There's this native proverb that translates to "as long as its the first time you are seeing a friend in the year even though it is on the last day the of the last month of the year in question, it is proper to greet them by saying - Happy New Year" with that in mind and feeling rather pleased with myself for remembering to do this while the year is still young, I holler a big and cheerful "Happy New Year!!!" to friends, family and fans who are alive and able to read this post.
May this year be one of fulfillment, accomplishment and victories for you.
Walking along the road and cursing the bitter weather, I often wish I had my PC on hand to nag/whine/grumble about how wicked the weather is being and my suspicion that earth has a personal vendetta for me.
What I have done to offend it?
I cannot say.
I know that complaining about the weather would not make it any more bearable but then again wouldn't it?
Based on the marked absence of my once traditional "*Christmas Mangoes" it is safe to say that there is really something up with the weather.
In school between doodling around the edges of my notebook during lectures and willing the time to move faster so I could make it in at the precise moment to eat hot jollof rice with fried plantain/moi-moi and goat meat at Main Gate Restaurant (going too early gets you the tasteless potty-like top of the pot of rice, while going too late gets pieces of fat/bone pretending to be goat meat on your plate of rice often times minus the plantain) a particular discussion caught my attention.
The lecturer was talking about Greenhouse gases, the pros and the cons.
At the moment, I can't recall the precise details of the lecture or what brought about that discussion but what I do recall is that Greenhouse gases was fingered to be reason behind the missing mangoes.
Before I get carried away and go on and on about what other fruits might have gone missing or changed their delivery dates, it occurs to me that persons who were not in that particular lecture with me might still be stuck on “Greenhouse gases” and wondering how a curious green house and probably cooking gas are responsible for missing mangoes or worse be considering that a man named Greenhouse proposed a theory of Gases.
I’d spare your amazing brains the trouble of wandering off to wherever in search of an answer by giving what I believe is a layman’s take.
Greenhouse gases combine to form a nice fuzzy blanket around the earth that allows just enough sunlight to get to us so the planet can be nice and warm. Without the greenhouse gases, earth would be a very cold planet. With this nice greenhouse “blanket” present, when the suns gives off energy, even though the it is miles away, the earth is able to retain just heat to keep us warm while the excess heat goes back to the atmosphere.
Greenhouse gases occur naturally which now seems to be a problem for us because we humans are creating more green house gases than is needed (it’s like feeling a little cold and deciding to sleep on a water heater - something you should never ever consider doing between) because not enough heat is leaving the planet while more heat is being accepted from the sun it is getting quite hot in here! As a result, we are witnessing effects of greenhouse gases and global warming. We have floods, lands drying up, some animals dying out, change in seasons (no more mangoes in December) and so on.
Before we have another ice age, evolution, or whatever, it would be a good idea to begin to nag/whine/grumble about the weather so that more people get concerned, ask questions find solutions and practice ways to reduce production of greenhouse gases plus save energy (long story).
On the long run, who knows maybe 10 years from now, I can get my Christmas mangoes in December and see if I am still daring enough to eat more than I know I should at one go.
Until then, welcome to the year twenty-fourteen.
Cheers!
*wink*wink*
*Four to six years ago during Christmas period and early January in my village, I would make myself sick by eating too much mangoes fresh off the trees a pleasurable experience I believed was worth the pain afterwards.
