So we hit 20,000 page views in March… Is this what making it looks like? I suppose my head would be a lot more swollen if my views weren't coming from spambots and robots and all the other bots that abound on the internet. On a more serious note, I'm profoundly grateful. I know there are things that I haven't delivered yet. The working titles section is looking less like a to do list and more like a list of things I'll never get round to.

Anyway in true The Ramblings of a Madman fashion this blog post isn't about my booming statistics - And they are booming aren't they? They're literally twice what they were in February, and three times what they were a year ago - it's about the effect that living in Nigeria has had on my temper.

I do not know what it is about Nigeria. I really don't. There must be something in the water. During my four years in Manchester I only lost my temper twice and that's pretty good in my opinion. In the short time that I've been back I've gained the ability to go from calm to murderous in no time at all.

A week or so ago, I was stuck in go slow on my way to the Wheatbaker for supper. The traffic moved a little bit, so I inched forward. That's how these things work. The car in front of you creeps as close to the bumper in front of it as possible, and you do the same. I wasn't expecting the car behind me to ram into me. I didn't see it coming. The accident came at the worst time as well, as some benevolent danfo drivers had just sorted out whatever mess it was that had caused the go slow. I got out of my Mitsubushi Outlander to survey the damage. It wasn't too bad. There was a dent in my bumper stained with the white paint job of the offending mustang. As I wondered how I would go about fixing the damage, the female driver sauntered out of her car haughtily with her phone in her hand and her headphones in her ears. I was preparing to be the gracious accepter of a profound apology when she said, "Why did you stop in the middle of the road?"

That was it. My head blew off. I would have slapped her, but my hands were held down by my love for me. I had the upper hand. If I had hit her, I would have lost my advantage. While the combined powers of my selfishness and conscience were enough to stay my hand, they had little or no effect on my mouth. The words flew from me in an explosion of spit that I delighted in. I had succeeded in spitting on her without actually spitting on her and it wasn't just a droplet of spit either. I counted six sizeable drops as they sailed through the air and landed on her face.

"You rear ended me in go slow, and you are asking me why I stopped in the middle of the road? Can you not see the cars in front of me?"

"You spat on me. Why would you spit on me -"

"Shut up! Are you crazy?! How can you accuse me of causing the accident! You are rude! You hit me and you didn't even have the good grace to apologise!"

"All you needed to say was that we were in traffic -"

"Shut up!" I screamed, cutting her off again. "How did you not realise that we were in traffic? You were on your phone, weren't you?!"

She started to deny it, but I had drawn blood and I wasn't letting up.

I marched to her car eager to prove my theory, but what I found there was much worse than the evidence of a quickly terminated phone call. It was a still burning spliff of what smelled like Arizona.

(Arizona's low grade weed. It smells like the devil's shit, and it's smoked by only three sorts of people, the desperate, the broke and the poor)

I had found my scapegoat. She would become the sacrificial lamb that I used to quieten all my aggravations about life in Lagos.

She started to say that it was a cigarette, and I lost it some more. 

"Shut up! Do you think I'm stupid? I am a degree holder! You were smoking IGBO! Getting high and driving! And after smoking cheap drugs you came here to blame me for the accident? You are a shameless woman!"

I was frothing at the mouth.

Area boys circled me to soothe the fine anger she had stirred but it was to no avail.

"Just beg him" they said to her.

She started to beg but it was too little too late. I was prepared to push the matter. butI knew that if I made even more of an event of it, I could see her to a police station where she would have been thoroughly embarrassed. The Nigerian Police Force can do that much. I have full confidence in them in that regard. But I let it go because I saw that I had stopped being the person that I was before I got here. I couldn't reconcile my actions to my perception of self. I had entered the fray and gone native. You never go native. You're not supposed to go native. Have I gone native?

Happy Days,
Afam

Sometimes, I wonder if this has been the wrong way to go about writing. I've been reading a forum that says, you must never ever write for free. They say you're only ever allowed to write letters for free. I'm not griping about not being paid now, I'm just thinking out loud. Does writing for free cheapen it? It certainly makes it more difficult for any writer that comes after you to make a living off it. For instance I do not think that Bellanaija would ever pay someone who writes like I do, and thinks like I do, when I was out there gifting moderately well written articles. I chose to write for them for exposure. "I need to get my name out there" I thought at the time. "I need to court their audience and steal it for my own" I continued. "If I have even a fraction of their audience, I can monetise it. I can take it to a bank and make something of it." That was the plan. It's still the plan, but I'm not sure if it's a very good one. It's all well and good to be a decent writer, but what many don't realise about writing is that you're a living business. You're exactly the same as a consultant, or an entrepreneur, except that where a consultant sells a service, and an entrepreneur sells his products, you sell the results of your creativity. A bad business decision will fuck you no matter how artistically viable or satisfying it may seem at the time.

Okay so it's 12 in the morning and Papa Afam's watching the tennis. I really want to jam while I write this one but if I dare, he'll come down the stairs and break my coconut head. The conversation will be something like this...

Enter Papa Afam (may he live for a long ass time) and Afam (the man-child behind the blog, the ramblings of a madman by Afam. Is he really mad, is he not, find out within)... (Forgive me, I am trying to sell my market, and optimise my search engine rankings. It's not easy being the top rambling madman on google and yahoo you know? Bing! I'm coming for you) 

Papa Afam: My dear chap, what are you doing up so late?

Afam: I'm working on something extraordinary.

Papa Afam: Are you on drugs again?

Afam: No. I'm not! Why do you always call me a drug addict?

Papa Afam: Because you act like one. How can I send you to school to do economics, and you come back and tell me that you're a blogger? You must be on some cheap drugs!!

Afam: (You cannot expect that I'll have a reply to that. Papa Afam is like a train. He's building up steam. He will not stop until he reaches his destination. He isn't like the American Police. Everything you say during a tirade, can and will be used against you. There is no statute of limitations either. Papa Afam has been known to recount twenty year histories in five minutes. 

Papa Afam: Now, you're listening to music at 12 in the morning, when your mates are studying and resting for work! You are clearly mad! Those cheap drugs have blown your mind.

Or something along those lines. 

But all of that is morbid and dull and issue full and imaginary, because it didn't happen. It might have, but it didn't. In any case it isn't time for that story. It's time for another.

A little while ago, I wrote a piece called, How to dress like a blogger. It wasn't tremendously popular but no matter. I don't obsess over the numbers. If a post isn't doing well, I move on to the next one. Anyway, It just occurred to me, that because I am a blogger, I would need to update it from time to time. You see, I'm not some stagnant fashionisto, I evolve with the times. As a rule, I am not very fashionable. I can be stylish when I put my mind to it, but most of it isn't very good style and that's okay too. There's a chap on Instagram who thinks I'm becoming a style icon, fourteen07style, but I can't fathom it. I suppose that's the way of these things, you don't name yourself. It's always other people that do you the honour or the disservice.

And that's enough of that. I must begin.

My dear Afaminators and Famzers, you cannot sit behind your mother's laptop, bleed words unto a page and call yourself a blogger. No! You must look the part as well! Yes if you are depressed Sheila writes, then you must dress like a depressed person, and if you're a sohosister, then you best dress like a sohosister. I'm the rambling madman, Afam, so I dress the part.

So what the what am I wearing? The trousers are from FCUK. When I got them, they cost a certain price, and the week after, they cost half that. I was devastated. The shoes are Russel and Bromley black tasselled loafers. Every man with smallish feet should have a pair. I like that my feet are small. You see I'm not very tall, so I think it's a good thing that my feet don't protrude to far in front of me. Now let's talk about the shirt, because this one's all about the shirt. The shirt is actually the cloth bag that the lovely people at Stranger Lagos give you when you make a purchase. I shit you not. My make up artist friend, Imoteda, said that she wanted to make hers into a crop top. I immediately attached myself to the idea and declared that I wanted to make a slutty wife beater of a tunic. That is what that is isn't it?

I look like I have decently sized and appropriately well proportioned arms in this one. It is a lie. I am substantially weedier in real life. I think this is my new turn up shirt. I'll reserve it for when I go to Elegushi beach on a Sunday night and I don't care about who's watching or who's there. When you're out there getting your life (that's when you're out there living and all systems are a go) it's important that you're really out there getting your life. It's impossible to get your life when you're wondering about what everybody thinks about you getting your life. Sometimes, that's why I dress like a madman. It's my form of peacocking. If I wear that very very questionable shirt, or those abominably bad muay thai shorts that I love so, then I already know what you're thinking of me so I don't need to agonise about it. Does that make sense? Clothes aren't just clothes you know? They're deep. They're deeper than deep.They're balls deep, and that's very deep indeed.

Where was I going dressed like this? Well, to be perfectly honest, I wasn't going anywhere, but since when do you need an excuse to dress up? I suppose this is my brand of madness. Why do you have to follow the curve? Say you wanted to dance, but you didn't have anyone to dance with, would you stay at home on a Friday night, or would you take the leap and see where the night takes you. There's a magic to living in the present. When you live in the present every moment's just so pregnant with opportunity.

Happy Days,
Afam

When I wrote this one, I was writing some copy for a client. It was a little bit weird that I was writing two completely different things simultaneously. Who said men can't multi-task eh? Anyway, I was disturbed by the shocking number of "take care of your man" articles out there. I cannot fathom why a man is essential. Sometimes we make deals that are senseless. Yes, you have a husband but now you're depressed. Yes, everyone thinks you've got everything but you know you've got nothing. And then you'll die. That'll be it. There has to be more to life than walking on eggshells for the sake of someone else. So, I took all the advice I'd heard over the years, and I wrote it down. I stripped it down and presented it as I saw it. That's what I generally try to do on the blog. The result was caustic sarcasm that covered its ass. As a writer, you must cover your ass. It's particularly essential when you're dealing with controversial issues, that apply to so many people. 

Mama Afam didn't like it. She thought it was too real. She said she knows too many people who lived like that to find it funny, no matter how ridiculous the writing got. I didn't want to stick the disclaimer on the end of it, at first. I thought my feminist credentials would show everyone that it was satirical, but my editors advised me to cover my ass, and so I did. 

This one was very well received by the Bellanaijarians who read it all the way through. I did however enjoy some of the comments from the people that didn't.

Luis Garavito: Admitted to the rape and murder of 147 young boys. Pedro Lopez: Accused of raping and killing over 300 girls across South America.

I quite liked this one. It made me laugh. Dog god alien fucker... it's very very very catchy.

Happy Days,
Afam

It's been four days since my last blog and I feel terrible. Well, I don't feel that terrible, but I don't think there's another adjective that'll do the job effectively so terrible will have to do. Truth be told I only feel mildly bad. If I was a millionaire and a blogger, maybe I'd have the time to feel very very terrible, but I'm not and so I don't. Between the 70 kilometres of driving I get through every day driving to my 9 to 4 and back, and the bags under my eyes, I can't feel guilty. Guilt? For who? All my feelings at the moment are reserved for Self pity. Yes, I pity myself goddammit! I'm tired, and I want to cry, and I touch my face like a chronic masturbator touches his penis. It's a coping mechanism.

I thought it'd be interesting if I started a public journal about writing and my writing journey. Journey makes you cringe a little doesn't it? Yeah, me too, it sounds like I'm an X factor contestant, and I'm about to insert every tragedy that's ever befallen me into a 30 second segment. But I'm not. I'm not open enough for that.

The other day, I introduced myself as a blogger. I said, "Hey, I'm Afam, and I'm Vimbai's personal blogger." I was at the time. I liked it. I like knowing what I am, and having boxes I can put myself in. There's a certain discomfort to being unlimited or undefined. It's that if you are unlimited and or undefined then the world has no idea how to process you. You cannot be introduced to introduced to anyone properly.

When it comes to meeting new people, I'm a mess. Am I Dami? Am I Afam? Or am I both? And what if you meet me when I'm Afam, and we become good friends, then I'd really rather be Dami to differentiate between the people that know me in a way that isn't professional, and the people who know me because I blog.

I didn't feel bad about introducing myself as a blogger then because I didn't imagine that it might cheapen me. Apparently blogging isn't serious writing. I think that's bullshit, but I would wouldn't I? When someone takes something that you do quite seriously as a joke it's bound to chafe a little bit. Oh well. I don't have the answer. I don't have any answers.

I used a new word today, incarnadine. I never imagined that it'd come out of my head, but there was a moment, and it felt right. No. It felt better than right. There are only so many times you can write magenta in an essay, so it was incarnadine, or reddish pink, or fuchsia. I chose incarnadine.

It's 3:15 in the morning, and I've got some editing to do before I make the drive to work. I work hard you know? I work hard, but I don't always work well. I use way too many thats when I write. It skews the writing towards the chatty in a way that is neither clever nor enlightening. It makes it clunky. Clunkiness is death.

Happy Days,
Afam

I was going to start this one by apologising for having a cook. You know how it is. In the world today, before you talk about wealth, especially your wealth or your family's wealth, you must first apologise for being wealthy. And I'm not saying that the Afam family is a wealthy one. All you need to know is that Papa Afam (may God bless his incredible soul) works hard and can afford to pay the school fees of the only child he has that's still in school, and that I, Afam also work hard but cannot afford to put petrol in the car that I drive. I'm not complaining. You would think I would hate it, but I don't. There's something about being monumentally broke when you're in your early twenties. It's a little bit of a communal experience. It's even more unifying when you're a writer of sorts. Do you know how many broke writers there are out there? No? That's because no one knows. It is possible that if my cook was as skilled as the rat in ratatouille, I would have felt guilty enough to apologise for my privilege. What privilege you wonder? It's the my parents both went to university, worked like bastards, and sacrificed like martyrs so that they and their children could live well privilege. But he isn't. I suppose that's the wrong thing to say. He is skilled in a way. He can chop and dice and fry and boil, but he's got the imagination of a boiled egg. That is to say that he is so unimaginative that I imagine that he must have been the recipient of a lobotomy at birth. He once served yam porridge, potato porridge, sweet potato porridge and plantain porridge in the same week. I was aghast. I starved. I'm incapable of coming back after my 9 to 5 to eat porridge. I'd rather eat nothing at all, and so I haven't been eating.

While all of that is quite terrible, it doesn't top what he did two days ago. I had a meeting in the morning, for some project I'm supposed to be working on quite soon and I didn't have any time for breakfast so I raced out of the house at eight with a mug of coffee, dreaming about what I would eat for supper. I usually don't eat out because I always regret it. When you're as broke as I am, you vacillate between berating yourself for your profligate ways and languishing in your perpetual lack of disposable income. My day that day ended at about eight. I dragged my feet through the door and asked Caderouse for my supper. I was famished! I was ravenous. I was on the brink of dying of hunger. Here is what Caderouse brought me.


Somebody's getting fired.

Happy Days,
Afam

I’ve blogged about this before but no matter. I blogged about so long ago that even I, Afam, the Rambling Madman, behind the blog THE RAMBLINGS OF A MADMAN by Afam, cannot remember what it was it was about. If you were able to follow the monstrosity that was the previous sentence then kudos - well done. You are gifted, and I am a villain for tasking your brain so.