I Did a Survey

Yes, that's right. I carried out a survey which I am not expecting to see published in the Lancet.

It was Monday morning and I was suffering from MMB, Monday Morning Blues. You know, the sickness which starts on Sunday evening when you realize that it'll be Monday morning in a few hours time and that that means that you've got to go to work. I suppose the sickness afflicts people in different ways; generally,  mine starts on Sunday evening and ends at about lunch time on Monday, only to start again the next Sunday evening, MMB is recurrent, like that.

Well this post is not about Monday Morning Blues, it's about that survey I did on a Monday morning. Let me dish you a little story to illustrate.

There I was on my way to work, suffering  full symptoms of MMB, ( wishing I could prolong the fun of the previous weekend, cursing Adam and Eve who in my mind are responsible for the tediousness of work, hating the brushes, noise and smoke caused by traffic,  dreading the Monday morning meeting and targets, etc etc etc), when I suddenly got an inspiration to play a mental game as antidote to  the MMB. Uninteresting girl that I am, the game I invented was to take a survey, to count how many people I saw who wore a particular trait. I settled on people on foot who had earphones on that morning.

That was the survey, the results were surprising. I counted fifty four people who had earphones on, on both ears, on busy Lagos Mainland roads. It was interesting to see that earphones are not a vogue only with teenagers; most people looked dressed for 'office' work (maybe that was their own MMB antidote), there was one secondary school girl, a tricycle operator, several agberos and roadside sellers and of course jeans sagging teens. White and black seemed to be the favorite colour of earphones here in Lagos. I did not count people in automobile; all my survey population were people standing or walking on their feet. Also the distance to work from my home is less than seven kilometres.

Well I did the survey to knock off my MMB but it's Wednesday now and I still can't get the survey experience out of my head. If you know Lagos, you can attest to the that maximum attention is needed on our roads. Most Lagos road users, especially bus drivers, motorcycle and tricyle operators are neither educated in traffic issues nor respectful of pedestrians.  I think it is  foolhardy  to deliberately tune into some sort of audio entertainment while walking on busy Lagos roads strewn with vehicles manned by reckless drivers and riders.

Is it wrong to listen to music or your fave podcasts via earphones? No. But please not while walking on Lagos mainland roads.

Catholic Sexuality

I am a Catholic, unashamedly. That means that I believe and try to practice all  that the Catholic Church teaches. It also means that I share those beliefs with people I am in contact with. I do  not force people to believe what I believe, I only recommend good principles which the Church prescribes for a happy life which I think is what everyone wants. 

Sexuality is one of the several aspects of life where many have gone wrong in the pursuit of pleasure and 'happiness'. We clearly have got it wrong when it comes to love, sex and marriage.  A week hardly passes without a story of a rape, child molestation, a question on how to get over a bad break up, news flash on the divorce of a popular or not so popular person, lewd songs with pornographic videos and so on catching my attention, I guess yours as well. A colleague aptly said the other day that we live in an 'oversexed' culture.

Hence, it was with joy that I discovered this new website, CatholicSexuality.com. The good fellows over there have kindly put up videos explaining everything from meaning of life and happiness, same sex attraction  fidelity in marriage, achieving and avoiding pregnancy the natural way to the consequences of casual sex. Philosophy lovers will be thrilled to know that issues like the principle of double effect, elements of morality and other logical and ethical guides for judging human acts were covered in some of the video courses.  The best part is that it costs nothing except an internet ready device to sign up and receive the courses. 

So go on to CatholicSexuality.com, sign up and share the knowledge with everyone you want to be happy.

Is This the Way to Help?

Was passing by a busy street near my office today and met a really sorry site. There was a young man sprawled on the floor, apparently he was recovering from some kind of fit judging by a small pool of saliva by the side of his head. I did not immediately see anyone offering to help him get on his feet or to clean him up. Passersby busily went on with their passing by. But there was this lone man at the scene who seemed interested in the convalescent guy. But the kind of interest he had in him was sickening, he was only interested in taking pictures with his phone. I approached closer to see the glee on his face as he finished with his shooting session with a comment on how 'Lagos is a place where wonders will never end'.

Is this really how we help nowadays? When we see people who are injured or who need immediate help, should our first reaction be to extend a helping hand or to flip out our gadgets to take 'uploadable' pictures? Victims of accidents or any form of emergency need help, we should go out to their aid or run to obtain the aid if we cannot immediately supply it. It is bad enough that at times people lose their lives or suffer irreparable damage because first respondents during accidents have no clue on what to do, it is much worse that people do not respond and worst that when they do, they exploit occasions of other people's misery for their own entertainment.

Let us be more of helpers and less of reporters.