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We Are Frowning Goats!…

November 28, 2015 jacquelineobyikocha13 Comments

In my young mind, when my grandma used Igbo (African) proverbs like ”no matter how much a goat frowned its face, its owner still had to take it to the market to sell’‘ I literally thought she was talking about her goats.

She used to raise some goats that were either sold or killed to celebrate special occasions, and I recall looking at the faces of the goats with curious eyes to determine how they frowned.

It took maturity for it to dawn on me that the proverb was meant to address issues that we were either dodging to do or were difficult to do, yet they needed to be done.

Maybe, I should liken myself to the frowning goat in the proverb above.

For the past few days including today; though today has been super-charged busy for me, I have found every busy reason to dodge sitting down and working on my book.

I know that I could find half an hour to squeeze in yet…

Well, I say to myself, the book will not write itself lady!

Get moving! No matter how many excuses made it still has to get done right?

Like my people would also say; ”if the child likes, he should play pranks all day, his portion to weed at the farm will still wait for him.”

I am sure there are other frowning billy and nanny goats as well as pranksters like my dear self, who are using all the bucking tactics available to skirt around the needful 😉 ‘fess up to your misdeeds and lets get it rolling.

Once again, izzyasabee thank you for the invitation to take part in the three quote challenge which I have concluded and will be moving on to the next round of invitation from Vincent Wambua.

I call on these gems of my blogging World to join the fun.

Thomas Dohling

Kat blogs

SarahC

Musings · Quotes For You · Writing

My Best Material Possessions…

November 27, 2015 jacquelineobyikocha33 Comments

Whenever someone asks me what the best purchase I ever made was, I wonder why my mind simply drifts to the books that I have read and those that I look forward to reading?

Books are such ordinary things to call prized possessions, yet no gemstones like them have I found. Does this happen to you too?

My mind traces back to those books that have imparted valuable knowledge and fed my eclectic taste and senses.

I am always hard pressed to think of other material belongings that give me as much pleasure as my books and my Kindle does.

Is it my diamond encrusted ring? I do love it so and it always glows on my finger and makes me smile.

They say that diamonds are a girls best friend but I am still not yet so sure if it is truly mine. I appreciate it’s value but it is yet to speak to me.

Is it my latest pair of LV slippers? Yes they are certainly popping beautiful feet candy but not my prized possession.

Is it the fantastic new perfume of mysterious origin that I discovered at the Souk?

I have no idea what the name of the perfume means, since it is written in Arabic, but I must tell you that the fragrance is divine.

The list could go on and on but if the truth be told, none of these other things gives me the depth of satisfaction that books I have read gave me.

When I buy a book, it’s like I found a new friend. I usually can’t wait to curl up on my sofa or bed to get acquainted.

I always think that the cover of a book is like a door. Which gives me delightful glimpses of where I have not been before.

Sometimes it casts a spell, tickles, teaches or chastises. I always wonder when I knock what welcome there will be.

This little poem I wrote a while back will tell you more of my thoughts about books.

So what’s your best purchase of recent? Do share the fun, whatever that may be 🙂

NaBloPoMo prompt – Friday, November 27

What’s the best purchase you ever made?

Family · Humor - Bellyful of laughter · Inspiration - Motivation · Personal story · The Daily Post · Tips for the day · Weave that Dream · Writing

If I Teach You Something, Will You Reciprocate?…

November 26, 2015November 26, 2015 jacquelineobyikocha21 Comments

There are things that I do often and quite enjoy doing. A lot of these things are physical and some are not.

I cook every day to keep myself and my family well nourished. One of the dishes that features in most West African homes is Jollof Rice. Maybe, some day, I will share the secrets of Jollof with you 🙂

I dance a lot too. Not the gymnastic, acrobatic tumbling all over the place, but I dance virtually everyday to the tunes of my music of the moment. However, I guess except I turn to you-tubing, I may not be able to teach you much about my dancing.

I write ever so often. I don’t bother tallying the amount of time that I spend penning something because writing to me is akin to breathing, laughing, reflecting and crying through my fingers.

I have been known to write on serviettes or tiny bits of receipts to catch that fleeting thought – and you need to see me on the days that I am scrambling through my bag trying to find that little piece of tissue on which I wrote something 😉

I actively search out ways to maintain a balance of my inner peace of mind in a chaotic life.

I am not a religious fanatic, but I am unapologetically a Christian.

At most times, I am a peaceful, humorous, friendly, loving and hopefully a kind human.

Let me share with you the little things that I do to create peace within and around. Maybe, we share somethings in common:

I dwell on positive thoughts – even if it is just one thought that I meditate on each day.

Walking or finding an hour to exercise either very early or much later in the day. It clears the cobwebs in the head and helps my health as well as the waist line 😉

Those thoughts that bug me, I write them down and them take time to tear the piece of paper into bits. Its a way of releasing and letting go for me.

Sometimes, wacky it may seem, I go into the bathroom, face the mirror and just speak my mind, make faces …

I say my mind if someone has hurt me and I move on. I let go of grudges as quickly as before I go to sleep.

I am always quick to apologize if need be. No need aggravating and dragging an issue that can be quickly nipped in the bud.

I doodle, draw and reflect as I draw. The doodle in the picture was my last work done two days ago.

Writing happy stuff.

Searching out amusing things to read or watch and laughing out real loud. I like people who can make me laugh.

Having a date with myself at least once a week. It could be going to the park, spa, museum or as simple as a cafe alone.

Rest when I am tired (still working on this though, because sometimes other events overtake my intentions).

Honesty is a key in life that I don’t compromise on and practice. Especially in my relationships.

Talking to people and not just family and friends. Total strangers too.

Minimized drastically the amount of time spent watching TV.

Keeping away as much as possible from negative and toxic conversations.

Working consistently towards my passion and financial goals.

Avoiding the spirit of envy and jealousy as much as possible and giving myself a hard telling off once I see the green eyed monster rearing it’s ugly head.

Accept those things that cannot change and leave bad memories in the past where they belong.

Learning to be more patient and tolerant with family, friends and everyone else.

Trying to focus my mind on what needs to be achieved at the moment and living in the moment and keeping it as simple as possible.

These things translate to my inner peace which leads to external peace. What one does not have they cannot give.

So what will you teach me today? I am listening 🙂

The Daily Post prompt Teach your bloggers well.

We all know how to do something well — write a post that teaches readers how to do something you know and/or love to do.

Creative Writing · Fiction · Humor - Bellyful of laughter · The Daily Post · writing ideas

Wowee! This Party is Hopping!…

November 24, 2015November 24, 2015 jacquelineobyikocha30 Comments

Your delightful presence would be most welcome to a cosy dinner party that I am hosting.

You know how I love to liven things up and I can assure you that you will have a most relaxing and delicious experience.

I wouldn’t want to let too much cat out of the bag but I want to titillate your senses just a wee bit.

An exquisite and sumptuous banquet from top culinary artists will be laid out to feast on.

We would have the most entertaining dinner guests of the past few centuries, in the names of Jane Austen, Charlotte Brontë, Ernest Hemingway, Leonardo Da Vinci, William Shakespeare, Wolfgang Mozart, Chinua Achebe and James Brown.

Da Vinci will be seated between Jane and Charlotte where he will spend the evening admiring their profiles and twiddling his thumbs in earnest desire to cast them into esteemed timeless art pieces like the Mona Lisa.

Shakespeare will be at one side of Jane where he will whisper naughty poetic nonsense to her and Jane will definitely reply him with Pride but without Prejudice.

James will ensconce himself beside Charlotte as well and listen to her tales of Jane Eyre and her enduring love for Rochester. He will do a little footwork under the table to her blushing chagrin and admiration.

Mozart will keep us entertained with his sublime piano concertos and intermittently, Ernest would recite his poetry’s that will make us feel intelligent and at peace.

Respected Achebe would recline in deep appreciation of his company while penning ‘So Long a letter’ to his pal Mariama Ba about how things seem to be coming together at my dinner party (and not falling apart like in his book ‘Things Fall Apart).

He would also emphasize on the fact that under my auspices, every one is now at ease and also not like in his novel ‘No Longer at Ease’ which had been written after a rather poor dinner outing with the Westerns 😉

RSVP as quickly as possible and do tell me you would grace us with your presence.

The Daily Post prompt Seat Guru

You get to plan a dinner party for 4-8 of your favorite writers/artists/musicians/other notable figures, whether dead or alive. Who do you seat next to whom in order to inspire the most fun evening?

Image credit: Zazzle.com

Blogging · Family · Writing · writing ideas

What’s your Expertise?..

November 24, 2015 jacquelineobyikocha19 Comments

Though the Business Dictionary defines an Expert as: The basis of credibility of a person who is perceived to be knowledgeable in an area or topic due to his or her study, training, or experience in the subject matter, the word expert connotes more meaning for me.

In my layman’s opinion, an expert is that person who is able to teach me something that I need to know and he/she knows it better than I do.

In my place, there is a proverb that says that “what one does not know is bigger than that person” which highlights the truism that knowledge is indeed power.

My young children seem to be more abreast with the electrical gadgets in the house than their mother and they are always amused when I have to call one of them to ask for help in fixing or putting on the new-fangled plasma screen TV etc, in return they get called praise names by me, like ”my Bobo genius, Mummy’s Champion” or any name that pops into my head and you can see their glow in proving valuable, so in such little instances, they are my experts.

During my growing up years, I believed that my dad was a genius and an expert.

He tinkered and fixed just about everything that got broken in his spare time, even those of our neighbours.

It occurred so often that it became the norm to see an honorary auntie or uncle come calling with a broken iron or kettle or car issues and you would hear them right from the entrance of our house saying ‘‘Jay, Jay Martins (that was my dad’s alias among his friends) biko/please can you help me look at this thing? I wonder what is wrong with it?”

He would collect it, fiddle around and in a lot of instances, he got it sorted. This was done freely.

It was just a hobby and not his job. He was not a trained engineer. He studied and worked as a crop scientist, yet his interest in knowing how things worked not only made my mum and his friends happy, but it put a lot of joy and smiles on his face.

Personally, I do not view expertise in the literal sense of the word of just being knowledgeable in a field of study, but the appropriate application of that knowledge to achieve required results.

Prowess in a particular field of knowledge may not be a subject of interest or a need to know information for me and therefore at that point in time, it is almost irrelevant.

On several occasions, I have asked other bloggers how they were able to do something that I found admirable and as I go on, I keep my eyes and heart open so that I may glean off the expertise of others while still working on developing the muscles of mine.

What areas of your life would you consider that you have sufficient prowess to be deemed an expert? Have you ever given it a thought?

NaBloPoMo Prompt – Who is an expert you admire and why?

Wednesday, November 25

Image credit:

Creative Writing · Humor - Bellyful of laughter · Love · Musings · The Daily Post · Writing

To A Dear Friend…

November 23, 2015 jacquelineobyikocha13 Comments

My dear best friend,

How ever could I have survived without you? I am sure that you are wondering that after all these years, I finally acknowledge the importance of your friendship above that of all those who have blood flowing in their veins.

You are inanimate, yet you stand strong. You neither disdain nor discard me. Always supportive with your constant non-judgmental ear and never have you tittle-tattled behind my back even when I have treated you so badly, crumpled you in annoyance and tossed you aside in utter disgust in moments of emotional turbulence. You are so trustworthy.

Each time you still accept my pick-ups without a word of complaint, soaking in the outpouring of my thoughts until I am drained and sated.

I know that sometimes you must be confused with all the different voices that races through your domain; the flighty, flirty and glamourous, the happy and sad, the joyful and sorrowful, the excited and dreary, the calm and crazy, the contented and disgruntled, the sexy and boring, the discombobulated and all the weirdos that I bring along.

You have caught my tears, held my laughter, my sighs and wishful thoughts. You have stoically shared my struggles, troubles and triumphs and only offered succour by serving up reminders of beautiful days past and a glimpse of finer days ahead.

What can I say dear best friend but thank you.

I sincerely appreciate you my dearest diary for keeping me sane all these years.

You and chocolate have been wonderful companions of mine over the years. Bearing my torture and sating my taste buds, you are truly the best team a girl can ask for.

Yours truly,

Your sometimes awesome, fabulous and crabby owner,

Jacqueline.

The Daily Post prompt Literate Today

Someone or something you can’t communicate with through writing (a baby, a pet, an object) can understand every single word you write today, for one day only. What do you tell them?

Image credit: Pinterest

Creative Writing · Fiction · Humor - Bellyful of laughter · Short Stories · Writing

It’s Mating Season…

November 23, 2015November 23, 2015 jacquelineobyikocha16 Comments

”Don’t look! Just don’t even give that proud, shameless peacock a chance to flutter his feathers and show off some more.” Rita cautioned herself.

”He is just making an ass of himself, prancing around for all the younger hair-brained peahens that go cooing all over him.” She grumbled.

Marcel was a true debonair of a peacock.

He knew how to strut and display his stuff.

The dating and mating season was fast approaching and he just has to attract the best of the peafowls as much as he could.

”What’s with Rita and her forbidding looks?” He clucked to himself.

”She is just being a goose and giving me the bad eye.” He muttered as he admired his brilliant feathers.

”I better get away from her sight to more appreciating admirers”, he trots off in the direction of the clucking, cackling and sighing impressionable peahens.

…and still Rita followed from a distant pace, her disdain dripping from every not so bright feather.

Inlinkz

In response to the FFfAW photo prompt above. Thank you Sonya for the photo and Priceless Joy for this challenge platform.

Blogging · Gratitude · Hope · Life · Personal story · Writing

Staying Alive, staying alive….

November 20, 2015 jacquelineobyikocha59 Comments

The year fast draws to a close and it has really been an eventful one with a few dashes of rainbow and a lot of World mishaps.

Let us be prayerful that the next few weeks will be calm, joyful and refreshing.

On a personal note, by the end of the year, I will be thankful for having survived a turbulent World.

In today’s World where even the mundane part of life seems fraught with danger, we should be grateful for each day that we spend successfully as we lay ourselves down to sleep.

By the end of the year, I would have been running my blog nonstop for 7 months and should have concluded the draft of one of my books.

It was my hope to finish two of them, but with blogging in the mix and other duties that beckon for my attention daily, without ceasing, I had to focus on one and take it easy so that I don’t break down whilst trying to hurtle at a full-on break-neck speed.

I am currently at 50,000 words + and may be closing in with 70 to 80k words or so. I am not sure.

Being alive these days is a major achievement and it is only when we are successfully alive at the end of the year that we can count how many eggs our chickens have laid.

NaBloPoMo prompt – Friday, November 20

What do you hope happens by the end of this year?

Humor - Bellyful of laughter · Little rants · writing ideas

One-In-Town! Limited Edition!….

November 16, 2015 jacquelineobyikocha34 Comments

In my opinion, the dish washing machine producers simply didn’t think the production of this useful apparatus through when they were making it, except they indirectly created an automated cupboard for washed crockery.

It is really tiresome to engage in loading plates and off loading plates, then using the same plates within hours of washing and offloading and the hamster cycle continues.

My plates seem to live in the dishwasher more often than not except my fine china, which is brought out for auspicious August visitors and I dare say, that this is the case in a lot of homes.

With my tongue in my cheek, I know several African friends of mine whose dishwashers are mere items to decorate the kitchen and only put to use once in a while.

As a matter of fact, we actually end up washing the dishes ourselves and putting them on a plate rack to dry. Less trouble that way.

In that light, I am embarking on reinventing the dishwasher with an assistant attached to do the loading and offloading. Not that I am much of an inventor 😉

Who knows, I might come up with a fangled sophisticated new plate loader and off-loader.

Please queue up for your own limited edition of this one-in-town apparatus.

You can put down your name below, with required specifications and preferred colour 🙂

It’s first come, first serve basis!

In response to NaBloPoMo prompt – Monday, November 16

Pretending you have the expertise to make the product a reality, what do you wish you could invent?

image credit: gogobambini.com

Humor - Bellyful of laughter · Musings · Writing

Wouldn’t you just love to have your own Jeeves?…

November 12, 2015 jacquelineobyikocha33 Comments

Let’s be honest with one another, if the truth be told, wouldn’t you want to have that magical Jeeves/Personal Assistant who will tackle those dreaded and impossible to delegate tasks that you are faced with?

Oh! I so would love me some Jeeves. Genie Jeeves would take care of my business in an efficient manner such as:

Exercising for me, and passing all the nicely contoured muscles to my body. He sweats it out while I shape up nicely and of course I would recline on a plush chaise-lounge like a rich Nabob eating whatever I liked without the repercussions of the weighing scale. How awesome would that be 🙂

My dear genie Jeeves, would write those bestseller stories and books running around in my head to a perfect T and as quickly as possible too, so that he can start selling and make me wads of money.

Genie Jeeves would read my tons of mail, weed out the unintelligent ones and pass the intelligent information that I need to know into my head.

All those boxes of knick-knacks that found their way into the house would be nicely sorted out, labeled, given away or whatever. Jeeves will take care of that mess.

Running all those distracting little errands that can cut into my precious “knowing me time’‘ would be up Jeeves alley.

…..Earth to Jacqueline, now stop the daydreaming and remember that wishes are not horses, so no ride for this poor beggar.

Let me keep staring out of the window as often as possible, hopefully, I just might catch a shooting star and make my wishes; you never know these things 😉

So, tell me, do you have any chores that you need sorted out?

I might just be in the mood to lend you my Jeeves when he arrives.

In response to NaBloPoMo – Thursday, November 12

If you had a personal assistant who would do your most dreaded tasks, which items from your to-do list would you assign out?