Life with Las B...

If you had told me I'd be looking forward to a 10 week workout programme in January 2025, I'd have called you a bloody liar. But here I am. Caroline has turned me into someone I can't recognize (in a good way). I hit my goal weight then finished the 6 week Iron Series ending of October and I was ecstatic. My body was in the best shape it'd ever been. Afterwards, did her 1 week HIIT series (which was bloody cos tell me why had 40 variations of Burpees on the first day). Then followed it up with 2 weeks Beastmode series. After which I had to take a deload week of just yoga and mobility exercises. Unfortunately, at the same time, my diet went to shit because my siblings came back and I was eating junk like there was no tomorrow. Anyways, my weeks of decadence is over so I'm back to my routine with a new series (Epic Heat by Caroline Girvan). This time, it's 10 weeks long. So hoping to be done by my birthday in February. Keeping fingers crossed🤞🏼 

Hmmmm. I do agree learning is uncomfortable cos you're training the brain muscle. But I'd like to see it as working out. If you're a beginner, you don't just straight to lifting heavy cos you may feel discouraged. Best way would be to start with simple workouts like, get to moving your body. Then as you progress, you add on challenges. I dislike the whole "you must suffer before you learn." It's similar to those who claim you only learn by reading books. Yeah, whilst reading, you engage different muscle groups and force the concentration to the written words. But some people just thrive the media format. Same way some would prefer gamified methodologies to imbibe knowledge. The whole elitism about learning is so trite.

I regressed. We like to think that our future selves will be a much better, improved version of ourselves. It's the optimism that drives our day-to-day living. What happens then when the reverse is the case? I came across a fiction I wrote in 2020, and I couldn't help but marvel at the brilliance in writing. I kept whispering to myself, "how were you good at this?" The irony is that back that I didn't think I was any good. I'd compare my writing to others I'd seen, to published and established authors and resign myself to the fate that I'd never get to that level. Well talk about a self-fulfilling prophecy. I had no hope in myself, didn't think there was a future in my writing. Hence I sought other means of livelihood. Now, my mind is submerged with technical terms. Unlike the average person, when I hear or see words such as console, object, promise, pointer, block: my mind immediately goes to the programming equivalent.   Now I can't help but ...

 I AM AN ADDICT. Nah, it's not the drug kind, it's the devil and blessing in disguise called SOCIAL MEDIA. It took me a while to admit to being a social media addict. I really didn't realize how much I reach for Facebook and Instagram until I downloaded the StayFocused app. Yes, even though I had already uninstalled the mobile apps for Instagram, Facebook, Tiktok, Twitter, I still access the Facebook and Instagram URLs from my chrome browser. I installed the StayFocused app to curtail my access time to social media. The best thing about the app is that you can block not just applications but websites. And it's also flexible in the sense that you can also set time limits to it.  So currently, I've set my access to Facebook, Instagram and Reddit web for max 15 minutes a day because I do have great information I get from those apps but limiting it is key to avoid doomscrolling. I also limited Netflix to 30 mins max a day. Another feature I love is that it allows you ...

  Apparently, Aileen killed about 7 men between 1989 and 1990 cos she said they tried to rape her. I'll be honest, watching this (as macabre as it sounds) is interesting in a dark way. But even more than that, the motivation and owning up to her crimes was quite refreshing in a way I don't see a lot in serial killers documentaries. Cos many a times, when I watch male serial killers, it's either some stupid ass revenge rejection a girl did to them in their formative years, having an abusive upbringing, religious inclinations and cult, etc.  Now, I would say this lady is a real misandrist and if her reasons for committing these crimes are true, and I do understand why she has to resort to that. In addition, shee was a sex-worker and thus, wouldn't have gotten justice from the police had she reported. I do think she was a victim but she took the vengeance to another level. Her first victim had been jailed earlier for sexual assault and had to be incarcerated for 10 years. ...

  I just completed the Caroline Girvan's 6 weeks Iron series. It was an incredible experience, dedicating 5 days a week to train my body. I do appreciate her for such a structured workout. And I love the format: Day 1: Lower body Day 2: Upper body Day 3: Glutes  Day 4: Full body Day 5: Upper body or shoulders I'm incredibly proud of keeping to this as well as the strength I've built during this process. So much so I upped my dumbbells to 6kg pair after the second week cos my current 3kg paid dumbbells were no longer challenging for lower body workouts. Here is the link if you want to check it out If you had told me in January I'd be working out like this, I wouldn't believe you. I remember when I was looking at this picture from 2019 and I thought "I will do anything to go back to this weight including losing my programming skills and starting from scratch" The way my brain snapped me back to reality eeh. Like forget programming, am I dumb? Girlll, I suffe...

I have just been avoiding Ochanya's story cos it's quite triggering.  I knew when Gwamnishu Harrison talked about her first in 2018 and she was still alive. Imagine my shock her story resurfacing now only to hear she eventually died from the complications. Whenever people yap about misandry, I just know they aren't serious. You can't be in Nigeria and deny that this society is terrible against the girl child. So a couple of women being extremists on social media is nowhere near equivalent to the crimes committed against the girl child, more so by those closest to them. Again, 1 in 3 girls globally experience sexual violence and 1 in 8 girls have been sexually harassed before they are 18 years. You don't see the likes of those stupid guys that did kito on that Port harcourt dude. They barely, if ever have smoke for pedophiles like Ochanya's uncle and the son. And in case you're wondering, it's cos they are potential rapists themselves and have likely forc...

It was awhile back when I started questioning how the bible presented the so called villain women in the bible. Delilah - What on earth would you have her do? Samson was outchea pillaging her people. And the leaders of where she came from gave her an ultimatum to get that work done, get that man's weakness. Her work isn't any different from what some of these Russian spies were doing during the world wars and cold war eras. Jezebel - Really. So what if she brought her own gods to the land. So you that's a Christian, you don't think you'd try to convert your husband if he is not the same religion as you are? That shit of a man called Ahab was the one that committed the offences. And she tried to cover up for him. And what did she get in return? The cowardly son of a bastard went behind her back to seek God's forgiveness. Leaving her to deal with consequences  Vashti - Literally, she is my favourite female figure in the bible. The fuck you mean I should come and p...

I've been doing this 25 day challenge for 3 months now and finally finished it. You know how I usually say "Caroline is a beast but in a good way" while talking about Caroline Girvan's workout, well I can't say the same for Izzy. This lady genuinely wants to kill you with time under tension. Literally. She doesn't have breaks in-between the add-ons until an entire series is done. So she just continuously adds on to the moves (making them harder) like 6 - 10 minutes straight before you take a quick break and proceed to another series in the workout. This kain endurance, Chukwu zọba kwa. I do her workouts once or twice a week just to humble myself that I still have a long way to go endurance wise. Good thing though is as we (those following along) are cursing her during the sessions, she is also cursing herself for doing the routine.  

  One year later and 20 kg lighter, what I have to say is always a marathon not a sprint. Doing what works for you cos fad diets are the absolute ghetto. Cos even on my weightloss plans, I was still eating swallow and native soups every night (I mean, a bụ m nwa Anambra, literally grew up eating soup every day. Why will I ever give that up?) And far be it from me that I never eat bread cos of diet. Me and bread that have a covenant, any diet wey require getting rid of everything is one I never want a part of and is not sustainable in the least. Now that my number of the weight has reached my desired size, na to continue challenging myself for more plank minutes, eventually learning how to do a full pushup and general fitness 

Got myself a 6kg pair dumbbell cos I was no longer pushing to failure with the 3kg pair. I've lost roughly 19kg between last year and now. It really does blow my mind that the total 18kg mass represented by both of these dumbbell pairs was once stored inside my body as fat. Shit is crazy. Hell, if you had told me I'd take this strength training seriously, I wouldn't believe it myself. But many thanks to Dr Vonda Wright for talking about osteoporosis (which happens to a lot of women as we age). I was even more insistent on it cos I had already fractured my two knees as a teen. When I still had the extra 19kg fat, my patella kneecap were usually dislocating anytime I made a quick movement. Most likely due to my tibia and fibula not being able to support the excess fat on my thighs and joint stress. But since I started with pilates in February/March this year and eventually Caroline Girvan's workouts, my knees haven't shifted (and I do more complex movements now). Hop...

  I can't even begin to describe how much I adore this woman. I've been working out with her since July and she's really effective. I normally do her workout series at night and then her 10 minutes core exercises in the morning. Today, I did her 3 minutes elbow plank challenge. And while my leg was shaking like crazy 2 minutes in, I'm incredibly pleased that I managed to completed it. Cos in February, I couldn't even do 30 seconds plank ya foduzie 1 minute 🫠🫠 Of course, I do accord pilates some recognition cos it's been helping me train my core but for muscle hypertrophy, it's all Caroline Girvan. I'm currently doing her Iron Series, completed day 4 yesterday. It's her 4th series I'm on having completed Beginner Epic, 2022 Advent Calendar, and the Calisthenics series. So far, I love the Iron Series. The sets are repetitive but the time goes by very quickly.  My aim is to be able to do 5 minutes plank and that's cos Cher (the singer) said he...

Again, Caroline is a beast. I decided to use this as a cool down this week (since it's calisthenics) before I start a the Iron series of with weight.  I had finished the Beginner Epic and 2022 24 days Advent Calender. However, I was in for a rough ride. You see that Day 1 leg day alone, my goodness. My thighs and calves saw shege on the time under tension. Upon the workouts are without weights, I was still feeling the DOMS today (that's Friday), and I did it on Monday. The time under tension especially for isometric moves, omg. Like 2 mins of work, then just 30 seconds test. And the 2 mins are different variations of the same exercise. So you're using the same leg over and over.  Now, I just finished the day 5 HIIT. Let's just say my smart watch heart rate was on the red like 60% of the workout. In fact, anytime she braids her hair for the workout, just know you're in for a very rough ride 😩😩😩 Love her series so much. Here is the link if you want to check it out

I've been waiting for this documentary for a while now and all I can say is "Wow." So when I decided to embark on weightloss October last year, my first point of contact was to do research. Cos I've always heard that the majority of people who lose weight gain it back after a few years. So I needed to understand the science behind gaining the weight back. Turns out that it's quite straightforward. The body is composed of fat and muscle. So when people go on mainly strict diets to lose weight, they're not only losing the fat but also their muscles. So if they don't build the muscle (resistance training), and they don't continue same diet afterwards, they gain back the weight. Now, what makes it worse is that it's only fat they're gaining back cos remember, the person lost both fat and muscle while during a restrictive diet. The science still rings true, Calorie In, Calorie Out (CICO). What you put in your body either gets used up, else the exces...

So, I'm usually on the hopeless romantic side of k-drama series. So color me shocked on how engrossed I was with Mercy for none.  I mean I know the South Korean film Industry is good, I've been watching them for 12 years now. But this one fed the vengeance in me, even more so than The Glory cos this was pure blood thirst revenge. This series is what I mean when I say I want to watch a revenge drama. I need the gore, the slaughter and the torture to be torturing.  You need to see the blood, the oozing back-to-back pool of blood was feeding my inner vampire. Literally no mercy as is in the series name. The way I was having schadenfreude as everyone was meeting their fate, and the method to the demise kwu, pure butchering. It fed my inner misanthrope. The revenge touch everybody, love eet.  Be like say I go pause on love and light k-dramas for now. I need this violence 🫨🫨

I used to look back at my 2019 pictures and do wishful thinking to get back to that size. But doing research on what makes up the body adipose tissue (read fat) is really straightforward. Unless you have Thyroid issues, Endometriosis, PCOS or other medical condition that affects your metabolism, weight loss is something that's within our control. In simple terms, it's about what you eat. 90% of your weightloss will come from diet over forcing yourself to do exercise.  For instance, a 30 minutes Cardio workout burns only about 200 calories. The calories in a loaf of bread is about 5x that. So if you go for a gym session and get pizza afterwards, then it's counterintuitive because you're eating more than you burn. Weightloss, as I've come to learn is what you eat. It's about the portion control, the cutting of junks, the enabling your body to get to ketosis, so you make your body get energy from the fat reserves by burning the excess fat. And that can only be gott...

At the end of the day, your audience is your audience. I stumbled upon Riyallure video on Tiktok and I don't know, something called to me immediately. It's almost as if I was on auto-movement or arrested by the Holy spirit, but I placed my order with immediate alacrity. So I got some samples first so I can know my favourites and they all exceeded my expectations. So Serenity - It's a sweet feminine welcoming scent. It reminds me a bit of Hundred Silent ways by Nishane. I think it's the mandarin and Jasmine in both notes but that's where the similarity ends. Serenity is sweeter (definitely the honey in it) but not too sweet that it smells like saccharine.  Elegance has you feeling like "YOU ARE HER." Like a confident young lady who knows how to take care of herself, look and smell good. The scent is how you'd imagine Arab women with their precise grooming would smell and I believe this is coming primarily from the Musk notes. It is giving siren exudin...

Registration Guidelines for Lagos NYSC Camp, Iyana Apaja Before I started this camp, there were so many things I wish someone had told me. The registration process is grueling, the queues are endless, and the system can feel downright chaotic. And even with the stated 40% attendance for the Batch A Stream 2, the crowd at the Lagos camp? It's better seen than experienced. If you doubt it, just check Tiktok for video clips. According to the Lagos state coordinator address, there were about 7000+ corpers mobilized for Lagos state but about 3212 people camped at Iyana Apaja. So, knowing what to expect beforehand will save you from unnecessary frustration and help you navigate the process more strategically. Here's everything you need to know to make your registration as smooth as possible. Timing is Everything - Go Ridiculously Early Go early, even the day before if possible. Some people came on the first day as early as 5 am. If you plan on going by 8 am thinking it's early, y...

Guess who went down from 83kg to 67kg between November 2024 and May 2025. Yup, that's me. There wasn't any advice I hadn't gotten from both online and my siblings on taking workouts and active lifestyle seriously, especially for health reasons. But I was giving excuses with "I'm too busy with work and too tired after the day to do anything." But guess what got me motivated to workout mostly everyday now? My Oraimo smart watch. My brother got me one at the beginning of the year and the dopamine of seeing my active calories burned count increase as well as signing in to the app mark my streak was far more motivating than abstract health benefits. Many thanks to Grow With Jo, Move with Nicole, Get fit with Rick, Denise Austin, and K-pop fitness YouTube videos. Also to my humble self (for making it a personal mission to get up by 6 am and go for 1 hour brisk walks). And to my siblings for always warning me of sedentary lifestyle effects. But the biggest thanks goe...

  Kdrama should never make such a series like this again, this is the hardest series I've seen. And it's not even the one with the most tragedy (a lot of saeguk will it give it run for its money). But it's the rawness of it. The realism that's embedded in each of the episodes. We watched them grow from childhood with dreams, to adulthood with optimism. And we saw life beat them over and over and over. We saw the harshness of life sap some light out of their eyes. But through it all, we still saw unwavering tenderness between our two MCs.  We saw them trudge trudge through parenthood, more financial crisis. We saw them evolve, regrets in middle age and we saw them pick up their dreams again. We saw them find pleasures and contentment, making do with the situation they'd been served by life.  This was a masterpiece of being alive and I didn't even know when a tear escaped my eyes in the last episode cos why was this so heartbreaking, tear-jerking, and whimsical at...

  For someone like me that had fallen prey for brainwashing 419, I can totally get how people become brainwashed to religious cults. Especially if you're doing it for "supposed protection" of your family. The craziest thing about this documentary is that the religious audio snippets by the cult leader is probably the least impressive thing you'd ever listen to. Like the very least, bottom barrel. Okay maybe I'm just biased to never take anything that is covered under the umbrella of religion as trustworthy but this is just crazy. Like literally, once I hear men of God, my brain just screams "Grain of salt. Take this with a full spoon of salt." So you're telling me that you're a Christian, and you read your bible and someone is telling you they're the only way to God and you believe it? My heart goes out to the victims though.

Oh this is an amazing amazing documentary.  I started off by rooting by Team France. By episode 5, I was on Team Serbia (rooting for the underdog and shit). But after team USA defeated Serbia, and by episode 6 for the finale, I couldn't help but cheer for Team USA. I watched the finals live but rewatching the highlights, that was a phenomenal game  Team USA is so arrogant, it grated on my nerves. But I mean why wouldn't they have that confidence?. They've won this gold for 4 times consecutively before the 2024 game. Others would chant their country's name before a game, and team USA was chanting "GOLD." Like not for once did it cross their minds they could actually get silver. It is Gold or nothing. I felt so bad for France. In their own country, and team USA defeated them in both the men and females for finals. I'm shaa looking forward to 2028 Olympics. I know it'd even be more obnoxious since it'd be in the United States.