Hey, City Bling!
I grew up in good ol' Ibadan with a population of over 3 million people. Ok......sigh.... I'll take all your Ibadan-girl jokes and memes now. Thanks. Lol. Anyway, 3 million people! 7 weeks ago, I moved into the most adorable town with a population of 100,000, still the moment I crossed the borderlines, I fell in love with the city.
Of course, I had given up on finding any Nigerians in such a small town or any Nigerian ties at all. Then two weeks ago, I stumbled on this record store, and there resting languidly against eachother were two records; Commander Ebenezer Obey's Operation Feed the Nation and an album from King Sunny Ade! I was a little too excited. I screamed a little and the guy across from me was mildly worried. Lol! I couldn't believe I found those records here. A piece of my identity as a Nigerian was just waiting there for me to find it. Hello, hidden city-blingy treasure!
Before this, we lived in Madison, Wisconsin, which has about 200,000 people. People still find it amusing that we lived in Madison but, goodness, did we make the best out of it! I can say with all of me that Ed and I ransacked that town; restaurants, fairs, lakes, zoos, rinks, bars, adorable roadside breakfast places, almost snuck into a college party(covering face), almost ice-fished, African parties, Afghani restaurants, street markets, fancy dining, woodsy hikes, gun range shooting...everything! EVERY.
Wherever you are, you are there for a reason and you're probably sitting on a goldmine of experiences. Explore, meet people, dig like a rabbied dog till you find the city's core, till you discover hidden treasure! (I know, rabied dogs aren't cute; they aren't, ok, dig for golden experiences like a healthy dog!)
I've only been in this town for about 7 weeks and everyday has its thrill. I can't wait to find out what else might be hidden behind these brick walls ❤️
Where is your city? Have you found its hidden, crazy gems?!
Source: Wikipedia
Credit: Ian Britton
Source: Alchetron
10 Maid of Honour Duties You Should Know
My first time ever as a Maid of Honour (MoH), I was so way off my MoH game! I was 16, lackadaisical and missed most of the ceremony; I spent the entire church service dozing and the reception with some guy that I was almost dating at the time, paying like zero attention to the bride (my sister). A million apologies, Sis. I really wish someone had sent me a blog post about my duties. Anyway after that, i've been a MoH twice and i've spent all the time trying to make up for that day.
If you have been recently graced with the honor of being a bridesmaid, congratulations! It, seriously, is a prestigious appointment; the bride literally just put you in a position where you could either make the wedding a success or a complete fart! Here are 10 things you should know as an MoH:
1. The wedding is not about you AT ALL
The 5th of April (or whatever date the wedding is) is not about you, not even one bit. It's a day you get to serve your friend. She has put you in charge of her well being for the day and to ensure the day goes as planned. So set your plans and almost-boyfriends aside and make your friend as comfortable as possible!
2. The Vendors are bae
Introduce yourself to the vendors, if they don't know you already and develop a good relationship with them. Once the bride wears her dress, all the vendors go through you. Ensure the only thing on her mind is getting to the altar and enjoying her reception. If the vendors haven't been paid or have a complaint, speak with the bride and resolve.
3. Contain drama...quickly
Disgruntles ex'es, a late bridegroom, a rip in her wedding dress, or even better, Egusi splattered on her dress at the reception, whatever the drama is, make sure it doesn't get out of control. If something goes wrong, fix it. She really doesn't need to know, if it isn't too important . Brides go through enough emotional roller coasters internally and if you can shed off the load that would be great. (Hint: You might want to ditch the heels at some point)
4. Get her a Unicorn!
Whatever makes her happy and cheerful, get it for her. As a MoH, you are responsible for keeping her comfortable and in a constant state of delight.
That night, after the wedding, you will feel like you have no feet and will be thoroughly exhausted but oh, the other feeling that warms your chest after caring for your friend. It's pretty darn good.
5. Keep her on time
At my church, if the couple to be wed don't arrive early, the minister starts without them. Lol! So if you really want your friend married that day with minimal frazzle, get her ready on time. Set deadlines and timelines for her dressing up, factor in the time needed by the MUA(makeup artist) , photographer, hair-stylist etc and be on your way.
6. Delegate duties to other bridesmaids
As a MoH, you are a team-lead. From interacting with the other bridesmaids, you should understand their strengths and utilize those strengths to making the bride as comfy as possible. Don't try and do the tasks all by yourself.
7. Provide spiritual support
I had two MoH's *Grin*. Bless my soul, the amount of spiritual support i received was remarkable. Months before the wedding, it's a great idea to choose a prayer day when the bridal party can pray towards the wedding!
8. Of course, organize a bridal shower
Organize the bridal shower with the other bridesmaids. Crafting a shower that works with her personality would be a great idea too! If she doesn't like penis-y cakes, then skip the penis-y cakes. If she doesn't like quiet, homely parties, then make some noise (in a non-residential venue). Remember to get gifts for her as well! (Gift ideas here!)
9. Eyes on the MUA
I love Makeup artists (MUA) but sometimes they just zap into the thinnest air! Make sure the MUA is available to touch-up the bride's makeup often enough or to right any smears.
10. Strap up your MoH Rambo kit!
Your MoH kit is your Maid-of-honor Rambo kit! Be prepared for contingencies. Weddings are the most probable places for rips, button pops and tears, so you must be prepared: Here's a list of what should be in your MoH kit:
Tissues
Pair of slippers or ballet flats for the bride
Bride's phone
Phone charger
Mints (no chewing gum, she'll regret it later when she gets the photos)
A snack
Safety pin
Mending kit
Hairpins
Tampon/ Sanitary towel (..because nature)
Nail file
Painkillers
Did i miss anything? Any MoH or bridesmaid experiences? Share! Share!
Get your own Business Idea in 6 Steps!
Developing a business idea is probably the simplest part of starting a business. Forget the belief that you have to be extraordinarily smart or be a mad scientist to invent something or to be innovative. Bleh, forget it! What you really need is an understanding of yourself and of the market you are trying to get into and from there, sprouts your business idea! *pop*
According to the Entrepreneur (and my Entrepreneurship teacher), a business idea is simply finding a solution to a problem within a market!
There are three main ways of developing your business idea:
- You identify a need in the community and you create a business plan around that or;
- You capitalize on your skills and create a need or;
- You build on an existing business concept!
All three ways aim to solve a problem within a market. Now dropping all business school lingo, here are 6 steps to building a business idea:
1. Scribble down the things you love to do; or something you are really good at; or a task you hope to achieve by acquiring the skills required. It could be cooking, creating craft, solving problems, playing games, sports, climbing trees, whatever. Scribble. Scribble. It's important that you build your business idea on something that you love to do.
2. Ask yourself "What need is present in my community that can be met with my skills or with this passion that I have?" To help you along with an answer to that, imagine something that annoys you on a daily basis in your everyday life; for example, waiting for the bus. Ask yourself, how can i improve this process of waiting for this *insert adjective* bus?
Then ask yourself, "How can i improve this process and get PAID for it?" Don't be afraid to answer this question too. People make money, they want to spend money; true they like good deals but that's another post entirely.
3. Do some research on how the market (people & transactions) might respond to your idea. This might involve surveys, interviews, general interactions with the community finding out what their needs really are. From this step, you might find affirmations to your answers to Q2 or more information about what people really need!
4. Implement your grand idea but start small. You don't want to invest too much at first. Plus, the earlier you introduce cost containment systems in your business, the easier it is to ensure your overheads (expenses) don't go crazy in the future! Start small, remember "lean is the new robust".
5. Pay attention to the market trends and know your competition. Know what the other tree-climbers are doing and how they are improving. Don't spend all your time focusing on them though, that's the perfect path to being unproductive.
6. Keep learning like your business depends on it....because it does. Continuous learning is the spinach to your business. Never stop learning and keep figuring out ways to improve on your business.
P.s (1) Scribble down even the crazy ideas (2) Don't pay ALL your attention to the other tree-climbers (3) Develop your skills daily (4) Develop other talents
What are your thoughts on starting a business? Do you have a business you are trying to improve? Do you obsess over other tree-climbers?
Experience: The Day I went Commando
Confession: So the other day, I went commando .........
For those who don't know, "going commando" is a situation where you forget (or voluntarily decide not) to wear underwear; like there's nothing, niente, nahda- just you and the wind.
*uncomfortable silence*
Now that we've established that uncomfortable silence, let's move on and lay a very important brick for the progression of this post.
Three years ago, I stumbled on a passage, which led me to believe that I wear two types of underwear everyday: a physical pair of briefs and a spiritual pair of briefs! Who knew?! It turns out that we are required to wear a "basic undergarment" which can be found in Colossians 3:
“....and regardless of what you put on, wear love. It’s your basic all-purpose undergarment. Never be without it.”
We are required to wear LOVE! All the time!!! It sounds good...I know but it's a little harder than it appears. We are supposed to consciously and deliberately don on our spiritual briefs - and I'm guessing they should be like full-coverage love briefs and not thongs. Lol! I feel like the more hypothetical coverage our spiritual underwear has, the more protected we'd be from the elements *shrug* Officially overthinking this. Tsk...spiritual thongs.
So back to my story, I went commando (spiritual-commando) to church, my love drawers were at home and I wasn't even aware until I got tested.
After service, I was standing in line, getting some tea, when out of nowhere this man cuts in front of me and pretends not to know that he had just cut a line! I don't like queue-cutters, not at all, not even if they are my family.
So anyway, this guy jumps the queue and acts like he's just minding his business. I decided not to call him out, because it wouldn't end well. I did stare him down a little. I was sure he could sense my irritation. After catching my eye a few times, he cowered and shrunk and maybe choked on his coffee a little.
I felt so bad, afterwards! Like after service, seriously, who fails at practicing biblical stuff? Turning the other cheek and all!
I was glad it happened though, it made me see that I had to voluntarily and consciously strap up this love-skivvies and stop harassing queue-skippers with my unparalleled stare-down skills! Holy Spirit, help me!
So people, never go commando with love. Love is our spiritual underwear and going commando is a complete No-No!
Mum, On the Matter of Kissing a Beardy Dude
This is a real conversation between my mum and I. It was all in Yoruba which made it sound so much better but it's been translated into English.
Mum: Ed's beard na wa o
Me: I like Ed’s beard
Mum: How do you kiss then?
Me: errrrrr
Mum: Kissing a man with a beard is complicated
Me: errrrrr-errr Not really, mum
Mum: What if the hair gets in your mouth?
Me: *Laughing out loud* It usually doesn’t
Mum: What if there's stew on it?
Me: Ewww
Mum: It's true. So, the hair doesn't get into your mouth?
Me: Nope, not at all
Mum: I remember one time your dad wanted to keep a beard. It didn't work out o.
Me: The hair doesn't have to get in though. We just work around it.
By now mum realizes I have superior kissing skills, then avoids the thought and proceeds to talk about something else.
What are your thoughts on kissing a bearded guy? Are you more pro-clean shaven or pro-beard gang?
How the Apes Plan to Take Over the World
One word. Meme-a-thons; this is how I spend my evenings, unwinding, giggling, even bawling sometimes. In the last two years, i have increasingly become a social media addict. That isn't shocking to you because you probably are an addict as well. Lol. I probably watch at the least 45 memes a day!
Well, studies show that the human brain loves being online! We love it! Our brains are like an insatiable trough that craves excitement and amusement. We are constantly looking for the next best thing, the next best meme. We are way past addiction with this internet-social media thing. In 2012, the average time spent on the Internet was about 3-5 hours, a day, now, we are spending about 5-7 hours a day!
This increased use of the internet and being perpetually transfixed on social media is now known to cause a loss of empathy, impaired decision making, and a perpetual adrenaline-high, resulting in mind fatigue.
Here's how: On either side of the cerebral hemispheres in your brain are the insular cortices. The insular controls your consciousness, emotions, empathy, cognition and interpersonal functions in general. In more practical terms, the insular controls your self-consciousness and environmental awareness; it's the reason you cry when your friend mourns, the reason you help when someone is in trouble etc. Studies now show that the increase in media-use causes a direct shrinkage of the insular!
Now here's where I'm going with this, the scary part, the ONLY other creature on earth who has access to the functionality of this insular- this ability to access these higher emotions, is the ape.
The apes show empathy, they cringe, they mourn with members of their family and friends. When a cousin ape falls into a 9-foot ditch, they don't giggle and take out their iPhones to record. When an ape kid gets hit by a car, they don't step over her and send out tweets about how they just witnessed something "absolutely crazy!" They don't have social media, so I'm guessing these apes are definitely not shrinking their insulars away, instead, probably developing this function quite extensively while we run around like zombies poking our phones and laughing intermittently at memes!
Decisions. Decisions. Moderate my nightly meme-a-thons or keep shrinking my brain and let the apes take over?
Of course, I'm not saying we should ditch social media all together, No! I love social media and all those crazy memes but I'm suggesting that we tone it down a bit and save the insular!
Imagine one morning you wake up, you hear a low grunt from the right side of your bed, it's an ape and he's wearing military gear with a side smile, he's holding your phone. He hangs it over your head, taunting you, as you would have taunted him with a banana. In a split second, he throws your phone into a large steel cage sitting in the corner of your room, you look at him, then at the phone, ....Would you jump in? Would I?
From my overactive mind.......
Gift Ideas for Her
Hey guys, 7 days more to Valentine's Day! Here are 10 (plus one) idea-generating suggestions. Be sure to comment below if you have suggestions of your own. I hope this helps! Enjoy!
1. The ring because *GRIN* // 2. Crossbody bag because it doesn't matter if she already has 89 bags // 3. Women's Acoustic Noise Cancelling Headphones for those Sunday football matches she honestly doesn't care about //4. Leather Watch so she stops making you late for events //5. Running shoes so she runs out of excuses // 6. Coconut oil for her curls and teeth (don't ask)
1. Love heart mug because it looks good with (3) // 2. Sì by Armani because it smells like currants and flowers // 3. The ring because reiterating makes a point //4. Pair of heels for date night or even more exciting- "something blue" // 5. A small bag because big bags can be a pain and take the attention off (3)!
P.s: You don't have to shop off the links provided, this post was created more as an idea prompter than a direct guide! Happy Shopping!
Gift Ideas for Him
Hey girls, after much site prowling, I came up with 10 items your "Him" might enjoy. Ed has been hitting my homepage waiting for this post because he thinks his Valentine's gift is here. Lol. Maybe it is, maybe it isn't. Hope it's helpful! Enjoy xx
1. Wireless Headphones for when you nag // 2. Docking Station so he knows where he phone is and you don't have to play phone tag // 3. Apple Watch sport, because it's the fad// 4. Dress Boots because they "work" for work, not-so-long walks and the dance floor // 5. Leather Backpack so he has free arms for your shopping bags!
1. Plaid Bowtie for #modePreppy 2. Doppkit for his toiletries for those weekends away ( and so he doesn't use your toothbrush) //3. Leather Bracelet because it's been cool since forever //4. Casual Loafers for date night //5. Duffel Bag for the dapper look!
"For Her" Gift Ideas up soon! You should guess what's #1 on the list is! *GRIN*
P.s: You don't have to shop off the links provided, this post was created more as an idea prompter than a direct guide! Happy Shopping!