4 Reasons You Should Read The Broadcast Messages Your Parents Send To You

If you ever wondered where your parents get those videos—the "Happy New Month" videos with the jazz sound track and the glittering letters, well, welcome to the club, it appears we will never know. My 4 parents love to send me broadcast messages and videos that have been forwarded to them by friends. The real mystery is who the people who create and peddle out these messages are. They sure know how to cover their tracks.

Our parents love them anyway.  In a way, it’s a little endearing to see them embrace technology and social media so readily. Their generation really is the real MVP. They were privileged enough to witness town-criers as kids, send telegrams and hand-written letters as young adults, they used those phones with the circular number dials in the 80s and 90s, then they moved to digital phones and faxes, then came emails, cellular phones and texting. My dad owned texting! He probably came up with at least half of the acronyms used in texting today, some of them my siblings and I are still trying to decipher until date. Owned it!

I miss using this phone! 

Seriously though, that generation amazes me, the way they have adapted to the times and adopted technology so fast.

If I were them, I’d have given up right after telegrams. So the next time they send you a message, regardless of the quality of the media, here are 4 reasons you should read it:

1. To humor them(and yourself):  The messages our parents send actually make the news at our dinner table. Ed and I go like,“Did you see the message dad sent out today?” Then we either reflect or laugh or be grossed out(my mum once sent a video of a chicken farm attendant pumping chickens with gallons of fat till they were double their sizes. We did not eat chicken for a month. Then she sent one about canned fish…)

2. To learn: Surprisingly some of these messages could be quite informative. We owe several lifestyle changes to some  of the broadcasts my parents and Ed’s parents send to us. For example, we have started drinking more water, eating more fruits and vegetables and are thoroughly aware that Jesus is coming back soon, through the not-so-gentle-reminders.

3. So you can discuss with them next time you speak: You know that moment when mum excitedly asks,”Did you see the video I sent to you?” and you start to stutter. Never to happen again! These messages make great conversation starters, and mum is glad that you acknowledged her message. The best child award goes to you.

4. To smile and remember how awesome they are: All 4 parents of mine love to send "Good Morning" messages, "Happy New Month" messages, messages containing motivational content as well as debatable political views. My favorite are the conspiracy theories. I personally love conspiracy theories and have mine stacked up in my mind. It makes me glad to know where I got this from. Lol! I try to send some back as well when I can. Yes, I admit, sometimes I'm a peddler, but only because it makes them happy!

How about you? Do your parents send you these broadcast messages? Which was the best? Are you a broadcast peddler? 

7 Quirky Phobias and the People who benefit from them.

I'm on a magnified feel-good-optimistic streak this month; so much that in this post we are going to talk about the benefits of phobias! Well, we are going to talk about phobias - and the people that would benefit when other people have those phobias. One man's 'bo!' is another man's boo.

One thing is certain, having a phobia doesn't benefit the person who has it, in any way, (well except phobia #1).

Below are 7 whimsically interesting phobias, which of them would you benefit from? 

1. Mageirocophobia

The fear of cooking.

Who this benefits: Me.

 "Babe, I have Mageirocophobia. *innocent stare* Lets eat out, forever!" That's what I'd say. However, we all know that's not the best idea. Cooking your own meals helps you monitor the quality and quantity of ingredients used!

2. Pogonophobia

The fear of Beards.

Who this benefits: My mum.

She doesn't get the beard-gang trend at all! I keep telling her, "Mum, Jesus had a beard!" Lol!

3. Chaetophobia

The fear of loose or detached hair (or bundles of Brazilian hair).

Who this benefits: Boo.

Having chaetophobia means no extra expense on over-priced extensions. I think I've had a mild case of Chaetiphobia before. I bought this Grade A Peruvian bundle once and honestly, it felt like it was alive! It was that authentic.

4. Ablutophobia

The fear of bathing

Who benefits: No one. No one at all.

No comment. Actually, comment: There's no substitute for a bath. I just checked, not even air baths. 

5. Eurotophobia

The fear of female genitalia

Who benefits: Your parents (if you are a guy)

They'd love for you to be europhobic until you are like 27 and you have a job and can actually afford to have a baby.

6. Anuptaphobia

The fear of being single

Who benefits: The Yoruba demons and Arch-demons.

Being frightened of living for months unhitched only causes you to run into the arms of the bad boys and if you are a guy, into the arms of a girl-demon. Choose not to live in fear. Nothing inspired by fear can end well.

7. Chronophobia

The fear of time passing

Who this benefits: Your doctor's mortgage payments.

Whenever I have a badly planned day, I admit I end up with a mild case of chronophobia. Actually, if you ever say "24 hours is not enough!" You might be well on your way to this phobia. Try planning your day the night before and tick off your to-do items as you go! That way, you don't have panic attacks and sporadic palpations that require you to see you Doctor often. 

Do you have Pentheraphobia (fear of your mother in law)? Read here to figure out how to deal!

Do you have any phobias? Who would they benefit?

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3 and a Half Ways to End a Relationship- by Skip

If you read PGI often, you might know Skip, our anonymous reader who sends me letters and calls me "Lix". Whether he's talking about his kissing conundrum or about finding the one, he never fails to crack us up. Here's his latest letter where he talks about ending a relationship without looking like a jerk. Enjoy!

Dear Lix,

It’s been a while and I miss you too.

Nothing much has been happening, except that I’ve really been trying to figure out exactly who I am and what I’m here for; so I’ve stopped eating healthy, I don't think I’m supposed to be about that balanced-diet-fit-fam life, although I recently started fixing the sheets once I finally wake up in the morning; it’s crazy, I’m like a machine, I’m up, wham bam, bed fixed! I consider this cool and very adult. Also, no more pre-marital sexing on that bed. Not anymore. I have moved all that business to the guest room; I’m like a machine.   

So this morning, I realized she was gone and it really hurt me. No heads-up, no conversation, nothing! She left with all her sweetness and hotness, even groundnut too. My boli woman was always there for me, always always, and I’m all for road reconstruction and better infrastructure, but when the government decides to interfere with my relationship and move her away, that’s where I draw the line. I strongly feel these past months together can’t have been for nothing, I bet she knew weeks ago that she would have to leave and she didn’t say anything; she was today’s plan for lunch.

Maybe she couldn’t bear to see my disappointed face. Maybe she didn’t care. Maybe she did. Maybe she left a note. Maybe last night’s rain washed away her note; although a note is hardly the fitting way to end what we had. I even told her at times when I had to travel. Lix, do you remember that ex that thought I would be interested in making the 6-hour journey to attend her wedding? She also thought it was appropriate to end our 4-year relationship with a text message. It’s like nobody knows how to breakup properly, because that’s what happened to me this morning, it was a breakup, and I’m not going to put this one on the government.

Meanwhile, let me share the 3 most appropriate ways to breakup since this has suddenly become about that:

1. Speak your truth.

Speak your truth and end with ‘…so I think we should end this’. By truth, I mean the honest reasons everybody thinks they want to hear, that they deserve to hear, until they hear and then they wish that they didn’t, like ‘Agnes, I really don’t like you anymore, so I think we should end this’, ‘Agnes, I’ve met someone better for me so….’, ‘Agnes, although it was my idea, I can’t handle the distance so…’, ‘Agnes, I just had the best sex with someone else....in the guest room, so…’, ‘Agnes, your house is in Festac so…’. Whatever you do, don’t chicken out with Agnes, it’s not you, it’s me. You may text, BBM or WhatsApp your truth. You can also put it in a note but make sure to write legibly and throw in a few xoxo’s at the end; I give you extra points if you tweet your truth @Agnes.

2. Restore to Factory Settings

This is way easier but takes a longer time than speaking your truth. Basically, what you to do is nothing! Act like there was never a relationship. Stop visiting or hanging out, stop those long phone conversations, and maybe don’t even pick up calls. Remember you’re a busy person, so make sure to reschedule every time he/she tries to meet up. Make sure to be as cordial as possible though, nobody is fighting with anybody! If he/she tries to start fight, don’t do it, apologize and promise to be better but don’t be better. In two months or less, you’ll be single and if you play this just right, he/she will break up with you and then you get extra points.

This requires you to be an Asshole and I know this comes more naturally to some folks while others may have to dig deeper to find their inner asshole, but it gets the job done; especially if you’re in the business of hurting people: and breaking up is all about hurting people, whether or not you mean to, so you might as well be the best asshole you can be.

You know that boyfriend who went funny and you don’t know what happened because he was so very cool and you loved him really hard? Now you know he couldn’t speak his truth so he restored to factory settings!

3. Fake your death.

Fake your death. The key here is to "Fake it". If at any point you realize you’ve died for real, then you haven’t done this right; so you died and made wrong life choices, I hope you now realise it wasn’t even that deep.

There may be a 4th appropriate way called “The Idealist-ist”, this is where you bla bla bla bla I’m tired of making stuff up! See Lix, I don’t think breakups are meant to be “appropriate”. Boli women leave and hurt you, you find better Boli so you start buying from someone else, you decide to balance-diet-fit-fam because, summer body, so you stop eating Boli.

Breakups are by their nature very horrible, at least for one person. “We had such a magical evening, and the breakup made it even more special”, said no one. I’m certain if someone decides to stop being with you, there’s not much you can do; and maybe it honestly isn’t you, and it’s them, I don’t know. 

I guess if you have to, just do it!

Abi?

On your sofa,

Skip.

Disclaimer: PGI does not endorse the happenings of Skip's guestroom.

Related posts: 8 reasons you might be stuck in a bad relationship; The sunny side of your breakup; What to expect when you call up an ex!

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