The Growing Concern for our Environment

No snow
As the climate warms up, mountainous regions may experience lower levels of snowfall. This image shows Mount Hood in Oregon at the same time in late summer in 1985 and 2002.

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Environment
The environment issue has become a global concern; CO2 levels have increased substantially since the Industrial Revolution, and are expected to continue doing so. It is reasonable to believe that humans have been responsible for much of this increase

Global warming
The continuing emissions of greenhouse gases, chiefly carbon dioxide (CO2) severely increases the earth's atmospheric and surface temperatures, with disastrous environmental consequences.

Consequences
Direct manifestations of a widespread and long-term trend toward warmer global temperatures will include:
· Heat waves and periods of unusually warm weather
· Ocean warming, sea-level rise and coastal flooding
· Glaciers melting
· Arctic and Antarctic warming

And the following events will foreshadow the types of impacts likely to become more frequent and widespread with continued warming:
· Spreading disease
· Earlier spring arrival
· Plant and animal range shifts and population changes
· Coral reef bleaching
· Downpours, heavy snowfalls, and flooding
· Droughts and fires

Example
A typical example of the effect of climate chance is the East Africa drought. You need to visit the Wajir and Turkana district in Kenya to view the drought’s impact on pastoralist and agricultural livelihoods. In Wajir District, there are evidences of an almost complete collapse of the pastoralist livelihood. Cattle and camels are dying, and people are weak and malnourished due severe water and food shortages.

What are you doing about it?
We had a lunchtime discussion about climate change and environment degradation and came up with the following points to help draft an organization policy on the environment.

· Consider less flying
· If you must fly, then offset carbon emissions of flying through paying a small sum for each flight to carbon offset organizations (see http://www.responsibletravel.com/ or http://www.carbonfootprint.com)/ or asking your travel agent to do this
· Use of video or teleconferencing may help reduce need for flights in some cases
· Use hotels that are more environmentally friendly - see responsible travel or Tourism Concern website
· Look into whether there are environmentally friendly strip lights
· Buy more glasses, so people don't have to use plastic cups for water
· Buy printers that can print double-sided, and so we can reuse paper that has already been used on one side (then we can photocopy etc double sided)
· Ditto for photocopies
· Recycle photocopier/printer cartridges
· Print less
· Buying recycled loo roll, photocopy and headed paper in bulk
· Buying environmentally friendly soap, washing up liquid, loo cleaner etc in bulk
· Having bags for recycling of plastic and glass
· Turn down/off the heating
· Only use air conditioning when essential, and turn it off after half an hour
· Making the travel expenses also available to interns or volunteers who cycle or walk to work (currently they don't get any travel costs, making it a disincentive to walk or cycle)
· Fix the shower so cycling is more attractive
· See how many copies of each publications we really need to print
· Use recycled and unbleached paper for all of our publications
· Turn all computers, lights, photocopiers off at night or when not in use
· When making tea, be sociable and boil the kettle once and make tea for others on your floor
· If you're able to, use your legs not the lift
· Install dual-flush loos
· No parking outside, so that staff are not encouraged to drive
· Have a shower for cyclists/walkers etc
· Give our database an overhaul so we don't waste loads of reports to people who no longer exist
· Encourage nursing mothers to use traditional cloth nappies instead of pampers
· Use 100% degradable material

Charity
If you would like to help, Merlin, a humanitarian aid charity (where I used to work) has some good projects in East Africa, particularly in Wajir and Turkana district. You may visit http://www.merlin.org/ to donate.

Phallic Glory I

At Work.

It suddenly throbbed into sight as soon as I adjusted the blinds, oh mi gawd! I exclaimed aloud and turned my attention from my work to the gigantic sight in view. There it stood in all its phallic glory, flanked by two testicles-like companions – how could I have missed out on this erotic view up until now.

I reached for my camera avoiding the probing gaze of my colleague who was worried by my sudden distracted and excited state.

I focused my camera and zoomed in on my object of desire, gawd! This thing is so huge; I felt a voyeuristic tingling all over me as I pressed the shutter repeatedly.

I sat down and downloaded the image unto my machine; I have captured it so beautifully, so suggestively. I attached the image and emailed it to the female colleague sitting directly in front of my desk. The subject line was; ‘the shape of things to come tonight!’

I saw her draw her breadth as she read the mail, a smile playing across her lips as she looked at me and mouthed ‘bad boy’.

I smiled back and prayerfully willed myself to become a psychic just for one minute so I could read her thoughts; I bet my life she was imagining herself touching its glans, that topmost tip. I couldn’t stop myself from thinking if it will recoil at a feminine touch, will it pulsate if she held those tender hands around that monstrous shaft?

With the erotic gherkin standing tall in all its magnificent erectness outside my window, work would be fun after all, all I would need would be furtive glances outta my window from time to time. LIKE NOW!

Montgomery Bus Boycott

Have you ever taken time out to observe how people select seats on buses here in London? Do you really know what informed your choice of that particular seat when you travelled home last night by bus.

If you have never given it a thought, then I think it’d be fun if you start to observe how people choose their seats on buses, maybe over the course of next week. You could start by noting down your own choices of seats and why you chose that particular seat.

For sometimes now, I’ve been watching people take seat on buses, I’ve been observing my own choices too and I think our choices of what seat to take on a bus is influenced by these 3 factors: Privacy, Race and availability and in that order too.

Note that my observation is based on the double-seat system on most London buses, where two seats are joined together to form a double-seat which are meant to sit two people comfortably.

Privacy

People get on busses and automatically look for empty double-seats first, if there is a half occupied double-seat close by and an empty one farther down, I have noticed that people would rather walk farther down to take the unoccupied double-seat than have a seat-mate.

Another scenario: lets say two people are sitting on a double-seat and another two sitting behind them, let it happen that the two in the back seat alighted at the same stop, you would often notice that one of the people sitting in the front double-seat will often get up to occupy the now empty double-seat behind. Everybody craves privacy.

Race

Now let it happen that all the double-seats in the bus are half occupied, you would start noticing is that most people would sit with someone who has the same colour as themselves. I often find myself choosing a double-seat occupied by a person of my colour. This has nothing to do with racism. The process of thoughts and action happens spontaneously.

Also sex, sexuality or ethnicity too can come into play here, e.g. let it happen that all the double-seats are half occupied by only black people, A Naija might find another Naija to seat with, a girl might prefer to seat with a girl while a gay would rather pair with another gay.

Availability

Working down from the first 2 scenarios, the 3^rd factor that informs our choice of where to seat will now depend on the availability of seats in the bus. Where a bus is almost full and there are only about a couple of seats available, there will be no option to be selective, you just sit on any available seat or choose to stand.

If I were a programmer, my code for the above mind program would be as follows:

If {Bus = Empty},

Then; Find empty double-seat, Sit alone

If {All double-seat = Half occupied},

Then; Find seat-mate of same colour, sex or sexuality, Sit

If {Bus = Almost full},

Then Sit anywhere

Else: STAND.

{End}.

2 Personalities, 1 love

I got married on Oct 14^th, about 2 weeks ago, My wife will be leaving her job back home to come join me in about a months time.

This is the first time we will be loiving together as couples and I cant wait for her to come. coming to join me in about a month and I am taking stock o

 and I’m reveiwng my life, If I were to mark my past life I would score 0 out of 10 in organization

Me:                     I’m always looking for my socks, shorts and shoes in the morning

My Baby:                She’s already chosen hers the night before, down to her undies and shoes

Me:                     I often wake up on Monday morning to find out that all my clothes are dirty, let alone talk about ironing

My Baby:                She does her ironing a week in advance, she irons the clothes she would wear for the whole week on Sunday.

Me:                     I often give presentaions at work, I only review it 30 minuste to time

My Baby:                She takes time out to study with a view to impressing

Me:                     I attack my food venoumously, and resigns after about average 5 sponfools/mouthfull

My Baby:                She eats slowly, her balls of eba is like an ant’s but finishes the food all the same

Me:                     When I am displeased about something

Todays event, There a suprise office party to a colleague who recently got married (in Cuba), we gathered on the 4^th floor, drank wine, juices and ate cakes and gave a toast for a wonderful married life. I got chatting with the Director (I am new at the organizaytuon, only 4 days old, resumed right after my wedding)  who asked me how I am getting on with the new Job, she said thre isnt many wedding here so it call

Office Hours

e-blogging

Have you ever tried blogging at the office, during office hours? - If you answer no, then you've been missing a thrill. You should try office blogging, imagine how tempting it is to sit on your desk, open your email processor and punch away on the keyboard, I bet you could blog all day long and your boss would not as much as cast a glance at you? of course s/he will think you are emailing a work colleague. E-blogging (publishing blogs by email) is fascinating, the end result is even more appealing - compose your blog as your email body, format as required, specify a subject as the blog title, enter your blogspot email address, hit the send button and get your blog automatically published.

My excitement here is not limited to the adrenalin rush derived from the risk involved in office hour blogging, I 'm also excited that I can get to blog conveniently when ideas are out of my head, fresh and still brewing hot. My advice, however, is to not try blogging at the office if you are struggling with your deadlines, workload or time management.

You see, in terms of performance, I am at my peak during the office hours; fresh and creative, devoid of writer's block. I can just sit down quietly and let my heart out on my machine. If, like me, you always have burning questions on your mind (some of which only God can answer) then you might understand me better. I never intended my blogs to be some sort of a diary of everyday event – no, I wanted to blog my heart out, let the heat on my machine and purge my mind of all burdening life puzzles that I try to find answers to. I am hoping these office hours blogging will bring out the bloggersopher in me.

Burnt Out

I feel so tired after office hours these days that the only thing I want after work is to lay down and sleep. I've been wondering why this is so, prior to coming to the UK, I worked in Abuja, Naija for 5 years and didn't experience (or failed to notice) these after-work fatigue. I can only begin to ponder on these:

• Am I doing more work here in the UK than back in Nigeria - Absolutely No.? as I also worked for International NGO in Abuja and had a similar job description
• Does commuting to work here require a lot more physical stress than back home in Nigeria? Again I would say 'No'. Back in Naija, I drive about 1 hour to work. Here, I just hop on the bus and get to work 15 minutes later
• Do I eat less now? No, my dieting has improved tremendously in this last year. (I'm renowned for skipping meals because I am either too busy with work or cant be bothered to cook)

My ex-boss (british) broke down completely a couple of months ago from exhaustion. He is a good guy and we all (all of us on the finance desk) like him. The department (always) had too much to do and we worked round the clock, as the director, my boss packed on extra responsibities and got completely burnt-out. He was seriously ill for about a month and after recuperation attended therapy sessions before he was nursed back to good health. He left the organization afterwards.
Having seen the effects of over-work and stress, I'm quick to take things slowly and steadily these days. I am learning to:

• Maintain the right work/life balance
• Relax and get enough rest
• Eat even more
• Switch off work completely once I get home
• Go out more often and socialise
• Plan my time and work more effectively and efficiently

Back home in Africa, millions of people work daily without the hope of either a good holiday a quality rest. I wonder how we survive, has poverty given us a thick skin? or did God thoughen us Himself for these challenges? Some of my burning questions.

Today's funny event: My desk at work overlooks the street, looking down a few minutes ago, A woman, whose clamped vehicle was being towed away (for wrong packing), jumped on the towing vehicle and wouldnt come down unless her car was released. I wish I knew how it was eventually resolved, same thing happened to my colleague at the same spot, he paid a penalty of 200 sterling

On a good note: 200 sterling will feed 6 Sudanese orphans for 30 days (Sorry! Remember I work in the charity sector)

Sunday Morning Rambles

On my bed, Sunday 22nd October 2006. 11.47 am.

Missed church again, as I have repeatedly done in the last 10 months.

Oh! I am beginning to think I've lost my identity, the definition of who I really am. I shouldnt sure exist for 'Nothing'; I must either be for God or for the Pub, no pun intended.

As a Naija, we were raised to think that you are either for God or for the devil, it has become absolutely impossible to rid my subconscious of this early life moral. Little wonder I wake up feeling guilty every Sunday morning for not attending a church service .

I've been to church only 4 times in the last 10 months, and of these 4, only once did I willingly go on my own, the other 3 times, I was dragged along by 'force' if you know what I mean.

Why havent I been motivated to attend church services?, is it because I havent found a church that meets my need? Maybe I need to look deep inside and re-define my religion. Whatever the answer is, I know I have often mused about the following in the last couple of months:

• I need a praying church, not an elegant one
• I need a church that dwells more on deep biblical teachings than on demons, leadership training or wealth creation
• I dont like churches that use miracles or beautiful architechure to attract members
• I prefer to sing hymns the orthodox way
• I dont like churches with members worshiping the leader rather than God
• I prefer a simple Pastor to a flamboyant Bishop
• I dont like it when a pastor proportionates my 'tithing' to my making it in life. (I am sure Warren Buffet, Alan Sugar dont pay tithes.)

Maybe I just need a deliverance, to be purged of the 'dont-go-to-church' demon that's living in me.

I am sure next Sunday wont meet me at home, lazing away idly on my bed.

I'd find a church- A good one.