Random thoughts.

Just some thoughts. Everyone has strong points and weak points. And the way I see it is for every weak point one has, he's gotta have loads of good points to counter that. What do I mean? Lets take a house for example. It may take six months to build a house but all that effort can be wasted in a day if you wanted to demolish the house. Unless it is achieved fraudulently, it takes so much effort to progress. Yet I have observed,sadly, that many of us make some progress and then allow our weaknesses to derail our way forward and destroy what we have already achieved.

I am saying this with some particular guys in mind. Some behave like money burns holes in their pockets to their skin. Some even seem to have a death wish. Discipline is something that seems to be foreign to them. I know guys who receive mshande and you dont see them till the money's run out.

The biggest weaknesses suffered by the average Kenyan worker are alcohol and women. There are other vices of course but these dont seem to have hit our average worker in a magnitude that would cause real worry as far as the wider society is concerned. Drugs are there of course and are admittedly a danger especially to our youth. Gambling? Maybe among the more affluent members of our society.

What is it that these people lack? I dont want to portray myself as a Mr. Perfect. Far from it. I have been known to overdo things many times myself and find myself cursing again and again the next morning for my escapades the previous night but for the most part I manage to keep my desires in check.

Methinks we lack discipline. We just cant seem to know when enough gets enough or even if it's not enough , we cant afford any more( Yeah, gotta pay rent,right?). Some people, once they are in it, they just let the good times roll and to hell with everything else. A very destructive trait.

Of course ladies are more disciplined than men when it comes to handling money matters. Okay, I've met quite a number of ladies who also cant stop once they've taken the first drink and even some whose pants get real loose after that. But on the whole, I think women are generally better handlers than men.

Or are they plain stingy? I dont know. But what I do know is I am seeing more and more women apparently doing well financially than was the case some time ago. More women are driving big ass cars. More women holding big jobs in this town. More women engaging in lucrative businesses. In fact, if it was just discipline I think women would be doing much better than us by now. Wangekuwa madongra kutushinda.

So it's not just discipline. I think what keeps men ahead is the fact that despite their weaknesses, men are more aggressive in their quest for wealth, more adventurous and more ready to take risks. Women wont risk a coin. They take it where they are absolutely sure of the transaction otherwise it had rather just cool its heels in the bank. The day they acquire above mentioned attributes, woe unto us!

I know this is not a well organised post and I'm not an expert on social issues but I was just letting my fingers walk over the keyboard with my thoughts prodding them. Hope you have some opinion about this.

Walking the streets.

I've just come from the streets. Now my movements within town are normally pretty limited. Mostly it's from the parking lot to the office and back again in the evening. I rarely get the opportunity to walk the streets of Nairobi. But whenever I do like I did today, it turns out to be quite an experience. Is it just me or are there a lot of simply gorgeous women out there? I havent been to the whole of Africa but I'm ready to bet. Our women must be the most beautiful women in Africa. I just cannot get enough of looking at our babes. Damn our women are beautiful!

I saw a katiny one with these loose blouses they are wearing nowadays and a skirt reaching just above the knees, ample breast and thought damn! That's got to be Chick Of The Day for me. Then as I'm crossing H. Selassie, who is walking towards me? Long legs, tight hipster, high heels, chocolate complexion, shades on top of her head. Manze! Earlier mentioned COTD toppled. It was all I could do not to turn back and check out the madiabs. I was in the middle of the road.

Now each chic I see topples the last COTD. Boggles the mind bana. Some of them I feel like I can throw shame to the winds and just stalk them and watch. Later, I join a queue at the bank and the lady in front of me is wearing one look that just kills me. Short hair, long earings dangling. That one rocks! She drops some papers and before they hit the ground I've picked them up and like oops sooorry! Here you are. She takes them and says thanks and with my best smile I'm like, oh dont mention it. Oozing charm. After some minutes I try to chat. "Cashier's slow today", I say. Sh8t, I should have said fast cos actually the line never moved faster. Anyway her mind seems to be onto more important matters cos she gives me a passive,mmm, in agreement. Doubt whether she even heard what I said. Minutes later she's at the cashier's and the opportunity is forever lost.

As I walk back to the office I keep seeing them and ogling mpaka finally I said, hey, Aizoh get a hold of yourself bana. I tell myself nobody ever appreciates what he's got but hankers after what he doesn't have. Why, I'm sure lots of guys stare at my mamaa when she's walking these streets cos, well, she's damn pretty too if I say so myself. And with that thought I'm able to exorcize my mind of Chics Of The Day.

Until the next time I walk the streets.

The houseboy and the tyre.

I was a very mad man this morning. Today, for the first time in years I reported late for work. I was a whole ten minutes late. Now that in itself is not a very bad thing. It's the stress you go through before you get late. Stuck in a jam, moving one inch at a time, seeing the minutes tick by, and then maybe the fuel gauge decides to tell you that you are doing "enough" (E).

And all this was because of this new houseboy my sister sent me from ukambani. Now I'm not trying to disparage anyone here but he's the thickest fokojembe (dunderhead) I have ever met. He washed the car like he does each morning and by the way, I've noticed that he thoroughly enjoys this task. Why, even in the evening he eyes that car like he wants to wash it again. Like if i snap my fingers he'd jump to it with relish. I dont like misusing guys, however. Anyway,he washes the tyres too so he must have seen the flat. And the idiot does not tell me I have a flat so I do not notice till I am well out of my compound.

Now why would he notice a flat tyre and not say it? I thought about it and concluded;

This guy doesn't know tyres look the way they look because they contain air in them. Like, a tyre is a tyre so the car should move. Well, it may look flat where it touches the ground, but the rest of it is round. In fact there's more round than flat so that's no issue.

Or,

This guy is not that thick and knows about the air but he thinks that the car, being the wonder machine it is, will by some mechanism inflate the tyre to the desired pressure once the engine
starts running. Yaani I hit the ignition and voila! Tyre's good to go.

Otherwise why else wouldn't he tell me?

'Twas the Nite.

I cant think of anything to write about just now but I fell I need to do a post so I will give you this here poem that took my fancy. This is NOT my own creation (I wish it was). Cant remember exactly where I came across it but it was no doubt within the internet's many nooks and crannies. It's called:


'Twas the Nite Before Implementation

T 'was the nite before implementation and all through the house,
Not a program was working, not even a browse.

The programmers hung, by their tubes in despair,
With hopes that a miracle soon would be there.

The users were nestled all snug in their beds,
While visions of inquiries danced in their heads.

When out in the machine room there arose such a clatter,
I sprang from my desk to see what was the matter.

And what to my wondering eyes should appear,
But a super programmer ( with a six-pack of beer ).

Her resume glowed with experience so rare,
She turned out great code with a bit-pusher's flair.

More rapid than eagles, her programs they came,
And she cursed and muttered and called them by name.

On Update! On Add! On Inquiry! On Delete!
On Batch Jobs! On Closings! On Functions Complete!

Her eyes were glazed over, fingers nimble and lean,
From weekends and nites in front of a screen.

A wink of her eye and a twitch of her head,
Soon gave me to know I had nothing to dread.

She spoke not a word, but went straight to her work,
Turning specs into code; then turned with a jerk.

And laying her finger upon the "ENTER" key,
The system came up and worked perfectly.

The updates updated; the deletes, they deleted;
The inquiries inquired, and closings completed.

She tested each whistle, and tested each bell,
With nary a bomb, and all had gone well.

The system was finished, the tests were concluded,
The users' last changes were even included.

And the user exclaimed with a snarl and a taunt,
"It's just what I asked for, but not what I want!"

A blog by any other name.

If you are the least bit observant, you must have noticed that this blog has a new name. Yes, I renamed it. I was told the previous name sounds silly. Thootsmusings. Sounded nice to me. Quite a mouthful,some said. Too hard, others said. A goddamn tongue twister. And indeed it was, to some. You should hear how it came out when some people pronounced it. One chick said something like "thoosmuthins",with her lips extended way out. Another was like "Ati thoos what?". I said what the hell.

But if that was the only complaint I wouldn't have bothered. The most compelling reason was that it wasn't original. We have other *musings. Apologies to Afromusing and Kenyamusings. I back off. Humbly beat a hasty retreat. However, they should feel pampered. Imitation is the strongest form of flattery.