Ratogiddy! Reptoville! Mushroomville!

Howdy Y’All,


Trust you are doing great and enjoying summer one way or another – or should I say whatever is left of it; though na rain dey knack us for Las Giddy!

Thanks for your continued readership and support!


For this edition, here goes:


1. Picture this: Ratogiddy! I suddenly started seeing tiny ‘poo’ droplets around my kitchen – on the work top, on the cooker top, on the sink top, on the freezer top, practically everywhere!
One night I had a little cold and had sneezed and blown my nose significantly into some tissue paper by my bed side. When I woke up in the morning, there were bits of tissue littered by the bed side. I said to my self that this must have been done by roaches or so.
Then I noticed some evidence of tampering on the tuber of yam in the kitchen, tampering on some potatoes etc. On another evening, I brought out some tomatoes & peppers that had lost their lives in the fridge due to NEPA issues and left them in a bowl on top of the freezer for disposal. By morning time, there were bite marks on them!

For days, I deluded myself that the droplets were from roaches, though the bite marks on the tomatoes began to drastically change my orientation. I just completely refused to believe that I had a rat visitor(s) until I went to the kitchen one early evening and saw something dash from one end of the room to another.

I was completely freaked out! I didn’t anticipate this in anyway and done well so far without their intrusion! The kitchen door went to permanent closure! Then it suddenly occurred to me that the chewed bits of tissue found by my bed side that morning was none other than from the rat! Oh my days! I was utterly disgusted, irritated and freaked! I also later found some movement of some stuffs towards my headrest side of the bed. What really got to me on this one was the fact that I didn’t hear, see or feel anything when the visitor was around! Was I so dead to the world or was it the sound of the generators that created that temporary deafness? How a rat could have snuck up a few inches away from me via the space underneath my doorway and I didn’t know about it? What else may have been done that I wasn’t aware of? Please don’t imagine? Please!

Well, I had to go look for and purchase rat poison. Till date, though it seemed to have disappeared, I’m not sure if that was due to the poison, a miracle or my earnest plea to God because I’m yet to discover the skeleton(s) or smell any carcasses!


2. Noticed some light studs on some roads in Ikeja – you know those ones that light up the motorways in jand when you get to parts where there are no lamps / lights. I was quite chuffed to see them!


3. I’m sure you would have heard by now about the part closure of the famous bridge currently causing chaos in Las Giddy! So plan your trip to Las Giddy accordingly.


4. Picture this: Cutlery handout! Did you know that as part of handouts at parties, people give out cutlery pieces. Well not quite like how its done from those lovely wedding gift lists from JL et al. What some people do is that a pack of 24 pieces for instance may be distributed amongst 12 guests! So some people may get 1 fork and 1 knife; some may get 1 teaspoon and 1 regular spoon! C’mon, isn’t this pathetic? Habi na by force to give handout? Na waya o! So my people, when next you visit someone in Las Giddy, watch out for all those ‘iya o ba baba tan’ pieces – they may just have originated from various parties your hosts / hostesses have attended! :)


5. Picture this: The Nepa situation seems to have improved a bit o! There was a day when we had light for a good 24hours non-stop – in fact I got scared because of this unusual phenomenon! Then for the last couple of weeks (at least before I checked out), we’ve been consistently getting electricity supply from around 12midnight to about 12midday. Well, fine, no light when you get back from work but hey, half loaf is better than nothing o!
So for this, I’m forever grateful to God Almighty!


6. Remember the last time, I reported on an oil tanker incidence. Well there have been more fatalities. There’s been a jack-knifed lorry and a burnt oil tanker around the same location as the last time. Then, there’s been a fatal lorry and car accident at almost the exact location as the last oil tanker incidence. Plus the other horrible incidence at Apapa as reported in the dailies probably because it affected Obafemi Martins!
One begins to wonder whether there’s more to it than meets the eye!

May God’s protection continue to abound towards us all! Amen.


7. Picture this: Alayonbere! On one lovely morning, I woke up to no light. I went about my usual morning chores in prep for work. As I did this, I noticed a dark spot on one side of the living room in the darkness. I didn’t think anything of it but still felt compelled to put my right foot on the spot. To my greatest horror that morning the ‘dark thing’ moved! Guess what, it was an ‘Alayonbere’ – snake lizard as some of us know it to be.

I was utterly terrified as the thing crawled up to the highest point on the wall in the living room. After the rat incidence, I’d adopted stuffing up the underneath of each door around the house but what I didn’t do was to stuff up the entrance door upstairs. Meanwhile my room is the closest to this door, I can’t begin to imagine whether or not my room wouldn’t have been the first port of call had I not adopted the stuffing up!

I retreated to my room in fear to dress up and hurriedly got out of the house. I spent the rest of the day beseeching the Lord to make a way of escape for this thing as my mind played a huge one on me on all the horror stories I’d heard about this thing whilst in boarding school.

When I got back home in the evening, I armed myself with the security guard and got him to lead the way to do justice to it should it still be around. Behold, it was not in sight and nowhere to be found. For the next few days I lived in my house in fear.
Some of the horrors of living in Las Giddy! This morning, I saw a snake as thick as my upper arm and about maybe 8 to 10 feet long that had been caught near Sheraton ‘again’! Remember the Anaconda report that was near this same Sheraton too. Hope they don’t form part of the menu o!

Thank the Lord for his mercies!


8. Picture this: Mushroomville! As you know, we’ve been in the raining season for a few months and my house has not been without its leaking challenges – the only room without a leak in the house is the kitchen! In fact, when the leaking starts especially with heavy down pours, I just turn a blinder these days until I made a discovery!

Right under my very nose, in my bedroom – a few yards away from my bed, I discovered ‘Mushrooms’! Now, the AC spot in the room leaks so much water despite the fact that there’s an AC in the hole. Obviously, the carpenter had done a shoddy job with the covering and with me not knowing who else to turn to who will be trustworthy; I just learnt to cope with the leaking. I basically ‘collect’ the water, in previous times with a bowl but in recent times with a permanent ‘unused bed sheet’! So, due to the heavy down pours, it had become permanently damp hence why the mushrooms suddenly found a lovely environment to grow! So I was thinking – if mushrooms can grow there, I wonder what else may just spring forth one of these days!

Meanwhile on the outer part of the AC, there are a few bed nests – so I equally regularly contend with those birdies for some peace and quiet!

Ha, I tire o!


9. Picture this: Car key wahala! One night, after a long day of meetings, I got home at around 10pm and firstly hurriedly dismissed the driver. As I tried to get my stuff out of the trunk, the key got stuck and wouldn’t budge. After fiddling with it for a few good minutes, I had to give up because I was fatigued and I could barely see, as there was no light. I gave up and left it in the key hole over night.

When the driver appeared in the morning, he found the key hanging and began to have a go! The key refused to budge o! I sprayed almost all the WD40 I had at home with no result. Meanwhile, all this time, I knew I only had 1 key – no spare that is, but it just didn’t occur to me to cut another key.

So here was me faced with a dilemma at home on a very critical day for me at work. Ideally, I would have just left the car and the driver to battle it out whilst I took a cab to work, I however couldn’t do that because I was blocking my neighbour’s car!
The panel beater was brought in but almost to no avail (as you know, any repair work required in 9ja would almost always be a job for the panel beater)! Each time I mention something that needs attention, the driver will say lets call the ‘panel beater’ – just been wondering what they are beating! Do we have PBs in jand or yankee? Abeg let me know o!

Anyway sha, at the point of almost considering breaking the windscreen – even at the uncertainty of this resolving the issue because of the central-lock mechanism; tugging at the key for over 2hours; calling the mechanic for his ‘divine’ input (but alas none; he simply said to leave the key alone to prevent breakage); the key in its own time got un-stuck and the truck opened up! Ha, choi!


10. Picture this: Yet another horror! One night, I suddenly heard some thudding sounds from the ceiling – as in, in the space between the roof and the internal ceiling. ‘My sleep left me in a jiffy’ as I startled fearfully out of my sleep. A few minutes later, I heard the ‘gbururu’ sounds again. Somehow I realised we had some heavy nocturnal visitors there – heavy rodents! In bravery, I got up and inspected all the ceilings around the house to ensure they hadn’t broken through in any way and to ensure I hadn’t developed holes in the ceiling suddenly!

A few days later I was conversing with my neighbours and they explained to me that they experience it too and more so in a more intimate manner – that the rats have found a way to visit them in the house!
Since that discovery, it has almost become a nightly affair to hear them running around a few times!

So this is it o for this episode!

I shall keep you posted on other Las Giddy happenings! Take care everyone and God bless!

Ciao.


Always & Always,
Moi (Keeping It Real)