmotivated to do anything? Or are you so bored that you want to do something to bring you out of that mood even if it means creating something stupid?

Last night I thought within myself, 80% of individuals will go to sleep tonight and then wake up tomorrow morning to go through the same routine again. It is the season of Country lockdown and the routine for most people is simple - Eat, Work from home( for some), take care of the house, cook( for some), Spend hours on the phone, Sleep and Repeat.

The act of hanging out and/or having unprotected sex is not even safe for those who engage in this anymore at this present time. Some really close friends are even practicing social distancing, what could be more awkward than your friend telling you not to visit at the moment. Of course many are grateful for the gift of life and for good health but this restriction to movements abd social distancing is no longer funny.

Amidst all the funny memes and skits created on social media to alleviate panic and give comic relief this period, a funny meme appeared on my WhatsApp status recently which really cracked me up but still sent a message. It read :

"Notice from Psychiatric Society"

"During lockdown, it is normal to talk to  plants, pots, pans and things. Contact us only if you hear their reply"

 As funny as this is,it drives home the fact that a lot of people may be mentally or psychologically affected by this compulsory stay at home and social distancing. A lot of people may be affected by the fact that they have to remain indoors and practice a routine that they have never been used to all their lives. A lot of people may become bored and not know what to do about it.

It is true that some people will get their needed rest and relaxation. For some it means that you will finally know who cares about you, for others it means that you can have more family time and you can try out new skills but are you immune to boredom? Do you know that there are levels of boredom? ever heard of Apathetic boredom? 

Apathetic boredom is usually characterized by a lack of interest in life activities or interactions with others. The individual becomes so bored that he or she can't maintain relationships and enjoy life.

Everybody experiences apathy from time to time. There are times we feel unmotivated or uninterested in daily tasks. This type of situational apathy is normal.

However when Apathy becomes frequent and uncontrollable, it is a symptom of several psychiatric and neurological disorders. Some of which includes:

Alzheimer’s disease, Huntington’s disease

Parkinson’s disease, schizophrenia, stroke

Etc

Boredom can drive one to the brink of insanity, at the same time it can birth creative ideas in individuals. It all depends on how you experience it.

Boredom can be a destructive feeling, leading people to depression yet in certain circumstances, boredom can be a force for good, something that starts a creative process or something that leads to greater self-reflection.

Boredom is an emotion that is underrated despite its being common in today’s society. I hope that in a time like this when the world is faced with plagues which has forced many to remain in seclusion, we can channel our boredom, and isolation from the outside world into something great. I hope that we don't become people who suffer negative effects of boredom but rather people who bring out the good from sour situations.

What I think About Gabrielle Union's "Welcome to the Party"

Apart from the fact that the beautiful and ageless Gabrielle Union and her daughter, Kaavia James, have stolen our hearts from the start, we enjoy seeing their cute and hilarious moments together on Instagram. Now that Kaavia has inspired her mother to write a children's book, you can be sure of one thing, the book, "Welcome to the Party",will be an outpouring of affection and a mother's love. 

Live healthy with Fruttanuts Nigeria Limited

 Fruttanuts Nigeria Limited, located at 2 Limson estate, Ojodu Berger, makers of GingerUp(120ml), GingerUp(500ml), GingerUp(satchet) and GingerUp jam(premium quality) have assured that their products which contains Ginger, Honey and water is NAFDAC approved and it has a whole lot of health benefits.

Benefits  of Ginger Up

1. Helps relieve digestive issues
2. Promotes detoxification
3. Relieves menstrual cramps
4. Fights colds
5. Natural Antiinflammatory
6. Speeds up the rate of metabolism
7. Improves Blood Circulation
8. Relieves Tooth Ache
9. Promotes Detoxification

Ginger Up is available in supermarkets on the island and on the mainland. For more information contact the company on:

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Instagram: fruttanuts_gingerupdrink
Facebook: Gingerup Naija
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8 Wonderful Ways To Celebrate Christmas

Christmas is a beautiful time of the year. It is that time of the year when everyone wants to be at their best. The season of giving and receiving. There are several ways to celebrate and enjoy this beautiful season. See ways one can enjoy Christmas below:

1. Have a friend or family reunion

Christmas is one of the best times to get every member of one's family together. What can be more wonderful than spending your holiday with your friends or family, especially the ones you hardly have time to visit  or have not seen all year round.

2. Take time to reflect

Christmas is when most homecomings and reunions take place. You can take advantage of this season to relax and look back at how you have fared all through the year.

3. Pray or go to Church

Going to church to give thanks,  going for musical concerts and praying are also ways to celebrate this season.

4. Give and show love

Just because this season preaches love and it is that time of the year when one can't get enough love, it gives greater joy when we show love and keep spreading love. 

5.Christmas carols

Carols are happy or religious songs, usually sung at Christmas. The great joy and gladness that comes with attending or partaking in carols is one that makes even the hardest of hearts melt. Christmas is almost incomplete without carols.

6. Avoid Conflict

No matter how pushed we get during this season, we must learn to avoid conflict. We must not destroy the solemnity and gladness of the season by being enveloped in conflict.

7. Remember what Christmas season is about

We must make conscious effort to remember what christmas really is. It isn't an end of the year routine celebration or a religious routine celebration. It is a celebration of love and kindness.

 8. Take a Vacation 

You and your family can go on a beautiful vacation trip to a place you have always wanted. There are usually discounted travel packages at this moment as well.

Christmas time is meant to be filled with gladness, merriment and thankfulness. To have a memorable Christmas, one must be intentional. Carve out time with family and friends to reconnect with one another. Do new fun things, visit a new place. Don’t let the month go by without recording really memorable moments.

5 Life lessons to learn from Tissy Nnachi's "Don't Leave Home"

Directed by Tissy Nnachi, Nollywood movie Don't Leave Home was released earlier this year and it stars talented Nollywood acts Bimbo Ademoye, Adaora Ukoh, Daniel Lloyd, Lilian Esoro and many more.

Not only did this movie tell  a touching story, it exposes the deep effects of external influence on an individual. In this movie, a pregnant woman naively allowed a stranger into her life. This stranger came under the guise of 'I am also pregnant' and of course she offered friendship and was able to penetrate into the latter's life.

It is true that pregnant women experience a lot of emotions in this state. The various hormones being secreted in their body places them on a emotional rollercoaster which can explain why they may act gullible. This however isn't enough reason to let their guards down and become easily brainwashed.

So what are the lessons to be learnt from this movie:

Lesson 1

- Never let your emotions control you

Run things, do not let things run you

Lesson 2

-Old Friends are Diamonds

Ever heard of that song, Old friends are diamonds, new friends are gold? Which would you to chose to keep if you had to pick?

Lesson 3

- Do not reveal all about you all the time

Is it possible to always keep really personal information within you? What is it with women and the need to spill out everything happening in their lives to friends? Sometimes some information are better hidden or kept within.

Lesson 4

-Listen to your life partner

Some women may not agree with me on this but the institution marriage, kind of comes with some rules and regulations. A lot of people will avoid unnecessary headaches and problems if they can listen to advise from their life partner.

Lesson 5

-Never leave your home

This is for married people. Except you are in an abusive relationship and your life is threatened, do not leave your home. No matter the challenge, no matter how bad the situation is, do not leave your home until you have been able to prove beyond every reasonable doubt that it is the best option.

Finally, Karma is real and it is a known fact that everyone will reap whatever they sow, even if it takes time.

More pictures from the movie:

A life changing experience

A couple of months ago, I passed through one of the most unforgettable experience of my life.

As humans, we are bound to go through different experiences daily and in our entire life. Our life is a sum total of various situations we have passed through, circumstances we have found ourselves in and what we have learnt from these things.

  However there are experiences that cannot be forgotten and that are of course unique to us.

By now I'm sure you want to know what this is, anyway, it is something usual, I gave birth. Bringing another human to life isn't such a big deal for some people at least that was what I thought until I had to go through it. My honest conclusion is, experience is the best teacher.

It is true that when you do certain things, your life changes forever. Becoming a parent is one of those things. Becoming a parent can be a wonderful experience but at times, it can be daunting and overwhelming as you begin to make decisions about a lot of things that may be quite new to you. Some new parents suffer from postnatal depression unaware, especially if they have little or no helper around. It is therefore expedient that one avoids venturing into the business of having children when one is not ready.

 For those already on this journey, good luck and God's grace to us all. For those looking forward to start the journey, grace and courage to have a wonderful experience from the start.

Do you think you sometimes overreact?

It recently crossed my mind to talk about over reacting to issues and situations. A couple of months back, I probably wouldn't have thought about this. However, in recent times it has become quite obvious that a lot of times as individuals we let our strong emotions take over, we over-think situations, we analyze wrongly and then we overreact to them. Often times it may not necessarily be our fault, this is because we live in a world full of different kinds of people.

Daily in our activities and even at our work places we come across different people with different temperaments. We agree with some people and we find ourselves disagreeing with some. We may also find ourselves having to face serious antagonistic situations, such that there is a need for us to desperately react. What do we do in such situations?
Yield to our already over charged feelings and emotions at those times or relax and have a rethink before we react?

I'm 99% certain that everyone has over reacted at some points in their lifetime. Whether we agree or not, whether we knew we did or not , we have at some points over reacted.

After reading this article today, we must decide in our hearts that as much as we are not perfect, we will try to calm down in confrontational situations or when our anger is at its peak. Everyone can save themselves the stress of regretting what they didn't mean but said earlier out of annoyance.

Publishing my first book

Despite the fact that I am a writer and I have manuscripts, I have been unable to publish any for years until now.  All I had been doing for years was writing articles, blogging, speaking at events and creating contents for different magazines, writers and bloggers. I just couldn't publish a book.

At first it was the fact that I kept desperately searching for a known and established publishing house to help publish that was delaying me. The few publishing houses I had approached because I believed I stood a better chance with them, had been quick to say No to me. Later there was one that eventually agreed to publish my book, back then I had been overjoyed and I even started telling family and close friends that I was going to get published by a "big publishing house".  Little did I know, that one of the workers who was majorly in charge of new authors and manuscripts  had somethingelse in mind. My dad who had experience with men in publishing had warned me earlier to be careful but I thought he was just being protective.

At the end of the day one of the men I had encountered wanted to go out with me " to speak concerning my book". Of course that was the end of that chapter, and many more like that which occured. The ones that had the decency not to ask me out, wanted me to wait. There was a particular publisher who kept saying " paper is expensive, paper is this and that but your manuscript is good if only you can wait for a while...". Of course I waited for over a year to no avail. It took tact and wisdom to get him to release the manuscript after wasting so much time.

I then started to try getting published by foreign publishing houses, I tried so many that I cannot even remember all right now,  but there was one particular one that kept contacting and calling me, Dorothy Publishing house. In the end, it turned out they wanted me to partly finance and share the expenses of the publishing. Imagine that, I didn't have enough money to publish in Nigeria now they were asking me for dollars ???

To cut the long story short, after several thoughts, self condemnation, self denial and self motivation, I decided to publish on my own late last year. Of course I had few people who encouraged me to do so too. And although today, I have started with the smallest of my manuscripts, I'm grateful that I have started.

Even if this looks small to some people, to me, it is like I have taken a big leap and I'm excited that I'm sharing this with this community. I'm officially an author!

Thank you for always reading my blogposts and have a great new year!

How I met my husband 3

Of course I didn't want to pay. Don't get me started with the "why do females always feel entitled" question,  you guys come after ladies, promising heaven and earth. Is it wrong if we then decide to ask for just a little favour?

Anyway, he told me how much he will charge and I immediately was annoyed. I was annoyed because I expected him to seize the opportunity and do it for free. I immediately dismissed him and made up my mind that nothing will ever happen between us or bring us together again. Until one day, several weeks after when he sent me a beautiful pencil image of myself.

it was a drawing of one of my pictures and I was very happy about it but I still wasn't interested in a relationship. There was somebody else I thought was the "right person" at that time. I of course wanted to collect the picture but again he disappointed me by saying he wouldn't release it to me. He just wanted me to know he drew me. I was irritated...it was later about two years after, when we started dating that I realized what became of my picture. My picture is pasted on his wardrobe, such that it is the first thing he sees whenever he opens the wardrobe, up till now.

 To cut the long story short, I graduated from the university and I had forgotten about him as usual when one day, he showed up at my branch church. As much as he still claims he didn't come there because of me, your guess is as good as mine. Anyways,I started seeing him differently right from church and for the first time, I decided to start relating with him as a friend. In fact I gave him my bbm pin at that time.

After some weeks of chatting as friends, I realized he is quite intelligent and can be charming whenever he decides to be. He then asked a particular question in one of our chats, "is it possible that we can have a serious relationship? "  At that point, I had prayed and was certain that we could give it a trial, so I told him yes there is a possibility.

So few weeks to getting my call up letter, I told him that I will think about his proposal.  As at then, the person I thought was the right person had messed up, that one told me that he sees me as  a younger sister and that he doesn't think God wants us together. "funny stuffs Christian men come up with right?"  I later found out he got back together with his ex, someone he had been seeing at the same time he had been giving me hope.

I got my call up letter some weeks after and our fears were confirmed. I was posted to Plateau state and my guy had been very worried. He had served earlier than me and he knew what it meant for a single lady to go to NYSC camp. Especially when I was leaving him hanging. He tried all he could to get me to say yes before going to camp so that I will be committed but I didn't. I secretly wanted to get to camp and see if I will meet "better guys".

However, on the contrary, when I got to camp, every other person I met just didn't match up or fit. I met good looking guys but it just wasn't it. Right there in camp , before 3 weeks ended, I sent him a message saying YES.

How I met my husband 2

The days passed and what I thought was just a passing fleet of emotions refused to end. Adeola as I had already known his name by now, refused to stop. Rather than stop, he intensified his efforts.