Inspired by thoughts and things

Disorderly words

Not for a while wrote I an ode,
To wit they ask you call that large?
For the many words to make the code,
Sit back and be entertained in a barge,
For in that we find a lovely abode.

Frequently the letters race about,
Never in the order that you seek to write,
When you do, you’re much in doubt,
Afraid that it won’t read as bright,
Yet all this is not for the clout.

Said him, I’ll show you what large is,
Obviously, it must be about what it means,
Not really with regards to all of this,
In the script that gives more than it leans,
Towards the world that’s sealed with a kiss.

Learning from the letters

Letters from the past

In the process of writing one’s story, much research still needs to be done, the many things you think you remember from things said and related, over time that should be reviewed and confirmed. The confusion of dates and events along with those involved.

I thought I was going type out the sketches of memory percolating in my mind over the last couple of weeks, but at the same time, I had been thinking of reading letters going back 30 years just to fill in some gaps.

Reaching for the trusty shoebox, I read the first lover’s letter from April 1992 and many subsequent letters afterwards with some dates confirmed and what feelings we had for each other then. My parents each with their entreaties about what should be doing in the UK, full of advice on how to approach things and the obligatory badgering about making introductions and getting married.

Letters with a blast

On the event side, it occurred to me that there were things I might not have noticed, marriages, births, and deaths placed in their perspectives of relationships, celebrations and there were quite a few, who was doing what and where, especially how they were getting on, I had not read these letters since when I received and read them the first time.

Other things that could wear you down from all quarters, as questions, requests, demands, and pleadings extending beyond relations to friends and passing acquaintances, many with the view that you are living large abroad with no responsibilities apart from that which regards them. If one were to put a cost to the tranche of requirements, you would be totally wiped out. For those of us with regular engagements, you had to ignore and withhold a response totally.

Yet, there were many more letters to read all of which read out in my head in the hearing of the voices of the authors, that itself brought a kind of mental strain even though none had the contemporaneous urgency that portended the time of writing, I had to give it a break and find another time to read a few more.

Letters written to last

Though, in one of the letters from my mother with some useful historical content that I jotted down from my notes, she also revealed that she once worked at Vono Tipton. Vono was also known in Nigeria for beds, bed frames, bedsteads, bedding, and furniture. What I did not know was that VONO is in fact an acronym for Vaughan Only, No Others. The company was founded in 1896 by Ernest Vaughan and at one time, the largest employer in Tipton. [The annals of Tipton industries]

As for the other pertinent pieces of information I gain, I would suppose those would be woven into the stories to be found in my book.

Let's do basic Greek indeed

All Greek in our romance

In the quandary of names or naming, the unintended occurs with the need to avoid unnecessary conflict that some are wont to stir up for it is in confusion and confrontation that they find every sense of satisfaction, you almost voice a silent prayer that peace would never find a home with their kind of hospitality. [UK Today News: Donald Trump Jr, Ted Cruz troll WHO for skipping ‘Xi’ in naming omicron variant]

Much as we have adopted the Greek alphabet as the nomenclature for the variants of the Coronavirus we could as well have used Roman numerals. However, if you thought you could learn the Greek alphabet as the pandemic reveals new ways to remain part of our globally contemporary news stories, you will be on to a bad education.

Know beyond the popular

Having done engineering subjects, many of the units of measurement or formulas for equations have Greek nomenclature, many of which I cannot care to remember at this time. The new Coronavirus Variant of Concern (VoC) has been given omicron, after we have seen through alpha, beta, gamma, and delta variants, some Variants of Interest (VoI) were given lambda and mu. It would appear some designated variants just never reached the popularity stakes and so did not become global news. [WHO: Tracking SARS-CoV-2 variants]

To help understand the situation, I have shared the Greek alphabet; alpha, beta, gamma, delta, epsilon, zeta, eta, theta, iota, kappa, lambda, mu, nu, xi, omicron, pi, rho, sigma, tau, upsilon, phi, chi, psi, omega.

Names to make trouble with

The WHO skipped the 13^th Greek letter, nu just not to give the Coronavirus the moniker of new, the decision to skip the 14^th Greek letter xi can be termed political and diplomatic as it would have sent us looking east to China where the first indications the Coronavirus emerged from and it just happens to be the surname of the President of the People’s Republic of China, Xi Jinping. The surname is first when referring to Chinese names.

I guess we would have been met with the same dilemma if Roman numerals were used, for at the time we had lambda in the Greek alphabet, it would have been XI. The WHO depends on global consensus and cooperation, which can entertain the risk of favouritism and/or bias in trying to serve all interests without offending any principal participant.

Get a piece of the pie

It might have hamstrung the WHO in tackling the Coronavirus with alacrity and most especially in determining the true source of this global pandemic, yet everyone needs to be kept on board.

One can only hope that with the emergence of the omicron variant, world leaders can come together to address the appallingly disgraceful state of global vaccine inequity and along with relaxing patent restrictions to allow the Global South to produce their own vaccines to local distribution too. In a sense, we might with that agreement finally have got a piece of the pie, to get this Coronavirus out of circulation that we would no need to get to a Coronavirus variant called pi.

Essential Snobbery 101: Writing letters you hate to write

It has always mattered

I remember once asking to go on an assertiveness course; those courses exist for a reason, my manager scoffed. He said, “Akin, anyone but you needs an assertiveness course.” Whilst I seemed to doubt myself, it appeared there was no doubt that I was an effective communicator.

In my engineering class, many of my classmates did not pay heed to the need to study English, which was a necessary elective. Obviously, we had to run the gauntlet of English lecturers who came to show off their loquacious vocabulary, communicating nothing but providing the entertainment of malapropism and meaningless sesquipedalianism of words strung together without grammatical structure or purpose.

Put it all in

My view was that, regardless of what profession you were in, it was essential that you could convey your ideas in your chosen language of expression with clarity to persuade and to convince. Now, when to comes to written communication, I like to think I am better equipped to get my point across, the intent, the context, the tone, the appeal to their humanity, the veiled insult politely delivered as a slow-working poison that causes little offence whilst eliciting praise, maybe an English putdown can find a showing too.

Concision is not my strongest point, and brevity is probably only needed for telegrams; clarity in prose is what matters more to me, so that by the time the reader is done, I am both comprehended and understood with responses appropriate to my requirements.

That it might tend to flourish or the flowery is a temptation I have too often yielded to, yet as a copy editor and proofreader of other material, I would be more conservative, active, and direct.

Then a grubby email

I guess I hate writing emails that have to do with contractual negotiations; they can be emotional and easily be grubby when professional persuasion is required. In such cases, it must be in the view of a sensible seamstress, like a good skirt, long enough to cover the detail, yet short enough to keep the interest and close the matter.

Once a client wrote to demand payment on the premise that I had been overpaid, by the time I put together the whole chain of evidence that suggested otherwise, what I received was a curt thank you in response and nothing more. Too recently, I noticed an error in my remuneration, not too significant, but on a matter of principle, we had an agreement that appeared to be irregularly and unilaterally recast as something else.

Now, I say

At first, I thought it was an error at the payment processing company; their prompt and useful response suggested it was further up the chain. Grudgingly, I made the case for respecting gentlemen's agreements and signed contracts that had no indication of the variation of terms, then closed with the deployment of the polite 3^rd person singular. “As such, one is owed moneys due.”

The purposeful switch from the apparently casual and familiar to the stuffily formal was for maximum effect. If as a person well known to me, you need to be addressed with titles and formality, you can be sure we are on the business end of issues that need to be addressed with alacrity, importance, and seriousness.

What mattered was that my intervention was effective and what I have requested will be granted; the slight on their part might suggest the need for an apology, not grovelling, just the acceptance of an administrative error on their part that would be made right is enough. Effective communication matters always, and if you are not that good at it, get the training to represent and express yourself better than anyone can.

Blue tick the damn thing

Long long time ago

Caught up in juvenile infatuation I could almost hear in my head a chorus of distraction, ‘He loves me, he loves me not’ a constant refrain that I cannot drive out of my head with the worry of love most fervent yet unrequited. Did I not feel that yearning even at the age of 7 and he a few years older playing a father in a game of family the burning tears of emotion filling my eyes whilst I pretended nothing is wrong. A tick for what?

Time passes on to when with another in a forage into what would not be much other than a dare, adolescence getting the better of me, my protégé submits a letter to her and she responds, ‘I am a small girl.’ That small girl a few years later a prefect, my junior but as fate would have it tables turned in ways that could never have been predicted. A tick-off that.

Letters and messages

We met for the school games, they from so far away, it was unlikely we would meet again. Yet, friends, we became and pen-pals more. A letter I sent, even two, unsure they will be delivered and even into oblivion they may have gone. If I do remember what I wrote then. A tickle it was.

Now, we seek in the instant, of gratification that cannot wait. In promptness and alacrity, the response must arrive before we have thought it. Woe betides he that leaves it nanosecond too late for the next will have you at the assizes and guilty, you’ll be found before your excuse is heard. To whom shall you appeal? In the courts of WhatsApp, the distance between you and jail is a blue tick. 

Holiday Snaps: At the font of letters amiss

The baptism of the font

Being a veteran of desktop publishing when it was a technical feat requiring your read the manuals to know what you were doing, I think I have a good idea about typesetting.

This was a time when you only had three fonts, Times New Roman, Helvetica and Courier, you had various weights and learnt that you did not throw everything on the screen and print out on paper with the thought that you were some artistic genius.

Printers were expensive and memory was not cheap and when you got new fonts it took the best part of 8 hours or more to build the font tables for each weight – you appreciated the luxury of variety and with moderation applied what you had to differentiate your work from others.

Rue the fate of the guru

Serifs, san serifs, proportional spacing, kerning, ghosting, pitch were some of the many terms brought from the printing world into the domain of personal computer software.

What I was involved in was not typical of the cut and paste collages by Patrick & Pets Printing Press just down the street, this was legal publishing in volumes as much as 40 requiring thoroughness and consistency you had to be meticulous.

Along the way, you picked the flyer type of work knowing that you were encroaching on the turf of traditional printers who were loath to embrace technology or were afraid they would lose influence.

The part about influence was something I experienced when I interviewed for a job at the BBC Enterprises and I was told I was selling myself short, a euphemism for you are a threat to our cosy setup – I was being hired as a desktop publishing guru with pedigree and I was to report someone whose background was from the toil and graft of setting type – I moved on, but it was tough lesson in 1991.

Brewing tea from steak

In any case, desktop publishing is no more the exclusive technical field it once was; everyone can churn out that most impressive work or the downright rottenly bad thing thinking they have done a work of commendable art.

Another sign came into view just last night, very big type at a restaurant I might have dared to patronise, SILOIN STEAK it read, someone had dropped a letter - Arggh! And I wonder how rare it would have become if a few more letters were dropped to allow for larger type whilst fitting the words to the width of the A2 size poster.

The tricks of desktop publishing, language, correctness and fitting all reaching for some consensus like if the STEAK lost the S and the K, the meat of the meal would have metamorphosed into Ceylon Tea – the rumpus of forgetting to spell check signs and the trouble that ensues.

Even Es are good

However, the economic situation in Spain was brought into stark relief when I noticed that name tag on one of the waiters in the hotel restaurant had lost a letter, he said it was due to the cuts – it was centred to create excite the animosity between the Catalans and the Castellans, the former preferring to drop the E on the end and the latter keeping it.

Which brings me to a memory of childhood – songs on the Children’s Television Workshop about how the E on the end can make all the difference between a tub and a tube; a scar and a scare and when driving a car, do it with care – English suddenly takes on a modicum of difficulty requiring everyone just make sure the letters are all in place, in the right order and check against a basic English dictionary.

Social Engineering UPS delivery

Showing fishy emails

I have decided that each time I see receive an email that threatens to expose me to scamming by reason of the genius of its construction, I will post the email and annotate it to expose the suspect activity, without getting too technical.

Looking through my inbox which receives close to 80 emails a day from so many email accounts there was one that appeared to arrive at my business account from UPS, the courier company.

From the header, I noticed there was no subject – No business with any sort of organised system should ever send a customer an email with a subject, on a personal basis, it is rude, in a business setting it is unprofessional.

Appearances and realities

The email appeared to come from UPS Support with the name of the sender, it looked official enough with a UPS.com email address too.

If you get an email from any organisation and the email domain does not reflect the organisation or business name, the sender is an impostor. Many lottery wins and collect emails do not use company email domains they can be classed as scams no matter how too good to be true the content might be. Yahoo, Hotmail, and MSN addresses should be ignored.

Where is my name in this email, they should know who they are delivering to, this is a delivery company for crying out loud. It looks like a fishing exercise.

PDF or broke

This email had an attachment with the name invoice. Be careful with attachments, the safest ones to open are ones with the PDF extension, anything else treat as suspicious, is probably a virus or a keylogger ready to steal your passwords to email or bank accounts. It would be safe to just delete those emails.

Nowadays, invoices must be emailed in PDF format, they are never too large to be undeliverable because of email service restrictions. ZIP files are like Trojan horses, open them and you can end up running a program that ruins your system or worse. EXE files, just NEVER open them. If they are TXT files, sometimes it is best to save the attachment first and then observe that they are really the format they say they are before you open them.

You must always have an up-to-date virus scanner on your system that scans emails too. AVG offers a free edition but the professional editions are inexpensive too.

Drawing you by the bait

Now to the social engineering part of this email; I have been informed that “Unfortunate we failed to deliv” then the rest of the text is obscured by an opaque grey box.

Out of frustration or curiosity, you will be tempted to find out what this was all about and find yourself opening the suspect attachment and you have been had – hook, line, and sinker.

I think it is a work of evil genius because many would end up opening the attachment, but I did not; there were two separate messages in this email.

The first was the text about a delivery and one I was not expecting, and the second was an invoice for something I cannot say I paid for.

No effect without cause

The invoice if I paid for anything should have come from the company, I bought stuff from and not from UPS except if I had engaged the services of UPS which I did not.

So, on the balance of probability, this is a scam, if UPS were unable to deliver a product, it would have arrived at my address and a note left in my post-box not an email sent to me.

The more this email looks authentic the more I am suspicious of its origins. In the worst-case scenario, I have replied to this email asking for it to be sent in legible text, with a PDF invoice and a letter sent by post explaining why they could not deliver the service. If your name is not in the email you received, do not sign off with your name.

Don’t give them more

They do not need my name or address in the reply, they should already have it – do not volunteer excess information to suspect situations.

People are looking to have you, so ensure you are not had by innocuous emails masquerading as authentic customer support emails. Benign as this might seem, it screams scamming to the rafters at best, I cannot think of what the worst of their intentions might be.

Thought Picnic: Losing the battle for the concise

Few views in many words

I would be the first to admit that I could be given to a bout of verbosity in my writings and communications.

However, I do strive hard to cut down my expressions to the bare essentials, in the process; I might use long words, complicated expressions and constructions that might have multiple meanings to convey my views.

I would very much like to eliminate ambiguity though something about English that allows you to offer unspoken assertions with nuanced intentions – rather be poetic than directly nasty which in common parlance is considered politely rude.

In all, it is still necessary to keep to the age-old dictum that I hope guides some of my writings – like a good skirt – it should be long enough to cover the detail and short enough to keep the interest.

An excess of letters and words

Yesterday, the Enough is Enough movement wrote an open letter to the governor of Lagos State and like many opinions expressed in the Sahara Reporters marketplace of vile sensationalism and perverse opinions it failed the good skirt test.

It was too long that every detail was covered but not short enough to keep my interest – for a busy man like the governor of Lagos State who might well have been interested in what they had to say, it would have been easy for him to plead the lack of time to read the tome and he probably would not have delegated the task of searching out the salient points to some underling.

The same can be said of the letter written to repudiate the activities of Charley Boy, it just went on and on, by the end, I wondered what got me into reading the stuff. [I read both letters on Facebook]

Precise, concise, short and simple

Living in the Netherlands, in official letters you notice they quickly want to get to the point in the first few paragraphs before it rambles on.

I like telling stories, but in letters we all need to acquire the fine art of the concise, the finesse of the precise and for urban acceptance sake, the punchy – short and simple can really get far – I do wonder if it is a lesson we Nigerians will ever learn.