How not to get caught...

i was going to blog about attitudes in the office and how to deal with the Co-worker who just has an attitude for no discernable reason. But, i'm more occupied with the fact that the petrol prices have been hiked. I dunno whether to be mad, i guess not. it's not really the government's fault. it would be nice to strangle someone for it though- i'm just kidding - of course.

No, no, actually what has my attention now is the certain minister who is alleged to have already been summoned and suspended for corruption. Already? I'll bet this dude just couldnt wait to fly his chic around with him aye? The sad thing is he's one of the younger ministers in the cabinet - u know - the kind that supposed to be an inspiration to other young people... Well that's gone right out of the window now, hasnt it? But that begs the question, did he get caught because he was young and inexperienced in "these things"? Because having a conversation with some other people i have come to find that the practice of flying around with an accompanying vegetable is in itself not a new practice. However, it takes tact and a certain skill to pull said feat off unnoticed especially if you are a public figure.

As part of my Corporate social responsibility, i will now outline How Not to get caught: when taking your partner at large/young vegetable/the woman who you know is not your wife along with you when going abroad on "assignment"

This will be done in a few easy to follow steps.

step 1. Pick destination: this is important to ensure that you and your "partner at large" do not get routes mixed up. It would be a shame to hear that she's hale and hearty in Dubai when you arrive in freezing Dublin and she's no where to be found. It also allows you to adequately prepare to not be seen together. If that last sentence was a tad twisted. read it again. Moving along...

Step 2. Send her ahead of you. Yes, we know you've been dying to spend some time with her alone, in a cozy environment. The airport is not that environment. Why? because you will be caught. The flight is not that place either. Air hostesses know who you are and they like your wife. if she is not your wife, you will be caught. When they offer you tea or coffee many more times than normal or necessary, they're just making sure youu're being naughty so they can report you via ground control. Maintain a cool head. You've waited this long you might as well wait the 14 hours it takes you to arrive at your destination. Watch the inflight movie, better yet get an iPod.

Step 3. Separate rooms. Yes, silly. You cant show the accountant your per diem slip if it says Mr. A on the ticket, but Mr. A and Guest on the hotel receipt. Who is Guest? and why was she in your room? Tsk Tsk... no. The right thing to do is to have her check in on her own and settle her bills on her own - with your money of course, but nonetheless on her own. My strong advice is to find a young vegetable who is mentally capable of doing these tasks by herself. A fine bossom alone is not sufficeient. Many a young minister has faltered at this stage, and for this the repercussions are many. It's trully sad i tell you.

Step 4. Enjoy yourselves, but make sure you actually do the assignment the government/your company has sent you to do. Pay attention at the conference/seminar/peace talks/land settlement negotiation... whatever. Take notes, raise your hand, participate in group discussions. Make sure you make the government proud for sending you. Who knows, they might be so impressed that they'll send you back for more. Ahem.

Step 5. Fly back home separately. I really shouldnt have to reiterate that; but unfortunately, this step is often overlooked as many a young minister will get caught up in the euphoria of having perfectly executed the preceeding steps that he will grab hold of said partner at large by her voluptuous waist as they confidently board the plane for the flight home. Fail. Always remember step 2 applies for both flights: in and out. The golden rule is never fly together, and please do not give her different passport identities dammit!

Step 6: Finally, buy your own baby diapers Perhaps this is a low blow and totally unrelated to our topic. However, i feel the need to reiterate that one should not bill a taxpayer for diapers. That's just wrong on so many levels.

Right, so i guess that about sums it up, yes? Indeed, there may be some steps that i may have skipped. I am afterall, not a public figure. Please bring them to my attention and that of the general public. We all need to learn as much as we can in these trying times. Be well. Live right.

Fix.

Big sexy eyes
Big blue eyes, 
i got 'em mixed up
Dont know how.
Mad, She asked, so who's Blue?
i'm like err... babe thats you?
Feeble.
now i'm in a fix
cuz i called Sexy Blue and couldnt explain it.

I've never been Blue!
Nuffn about me's Blue!
She's right, it's true
Blue's Blue cuz she wears contacts... they're blue,
Sexy doesnt even have contacts!
my conscience is throbbing, 
ironic, now i'm blue.
And still in a fix 
Cuz i called Sexy Blue and couldnt explain it.

Christian Bale? Who... Batman?

If you havent heard by now... and i find that quite hard to believe, Chhristian Bale, the actor who played Batman in the Dark Knight had a "little" temper imbalance on the set of Terminator - his upcoming movie.

He properly told off the DP (director of Photography) who apparently was walking thru a scene he was shooting. Never has one man managed to fit so many F words into 7 minutes. But that's not where this is going. Everyone throws major tantrums now and then right? but what strikes me is the fact that it made news on CNN. yeah, that's right CNN.

Why would CNN carry it as a news story? well probably because within minutes of the tantrum's audio clip going public on TMZ.com, it became a social phenomenon - And a very wide spread one indeed. The TMZ site was bombarded with visitors in a matter of minutes of their breaking the audio clip; and in a jolt there had been uploads to youtube. The one i saw on youtube had already had 141,385 views, in just 19hours!

There were tweets about it on twitter - which is how i found out about it in the first place, and tcritic already had tee shirts for sale! (http://tcritic.com/archives/christian-bale-and-i-are-done-professionally-t-shirt/) 

His fan pages on facebook had new members joining up in droves and discussion posts around the topic, mostly in his defence. 

All this in a matter of hours. The beauty of social media, from twitter to youtube and to facebook is that it has began to herald news. it's removing the traditional staleness and formality of news and reflecting what people really want to talk about - Serious or trivial. 

When the plane crash-landed in the Hudson a couple of weeks ago, within minutes the news had spread in a wildfire of twitter retweets. It ended in a culmination of a wide net of information from a broad base of eyewitnesses, rescuers, the rescued, and us onlookers. 

Generation Y has taken control of the medium and converted it not just into a form of self expression, but a funnel into which various attitudes, and perceptions, views and reactions can merge into a pool of community in diversity. And the beautiful thing about it is that this is only the beginning.  Imagine what the future holds... and it's just around the corner. 

I leave you with just one of the many marks of the beauty and ingenuity this new form of expression offers us: a dance remix to the infamous Bale tantrum. Enjoy!

you scare me

You scare me,

 You do.

I'm not supposed be this afraid

But you scare me at night

and even during day.

 

It's the desire in your eyes,

When you stare

and your lips...

But I wont go there

Whatever it is, I'm riddled with fear.

 

You scare me

 I've seen you kill

You've torn up hearts

...shredded 'em to bits

And you didn’t even know it

 

You scare me

Your actions send shudders down my spine,

You're like fresh dew, dripping down a vine,

You're sweet and deadly,

like poisonous wine.

 

You scare me,

With each gaze,

With each kiss

With every touch

You scare me.

Way to go!

Something interesting happened this morning. I've just installed a new GT eazypayfone, which came as part of my broadband subscription, so i decided to top it up with some credit. Having never done this before, i figured it would be quite a simple task. However anytime i entered the digits, i got an error stating the card was invalid.

Quite naturally after 3 tries i was getting quite ticked off, so i called the GT toll free number, geared up to properly rant, but a funny thing happened. The most pleasant voice picked up the Phone. She was almost too pleasant. Our conversation was scattered with"Please hold on while i sort it out for you, i'm so sorry about that,  kindly accept my apologies... please enjoy the rest of your day" 

Needless to say i was... utterly bewildered and pleasantly confused. All my anger and frustration just sort of wafted away as i held on till she sorted out my problem. then she comes back, cheerfully announces it's been fixed, it will never happen again and goes on to inquire whether i had any more problems. In my head i was like are u serious? 

when did these guys get this cheerful? i still remember her name, it was Sandra. One day i'm going to find sandra, and give her a proper thank you for brightening my day. if this is some new strategy being employed at GT i wholly commend them for it especially here where customer service is a non-existent theory in many organizations and services and is more aptly described as them doing us a favour. It's funny how a smile and pleasant voice can go a long way to soothe bad tempered customers. But thanks to Sandra and whoever is responsible for getting her to act the way she did, there's been nothing for me to rant about today.  

We'll see what tomorrow brings. the iRant blog is officially back. Pleasant reading.

Countdown to debate number 2

It's 00:40hrs GMT here and i'm up waiting for the most exciting event since the VP candidate debate last week... more on that later. During the last debate the host had a hard time getting the 2 candidates, Barack and John, to look at each other and actually "debate" each other. Mccain virtually ended up avoiding looking at Obama, and frankly it was all too friendly and courteous. I was looking for a raging argument... but that never happened. This TIME magazine cartoon says it all.

Well, guess what? i have a feeling things are going to be quite different tonight based on the sort of attacks and accusations which have been thrown during the past week. Oh, it's been shocking and i cant wait to see how these gentlemen will face each other tonight, knowing exactly what the other has said about them on various campaign platforms during the week. And then there's going to be live questioning from an audience? Oh this is going to be good. Infact i'm willing to bet that it will get confrontational... in a dignified and gentlemanly sort of way. You know?

Well, both candidates are at the venue, putting the final touches to their arguments i suppose... and we've got barely 12 minutes to go now. So, being totally original- like i usually am- let's get ready to rumble!  

where are our employees?

I was just watching the news on telly and i saw the headline story: Ghana Telecom workers hold float. So obviously, i just had to see it... and sure enough, when the item came on, it was a thick crowd of former GT and i suppose now Vodafone employees, dressed up in vodafone shirts and matching red caps, wildly jubilating to some apparently, quite energizing brass band music.

This is not about the sale of GT to Vodafone, but were things really that awful that its sale has resulted in such a joyous outcry of employee affection for the buying company? or is all this just being orchestrated as a final sprinkling of sand into the gari as it were, of the people who seemed to be against the move?

My biggest wonder, however, was this: how can the employees of a newly privatised company, afford to be out partying, celebrating... basically having a seemingly profound carnival experience on the streets in front of their national corporate headquarters - first thing in the morning - at the beginning of the working week!! Meanwhile, the vodafone officials interviewed in the same news story, seemed remarkably sober compared to all the fanfare that was going on outside their building. They looked like they were deeply in thought about finally getting business off the ground... or maybe they were just simply baffled by the fact that there was nobody manning the offices and most employees were outside... having a rollicking time dancing to brassband music.

I know there was a similar celebration the day the sale was ratified. The celebration then, was to be expected. But here we are, beginning of a new week.. and yet, once again, another celebration? What was it in aid of? Was that the norm at GT before: Music mondays, Trumpet tuesdays? (cuz that might explain the need for its sale... would it not?)
Or, is that one of the advantages that's coming along with the sale to V-fone? Because if it is, then i will be switching jobs... in time for next week's party! Red cap anyone?