tosin_o

it’s a cool tradition. i haven’t been “rich” recently, but I’ve done local trips.
last year – Ikogosi Warm Springs, a tourist center under development in my home state of Ekiti in Nigeria. ROAD TRIP! with one friend by public transportation, five hours each way.

previous year (2011) – Olumo Rock, in Abeokuta, Ogun State with three guys. well two friends and the brother of one.

2010 – La Campagne Tropicana beach resort. It’s expensive and wonderful to stay in their chalets, but it’s really inexpensive and very lovely if you just visit as we did. ROAD TRIP with two friends.

Where should I go this year – thinking Accra Ghana, or maybe Osun Osogbo sacred grove and Erin-Ijesha waterfalls, or maybe Idanre hills?

And then someday when I have money again, can do all the fancy far-flung places.

what a playful goal.

number one man in there: Rafa Nadal. yum.

Downloaded Arabic tapes. Better than nothing. insha’Allah I’ll be in Arabia again.

someday I’ll play sports (swim, synchro, etc) and be healthier than ever, but for now I watch. I hung out with my neighbour to watch the African Cup. His living room is sort of a viewing station for football and I also go there for major tennis tournaments. They’re from a difft part of the country so it’s a nice experience. And they’re mostly guys, so they like me ;)

at work i’m really quiet except with my students where well the love is mutual.

You know I adore Rafa Nadal, right? Can’t wait to meet him :)

Let’s be honest. I’m always reading or writing, always on the internet. Won’t pick up the phone, won’t even chat on social media. Heaven knows what sort of weirdo I am.

except you really really love to.
or you can’t think of anything better to do with your time.

I will someday, maybe. But for now I can think of a lot of better uses for my time. Really, avoid the PhD at all costs.

just started seeing a nice guy who lives on my street. fantastic idea. today i got scared tho’ thinking all the things that could go wrong. but what if i thought of all that could go right?

Even if I got 120 years, I’ve already spent 31 of them. Gotta have more fun. Gotta see more places. Gotta know more beautiful peeps. Even in the biblical sense.

Plan to stay at my job till either late this year or early next. I love my job, but I also want eagerly to move to the next fun thing. I do love my job very much tho’.

I now have a thesis. A topic that I know about, care about, and on which I think I can ramble for 100 pages.
I now have chapters too.
More than 10 years after I started a PhD, it seems I’m finally getting my head in that mode. Previously, I cared about everything, but not enough about any one thing.
Nothing can stop me now, thesis-completion speaking. If I complete it, will they approve it? That’s another question, to be answered in a bit.

my 2013 short story collection will now be reworked into a novel by interweaving the stories. It’s just three long short stories anyway and with very much in common in character (women) and setting (rural tropical) and action (slight subversion) and would work nicely as a novel.
Guess what? An editor (connected with a publisher) expressed an interest in “seeing it.” So time to get it finished. I’m a very happy person.

My circa 2015 novel which was to be my first will now be my second novel :)

have excess cash; publish more, write more; update my math blog monthly; and be the best teacher ever. These were my resolutions on 43things. My last resolution was actually to listen to better music this year.

Never tried resolutions before. I’m liking it because the goals seem more manageable than my typically long-term goals: get my PhD, publish my novel, etc. I mean, I’m unlikely to do a PhD before 2020, and I’m likely to publish my first novel in 2015. Consider also: travel to new places, or another one: be fluent in Arabic. Well, I travel to new nearby places, since there’s no money for the international trips at the moment. And I’m not sure when Arabic travel (or a move) will happen. not this year.

I have a brand new job and I don’t want to go. Not even for first day at work. I need to rediscover greatness…or the little acts that make one great.

Iraq
Yemen
Cuba
Mauritius

The Louvre (Paris museum)
ABU (Nigerian university)
Yosemite (American park)
WEF, Davos (Swiss conference)

Girls:
Kate Henshaw (Nigerian actress)
Dinara Safina (Russian tennis player)
Khadija Al-Salami (Yemeni diplomat)
Angela Maerkl (European policymaker)
Alicia Keys (American musician)

Boys:
Bill Clinton (US Statesman)
Garry Kasparov (Russian strategist)
Rafael Nadal (Spanish tennis player)
Lionel Messi (Argentine footballer)
Clive Owen (English actor)

In the past I met some of my people to meet :) so they’re not on this list. Believe.

My 2011 poetry collection will be a 2012 collection, for current financial constraints.
I’m applying for the Stegner Fellowship at Stanford. Almost deadline – not my plan at all to be so late – and credit card payment is acting up. My bank promised to help. Can’t wait to get application done and get in ;)

The first time around it was so hard, and now that I have a life full of hobbies I don’t want to go through the intensity of PhD work. I don’t have a thesis – this is my main problem.

On the other hand, I have become a writer, so that were I to have a thesis (idea), writing a thesis (book) out of it would be within my skill set. I also love teaching (already taught 2 years in university) and want to do a PhD as part of my improvement in my vocation. And also I love maths, and want to be in a math-ish and science-ish and logic-ish immersion environment again, so that I can get sharper.

I hope to be fortunate enough to get the right PhD program when I’m finally ready to do it.

Like maybe an Arabic language channel or something, to keep me in the habit of listening and learning Arabic.

Need two grand (dollars) this week to produce my next book. People owe me about ten grand, but mostly they’re not paying, maybe never.
Someday I’ll figure out the money thing, then it will be unstoppable.

2020. I want to go back to grad school in a few years, around 2016 (write and teach from now to 2014; travel and relax in 2015). Applied math, engineering, something like that.

yet I’ve never really spent time in one. I made an avatar in Second Life last year, time to go out and (learn to) play.