I always figured I was in the wrong profession. Not that I’ll even get away with trying to sell my body. A sell-by date doesn’t even apply in my case. I doubt that I’d ever pass any type of screening that would declare me fit for purpose for what seems to be a very lucrative trade in austere times.

Legend has it that there’s only 2 professions in the world that are recession proof. Being an undertaker and prostitution. You’ll never run out of a ready customer base willing to pay the going rate for services rendered.

But of course once in a while someone just takes the piss and redefines their own rules in the market. Take poor old Dawn. She thought she’d hit the jackpot, but didn’t account for her client being a thief. For the record, whoever pays for sex to the tune of £1.7 million in less than 3 years deserves to be locked up in prison and the keys thrown away. That kind of stupidity endangers the human gene pool.

It’s bad enough that the guy steals over £3 million from his employer, but he should have been executed for the manner in which he spent the proceeds of the heist.

The lady argues that her sexual services were value for money and the guy was prepared to pay the market rate – a rate her accountant estimates at about £20,000 a week. Even the judge in this case hard a problem with that appraisal of the defendants market value as a professional provider of horizontal refreshments. Which makes you really ask the question – is any pussy worth circa £3K a day? The law of the land clearly thinks not.

But then again, what price do you put on someone being a platinum idiot and agreeing to pay that amount. The lady is clearly aggrieved that she’s losing the fruits of her loins, literally – but you really can’t argue about a judge clawing back the proceeds of crime. It’s forbidden fruit.

My take – she should have hired a more savvy accountant to keep her hard earned money away from the long arm of the criminal justice system. There’s nothing that’s more of a bastard than thinking you’ve earned £1.7 million for a judge to tell you “actually, sweet heart – you need to pay that shit back”.

Or maybe she should have opted to become an undertaker. There are no grey areas when it comes to splitting hairs over the prices of the services rendered.

So I’ve also joined this twitter thing. I’m told its safer and more sane than MKZ – but what do I know. You can follow me on twitter and find out whether I get the hang of it.

So a few weeks ago while relaxing with some friends, I was asked to consider talking some sense into a dead beat dad – who for all intents and purposes, had left a poor girl at the traffic lights, literally holding the baby.

I guess I was only asked when it turned out that I actually went to high school with the said dead beat dad. You’ll be surprised how 6 degrees of separation can make the world smaller than it really seems.

I think we were talking about how kids change people’s lives – and one conversation too many ended up with the story of my former schoolmate. The said girl abandoned at the traffic lights is his ex-missus, so you can just picture where this conversation went short of wishing that she had actually been with us at the time.

I’ll plead the 5th amendment right here on going into the specific story of this couple for the simple reason that there’s a very high possibility that they will be directed to read this post.

I don’t consider myself a marriage counsellor, but for what it’s worth, I thought that this once, I’d provide a public service based on my experience and that of my peers. If it helps even one girl to make better choices in men – or convinces even one other guy to take care of responsibilities, then the post is most definitely worth my time.

It’s certainly easier than sitting down to talk sense to – you know who.

Girls, here’s 5 Stone Cold sure fire ways to identify a dead beat dad from a mile off.

1. Follow your instincts

God gave you instinct to protect you from the evil in this world. Use the damn instincts and save yourself from the world.

The best advice you can ever get is not to get yourself into certain situations especially when all your faculties are telling you that it’s plain madness. Your body is wired to be selective and to use any stimuli it can to detect what is inherently dangerous for you.

You have signs all over that only you choose to ignore – habits, what he says, what he does, the choices he makes, the risks he takes – even his scent gives you an indication about how dangerous the proposition is.

Let’s get one thing out of the way – you’re not going to totally avoid danger. There’s no such thing as zero risk. Everything you do is risky.

Even for a guy, looking at a girl’s ass is risky because it presents options not previously available. For a girl, the risks are different. I’m just saying listen to your instincts and minimize that risk.

2. Follow your instincts again (ground hog day, huh?)

Of course we live in a world where warm blooded males and females have raging sexual hormones so it’s inevitable that you’re going to get laid.

Having made that choice, you still need to exercise a level of ruthlessness that will put Jack Bauer to shame.

Simply put – unless you’re totally convinced that the man you’re shagging is material for being a decent father – never let him anywhere near an ejaculation. It’s his right to blow his load, but it doesn’t have to be inside you.

There’s a very big difference between boys that you want to get jiggy with and satisfy your sexual desires, and daddy material. For the former, you can pick up any rough neck from wherever.

But unless you’re sure the dude is made of daddy stuff – bullet proof yourself from conception even if you have to use a cocktail of birth control methods at the same time.

My point here is that the choice of who you have unprotected sex with is not for legislation. Just make sure if anything goes wrong, he’s someone who you can take home to your parents with a modicum of self respect and explain yourself.

3. Love is over-rated

When it comes to bringing up kids, there’s absolutely no place for romance. Your relationship with your man has little or nothing to do with the day to day responsibilities of raising and caring for a child.

It’s a full time job 24-7. Contrary to folklore – love will not conquer.

Bringing up children will test you in all the ways you can think of. It will make you scream, it will make you cry, it will make you curse. They focus on the fact that it’ll make you happy and provide you with something to live for yada yada yada.

Let’s get one thing straight – even your mother can’t prepare you for the drama your children will unleash on you. You’re mother has already had her share with you and your siblings and if anything, she’ll be laughing because of all them times you gave her grief.

There’s a lot you can already tell about how your man will cope with the responsibilities of bringing up a child. Does he have selfish habits? Does he still think you can both go gallivanting around town and hanging with the boys and stuff? Does he look at you with that ”how do I change this diaper” face? Does he roll over and fall asleep oblivious of the sleepless nights the kids are unleashing on you? Does he find it strange that being a father involves things like – giving the baby a bath and reading to them?

Love has a place in relationships, but this isn’t one of them.

4. It’s all around you – don’t ignore it

The bachelor pad tells you a million things a guy will never tell you. Everything from how clean the toilet is to what he has in the fridge is a message.

There’s something wrong with someone who’s driving a luxury car with all the trimmings, yet he doesn’t have enough toilet roll in the house or the stuff in his fridge expired 4 months ago but he hasn’t noticed. The car seats are more comfortable than his sofa, and the walls are overdue a lick of paint.

You can tell a lot from how often dude changes his sheets, to the extent and immaculate way (or not) he has wired his surround system in his bachelor pad.

Kids cost money – don’t let anyone lie to you and you can tell a lot about how a guy can cope with the financial responsibility by observing how he spends his money.

The point here is that the signs that a child will throw a monkey wrench into dude’s whole programme are there to be seen.

5. If he says he doesn’t want a child – listen to the bastard

I couldn’t be any blunter if I tried. He’s not ready so just move right along and find yourself another guy.

The years and time invested so far with him can never justify the heartache you’ll put an unwanted child in.

Cut your losses and run taking comfort from the fact that it’s better to have loved and lost than to have spent your whole life masturbating. It could be worse – believe me.

And guys, don’t worry – I have my own personal tips about how to totally avoid the dodgy broody girls you have to stay miles away from.

Unfortunately, they don’t come with signs written ’Certified Psycho’. Fatal attraction is nothing compared to what these girls will do to make your life hell.

When news about the devastating earthquake that hit Haiti started filtering through last week, my first thought was ”watch the vultures ride into town”

Even my wife was confused by my perceived indifference and reference to the aid and humanitarian organisations as vultures, as they geared up for what is turning out to be the biggest peace time humanitarian disaster of our generation, save for the 2004 Tsunami.

The earthquake and its aftershocks have caused untold devastation and suffering to the people of Haiti. Lord knows they need all the help they can get, and in principle, I have absolutely no problem with a coherent humanitarian effort followed by a structural programme to rehabilitate the country’s infrastructure.

Inevitably with such situations, the ugly side of the self righteous aid and development industry bears its teeth. It’s a conversation many people in the aid industry don’t want to have as they bury their heads in the sand.

Watch the news now, and it’s more to do with aid agencies marketing themselves and fund raising than actually doing the bread and butter things that helps stabilize relief issues in Haiti. Every aid agency you can think of are in town from Red Cross to Oxfam, from the Sisters of Guayando to The Pillars of Christian Faith, from Handicap International to Doctors Without Borders.

The question has to be asked though? Are all these people working with a silo mentality really helping? Some of the aid agencies are already being accused of focusing on the marketing opportunities the media coverage is providing. If you work in the aid industry, you’ll be well aware of the potential of fundraising off such a disaster.

Aid agencies are even claiming ownership of the relief efforts by using slogans like ”Spearheading the relief efforts” or ”Leading the relief challenge” – as if it was a job that belonged to that agency.

The blunt reality is that the co-ordination of the relief effort is incompetent at best and tragic at worst. The people of Haiti are already feeling the impact of these uncoordinated efforts. Lives that could have been saved are gone, those who could have been treated have developed permanent disabilities because aid agencies were still haggling on the tarmac at the airport in Port Au Prince.

The worst part is that the agencies will still continue to play territorial games and have the overall relief work hampered by politics and hidden agendas.

Where I live, we’ve even been approached by several people purporting to act for NGOs that are sending relief to Haiti. One of them even left a threatening note demanding that we give something.
See
, I’m one of those people who get pissed right off with such nonsense. For one, the heifer who left that note saying she was coming back to collect anything from money to old clothes has no clue where I stand on this issue – or even what I’ve already done for that matter.

I actually happen to know how the money trail works within the industry so I’ll be well placed to know what to do if and when I decide that my conscience needs to do something.

These same agencies haven’t even cleared up the mess of the bottlenecks they caused after the Asian Tsunami – and believe me when I say too many cooks spoilt that broth.

We’ve got a long way to go with Haiti.

When chatting to a good friend on new year’s day, I asked how her daughter was, and at first, it seemed that the question had dampened her spirits.

“Darius, she’s in secondary school now”, was the subdued answer and it was quickly followed by a resigned “Dude – it’s official, we’re old”.

But even after we both cracked out laughing, the thought lingered and you begin to take stock. I guess that the main change in my life over the last several years is that some things have become more important than others and you tend to prioritize better and focus on what’s important. What hasn’t changed though is the ability for nostalgia to hit you hard enough to make you home sick especially with the sub zero temperatures and snow storms that box you in the house and makes you ask that dreaded “what am I really doing here” question.

It made me think of the good old days growing up and enjoying some of the simplest and most cherishable moments life will ever present.

Don’t know about some readers up in here, but there were times when 5 bob could take you a long long way back in the day. My dad used to give us 5 bob a day and that would cover bus fare to and from school, a soda and a snack of some sort (usually quarter bread bandika) for lunch, and you’d still have left over change to buy roast maize with pili pili or patcos to carry you through the evening.

Long before the advent of satellite TV with over 20 exclusive movie channels, local entertainment back then was fronted by public service open air movie services like Tazama Mobile Cinema pitched up in an open field once a month to bring to you the blockbuster of the day. They had this strange habit though, of commentating the movie as it went on in a manner that was as equally funny as it was annoying.

Speaking of entertainment, there were classic shows that would definitely be in my DVD collection right now – From Vioja Mahakamani and the comical antics of the residents of Matopeni, to Vitimbi and the real celebrities like Othorong’ong’o and Masanduku (forget all these latter day celebs who think they’re celebs because…well, anything makes you a celeb these days). There were shows like Tushauriane that were banned outright because they showed a couple embracing and the chap started unblousing the girl. Or even the days when we didn’t have mobile phones and you had to walk a kilometre to the nearest phone box where there was a massive queue of all manner of people – and you’d be mad when your ‘girlfriend to be’ plays hard to get and pulls that stunt of asking you to call later because she’s watching No One But You or The Rich Also Cry. The ungrateful heifer – after all those hours you’ve waited in line to make that call….LOL!

And how was it that folks could actually watch such shows. The acting was so bad and the love scenes so predictable and drossy. Maybe I just hate them coz’ they cost me many a date.

Thinking about dates, I miss those day time dates where you save up the whole term and during the holidays you can take the young lady to a respectable restaurant in town followed by a movie. The only down side is that she has to leave by 4.30 pm so that she can get back home in time before her dad and mum arrive from work. It was such little time you didn’t even get the space to express yourself and give yourself a chance to get into her panties. The strategy was always to buy time and charm her enough to warrant the next date – and perhaps you might get the chance to start early enough in the day.

The most affordable place seemed to be Wimpy on Kenyatta Avenue where you had to contend with their Indian manager always shouting orders at waiters like ”upstairs-downstairs”. But the funny part was the red and blue Bata rubber shoes that they used to wear as part of their uniform. On occasion, some of them would be allowed to wear North stars – but you catch my drift…LOL

But on the entertainment – I miss shows like This is it whatever happened to Sam Madoka the presenter of the coolest music video show at the time); or Family Affairs that had Mambo and Riziki and their troubled family. On radio, there always seemed to be the same 3 or 4 folks sending salaams on shows like Yours for the Asking. I think there was Robbie Reuben Robbie and Agnetta Machinga who would never miss a shout out on radio. And of course Sundowner with legendary DJ’s like Ike Mulembo.
And what
Happened to Kenya’s best known (now he is a celebrity for sure) radio news reader Agao Patrobas. I used to think he was called A gang of robbers. But Patrobas used to front every news bulletin on radio until he became a household name. Legend has it that the reason why he was too good on radio and wasn’t seen on TV was that he was too ugly – but I honestly don’t think so. But a gang of robbers had the mojo for radio.

There were times that it was so boring during the day in the estates, my best friend and I would wear our Sunday best suits and head for town and just walk around. We would carry them brief case type portfolios and fill them with newspapers and Malkiat Singh text books just to give them substance. If we met someone we knew, they’d be impressed about how sharp and on the ball we were even though we were barely out of school. We’d try to say something intelligent to give our cover story some credence.

Speaking of Malkiat Singh, that dude had to be my best author during that time. He was either a mega multi-talented factual author of text books on every subject including Christianity, or he was the biggest conman in town. Either way, he trousered millions of shillings from unsuspecting Kenyan students.

But despite being in town, we would always end up at Jivanjee gardens at lunch time. It was the place to be. If you were lucky, you’d have a few bob to buy some chips and sausage at the only Kenchic in town at the time. Watching those naked chickens rotate on that machine was bad enough knowing you were never going to afford them – but what made Jivanjee gardens interesting is that most if not all of the folks hanging out there were broke like nobody’s business and they all came to pass time and listening to them loud lunch time preachers. But if you looked into the eyes of most of the people, they couldn’t disguise that hunger that oozed out and screamed ”I could murder a bandika and cold Fanta right now”.

We eventually figured out a way to survive being broke during meal times. We would go to Burma market by City Stadium and in the market, there is a long row of restaurants that do nyama choma. The idea was to pop into every restaurant and ask for a sample which would come on a very small plate. After you had the sample, just respectfully decline the offer of a meal and move on to the next restaurant. By the time you hit 8 or so restaurants, you’d have had a whole meal and all you have to do is ask for a glass of water to drink. It wasn’t glamorous but it worked for sure.

Down town Nairobi was a very interesting place though. I always thought the funniest part was whenever there was a fracas of some sort, people would just explode and run away in one direction. But if you even asked someone why they were running, they’d scratch their heads and say “I don’t know – people were running”. I never did figure this one out.

And who can forget the lunch time kiosks along the route to the railway station. I had a friend who used to work with mum and set out to start his own food kiosk called Aluta Continua. The thing was this though, Johnny used to give my best friend and I free meals and once in a while, he’d ask us to run him some errands – collect stock, heavy lifting, that sort of stuff. Sometimes when we got pressurised by girls who were only interested in being taken out for dates in expensive restaurants, we’d get them all dressed up and eventually weave our way to Johnny’s kiosk. There was a bonus for us of course and it’s not just the free meal. If we brought a pretty face it enhanced the equity of the kiosk and was the envy of many others around it – so Johnny would throw in a Fanta madiaba for good measure. Some chicks couldn’t cope and considered it humiliating – LOL, but some took to it like water off a ducks back. You can’t beat fried matumbo and chapos even if you were dressed for a lunch date at Trattoria.

Air travel isn’t what it used to be. If I’m really honest, it’s probably the bane of my life (or at least it ranks somewhere out there with the things I hate most). The long stretch of flight time 39K ft up there I can probably handle by watching a movie, listening to music or working. The worst part is most definitely the insulting security and pre-boarding checks that take place in the name of guaranteeing our personal safety.

Abdulmutallab, the Arsenal hating virgin who couldn’t even do a competent job as a suicide bomber has just made things overly complicated for hundreds of thousands of air travellers around the world. It’s bad enough to go to any airport and watch passengers being prodded around like useless cattle while being told to remove shoes and go through the most humiliating security checks that are legally sanctioned. But this 23 year old punk had to go try redefine the meaning of a Christmas cracker.

The removing the shoes thing started after some freak tried to blow up a plane with a device implanted in his sneakers and failed. What are they going to do now? Ask everyone to strip and flap their underwear in front of the security guards to make sure that only remnants of pubic hair drop out?

Conventional wisdom suggests that only securing the cockpit door of an aircraft with a Fort Knox style of security system will stop a hijacker taking control of an aircraft and using it as a loaded weapon. However, this ”just do it” mentality is starting to really piss me off.

All this reactive ‘extra security’ nonsense is only designed to make passengers feel better, but it does fuck all (forgive the industrial language) to deal with the issue of terrorist threats. It’s the old classic ideology of Problem, Reaction, Solution. Create a problem, cause a reaction and implement the solution you’ve always wanted because no one can really bitch about it.

They’ve now introduced thermal imaging machines at UK airports to scan through your clothes. Notwithstanding the fact that the guy at the other side of the TV monitor will pretty much be watching X-rated images of passenger’s genetalia, it still doesn’t stop another underwear bomber anyway.

So the politicians sign off another ”Just do it” initiative to pretend to do something about global terrorism. How about dealing with the Palestinian Israeli conflict for one. You’ll be surprised how many fundamentalist nutters will down their tools if the biggest miscarriage of justice in the middle east is resolved – or at least is seen to be dealt with fairly.

Meanwhile, the latest version of ‘Just Do It’ will see passengers being treated in airports around the world like concentration camp prisoners being queued up for slaughter. Airlines will continue to spout nonsense like “you need to check in 3 hrs before your flight”. What nonsense! I’ve never ever tried to appear at an airport 3 hrs before a flight. Why would I do something crazy like that?

If all 290 passengers turned up 3 hrs before (and combine that with all the other outbound flights) that’s just a nightmare in itself. I think it’s all a conspiracy supported by the airport management who want to keep you locked up in their airport for the longest possible time so that you can spend money as a captive customer.

But seriously, enough with this heightened security nonsense. Can someone in America or the UK (anywhere really) start dealing with the reason why people are so pissed off with them they’d want to use a fully fuelled long-haul aircraft as a live explosive device. We can start with prosecutors at the Hague indicting George Bush and Tony Blair for war crimes against the innocent citizens of Iraq and Afghanistan.

A debate has been raging this past week in the UK, about the role of men in the delivery room during childbirth. A renowned obstetrician Michel Odent has suggested that men should be kept well away from delivery rooms as they add little value to the process of childbirth.

Odent, a veteran who has overseen more than 15,000 deliveries in over 50 years says:

”I am more and more convinced that the participation of the father is one of the main reasons for long and difficult labours. A labouring woman needs to be protected against any stimulation of the thinking part of her brain – the neocortex – for labour to proceed with any
degree of ease. She needs to be in a private world where she doesn’t have to think or talk.

Yet, motivated by a desire to ‘share the experience’, the man asks questions and offers words of reassurance and advice, denying his partner the quiet mind that she needs. The father’s release of the stress hormone adrenaline as he watches his partner labour causes her anxiety, and prevents her from
Relaxing. No matter how much he tries to smile and appear relaxed, he cannot help but feel anxious. And the release of adrenaline is contagious.”

You see, my first encounter with the trauma of childbirth happened nowhere near a delivery room. Matter of fact, it happened at a social gathering while I attended some sort of party, I forget what the party was for, but I remember that I arrived late and was talked into having some dinner first before joining with the rough and tumble of the bash if you will.

The food was being served upstairs in the restaurant area and I ended up on the same table as a good friend of mine Bella, who had given birth less than 3 weeks earlier and was cuddling her little bundle of joy. While waiting for my food, I did what everyone who came through did – congratulated Bella, cuddled the baby myself and sang goo gaa songs as if the baby gave a fuck who I was. I of course questioned Bella about the father of the child coz’ this child was too cute to belong to her husband. I know him well, and G is one ugly son of a bitch.

Speaking of which, I really get cheezed off about how pretentious people can be. How many times have you heard people go all soft kneed and gooey and lying to a mother that her new born is a cute little thing, yet it’s all plain to see how ugly the sprog is. What happened to the good ole days when people were brave enough to call things for what they are? What happened to saying congratulations, but with a cautionary “lakini dude this baby is goddamn ugly, why lie”. But I digress.

As I tucked into my dish, more and more usual suspects came through to see the new baby. Unfortunately for me, many of them were young mothers who were keen to discuss more than just the baby. How was it? (as in the delivery) Was it as bad as the first? How badly did you tear?

I was very comfortable with how obscene these girls could get as we had been clubbing buddies for a long long time and very few things surprised any of us, or at least that’s what I thought. And believe me, this group of girls could be both vulgar and breath-taking in the same respect. I remember one of them once telling a dude who fancied her in the club not to bother if he was only going to survive one shot at an orgasm. If he wasn’t going to make her cum at least thrice, he should just cut his losses and run. And it was said with a nonchalant coldness it would unsettle any warm blooded male with a dick hard enough to cut diamonds.

Naturally, I made what I thought was a stealth move to relocate to another part of the room as clearly, the graphic conversation and description of childbirth was not conducive conversation for the meal. I was quickly ordered to sit the fuck down and listen to their tales, and I suspect the girls were enjoying watching me squirm as much as they were enjoying their conversation. I didn’t even realise at what point this banter turned into an indictment of the male species as I was blamed for all the happy go lucky men who just enjoy the orgasmic pleasure of sex and want little to do with the consequences. The least I could do was to sit and listen to the consequences of our orgasmic pleasure.

Of course I severely protested and insisted that they should blame their husbands and boyfriends seated downstairs, beer in hand and screaming at the football on the big screens. But that wasn’t going to cut any mustard. Calling my girlfriend at the time to bail me out was as useless as expecting the men downstairs to even attempt to venture into this conversation. I had to listen to every graphic detail from how Bella coped with the excruciating pain to the extent of her vaginal tears and how she was sown up by the midwife – and all this while having my rice and chicken. To tell you the truth, eating rice and chicken has never been the same for me any more.

Thinking of this debate about fathers in delivery rooms does make you wonder though. Will it all fall apart if we’re not there? I know for a fact, that many of my peers who are still back home won’t go anywhere near a delivery room. The best they’ll do is probably wait for the phone call to confirm whether it’s a girl or a boy, pop in to see mother and baby and then head off to the pub to celebrate with their mates.

I know it used to be like that in the 60s and 70’s, but the bra burning brigades of the 70s saw to it that some “bonding” was forthcoming and before long, men attending deliveries of their kids became more common than microwaves in the average household – at least in the western world. A good proportion even film the whole delivery and keep the video tape in the household collection alongside 101 Dalmatians, Chuck Norris’s Delta Force and that Lord of the Rings Trilogy.

Let’s face it. Despite the perceived bonding and closeness and the out of this world human experience that a couple can get from the man being present during the delivery, childbirth is a painful, stressful, unpleasant and traumatic experience. No amount of rose tinted “having my hubby around to support and share the experience” will change that fact.

Experiencing the birth of a child will definitely change a man. The question is whether it will change them enough to appreciate what their partner has just gone through enough to strengthen their relationship; or whether it traumatizes them to the point where they have a problem even looking at the business end of their partner’s femininity with the same enthusiasm that they used to do.

There are documented stories of men who have attended childbirth, and have been so traumatized that they have subsequently walked away never to be seen again by their partner.