Robby Scribbles' A series of Unfortunate events....

LOL! You guyz read my post about the way my Mumsy use to handle disciplinary issues and made me feel like I was the only one in Naija gettin' an ol' skool igbo whooping 4rm my mum! So y'all indirectly called my mum Hitler right? no wahala! I'm here to justify the numerous occasions when my mum had to go Kung fu on my hide. I'd just like you guys to know that as a kid I was a handful and there were only two things my parents could use to control me, Television and Utali (Igbo for cane), I wasn't stubborn or headstrong, I was just very unpredictable, "inquisitive" and "adventurous". My Aunts use to tell my parents that if I we were coming to visit them and I was coming along they'd like a week's notice so that they can pack up all the breakable things in their sitting room. I was so innocently mischieveous and leaving me to own devices was never a good idea..these are some of the things I did that left my parents, especially my mum, wiv no other choice than to start a graffiti session on my ass!

WAAAAAAIIIIIT!!! before u jump into my flashbacks I'd just like to say that some of these stories cannot be verified coz my parents tell them to me now that I'm older and I can't believe I did such things wen I was a kid lol...cos some aren't that believable

This was the period when Super Mario was more popular than anything on the planet, My dad had just bought us a Super Nintendo and My lil bro and I didn't pay attention to anything else except that! We use to play it all day and after a while we wanted to start playing it all night as well so at around 12am wen everyone was in bed I and my bro wud sneak out to the parlour, turn off all d lights and he'd be on remote control duty which involved turning the TV off wen we heard noises 4rm the bedrooms, I was on control pad duty which was bascially getting Mario from one stage to the next lol. One night my Lil' bro was off duty and it was just me in the sitting room wen I heard the bedroom door open, I was so shocked that instead of turning of the TV and rushing off to my room I simply turned it off and pretended to be sleeping on the parlour floor...not very ingenious right? especially since the control pad was beside me and the console was still on...That spot where I was pretending to be asleep on was where she dealt wiv me...and seized the Super Nintendo for a whole month....nearly drove us mad lol!

She'd just bought three packs of Rice Krispies and it was one of those ones where a lil' prize was hidden inside the pack. The next day she opened one pack and I ransacked the pack for the Prize, when she went out I decided to ransack the other unopened packs for the prizes as well so I took the unopened packs and shook them until I cud see the prize inside, then I took a razor blade, tore the pack and removed the prize. If I remember correctly the prizes were Godzilla toys. So I'd just torn two packs of Rice Krispies wen the first pack wasn't even finished yet...How did she find out? How else wud she find it, she notied that the kitchen floor was littered wiv grains of rice krispies! I denied it as usual but my mum is not as inquisitive as my dad..she beats first and asks questions later!

This one I remember well cos it was the first sign that I was science inclined even though it was lil or no association wiv my current aspirations lol. I use to go to the bathroom wiv a big bowl and I'd be pretending to carry out experiments there, my chemicals were my Dad's shaving powder, his hair cream, my mum's conditioner, detergent..anything that can be found in a bathroom I'd throw it into the bowl! then I'd cook it on the stove and hide it in the kitchen store so I cud continue the next day. I think it started smelling and wen my mum finally found the lil bowl tucked away under the basket of potatoes she didn't even investigate to find out who did it, she just went outside and cut branches from our cashew tree and told me to Hold somethin lol

This one is a story my Dad told me but I still don't believe it cos they didn't give me evidence that was concrete enuf. I have a lil scar on my forhead, it's so neglible that until I started typing this post I actually forgot I had it, it's quite small now but my Dad said wen I was a kid it was bigger cos one day I stood infront of the mirror in the bedroom staring at my reflection...then I asked the mirror if he was looking at me...then I broke it wiv my leg...I don't believe him jo! He said he was in the parlour and he heard a crashing sound in the bedroom, when he walked in he saw me standing in fornt of the mirrors frame wiv glass all around me, funny enuf he didn't beat me oh, he just handed me over to my mum!

She knew I liked to draw and wen my Dad bought our first PC I use to run mad wiv paint! I'd draw on paint and then print the stuff I'd drawn! The house was full wiv sheets of A4 paper wiv sketches of superman and power rangers. She banned us from using the printer cos the ink was expensive and I was just using it for nonsense. As usual I no dey hear word and I swore my brother and sister to secrecy cos back then they were too lil to resist blackmail, not like now that everyone has dirt on the other sibling, if you threaten anyone of them now u get threatened right back lol. I used the printer despite the ban and one day came back from work and I don't know if she had hidden cameras in the house or it was one of those her psychic moments but she just spontaneously asked who had been using the printer. No one answered her, then she took my lil bro into the bedroom and after a few touchy touchy wiv the Koboko the dude started singin like a bird...Mehn I can still picture that beating right now...she locked both of us in the room so I cudn't run...wen she opened the door I was a changed boy lol

This was one of the only two occasions wen my Dad beat me and it was cos of the reason I said in th earlier post, I lied to him. I had been playing in the bedrrom and had broken a very expensive boottle of cologne. In an effort to cover up my crime I opened the windows, switched on the fan and Air conditioner, scrub the floor, packed up the pieces of the broken bottle and sprayed Air Freshener and Shelltox in the room to mask the scent. I thot I'd covered up my tracks well enuf but Oga came back 4rm work and didn't even take three steps into the room before knowing something was wrong. He asked wat happened, I lied, he asked again, I lied, he stepped on a piece of glass...I got a whooping!

There are so many that I cud keep typing for ages. This last one was a very funny one. We had dis uncle who visited us very often and anytime he was leaving he'd give the kids in the house some money. I always liked wen he visited cos it meant by the end of his visit I'd have money for Chocomilo lol (those lil cubes were addictive mehn!). One day he came to visit and I was excited as usual, then we he was leaving he didn't even say goodbye to me and when he was about to get into his car what did I do...I ran out and said "Uncle! won't you give us money?"....MEEEEHNNN! the look my mumsy gave me ehn!!!...that night I chop am well well, she used koboko, shoe, cane...I didn't actually understand why I was being punished cos I thot the Dude had started a tradition and may have just forgotten to observe it that day...After that day anyone who visited th house wud harldy see me cos I'd run to the room, they thot I was shy...didn't know it was a survival technique!

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Series Finale: Robby Scribbles and...

The Three Tongues of Censure: A long time ago in a far away land there lived three young disciples who shared two masters each of great wisdom. The older Master was calm, shrewd, slow to anger but vicious in fury and he approached situations wiv a certan calmness and judgement that resolved matters amicably but wasn't afraid to use the hard hand of discipline even though it was rare. The second master was the more impulsive of the two and she was known to allow her temper cloud her judgement even though she compensated wiv a big warm loving heart. The Three Tongues of censure was a weapon whose origin was shrouded in mystery and only one of these great masters was able to attain this powerful weapon of chatisement learning all of it's techniques and using it to great effect on the pupils as a reminder of their training and as a tool of chastisement...this is the story of discipline, obedience, the weapon which imparted all these and it's weilder....MAMA SCRIBBLES!!!

The three Tongues of Censure (TTC) was the most feared thing in my childhood and was my mum's weapon of choice when it came to teaching us a lesson wen someone ended up breaking plates in the house or playing football outside past 6pm or telling lies or sneaking out to buy goody goody 4rm Mallam Musa! It was a tri-mouthed Koboko and it dealt an ass whooping the likes of which Spartans wept over! The thing that tripped me about the TTC was it's location, we never knew where she kept it but wen a whooping needed giving the Koboko came a'callin.
Somedays Me, my younger sis and bro wud ransack the whole house looking for it and we'd never find it but weneva she drove in 4rm work earlier than usual and caught us playing football wiv Tope and Tobi the TTC wud appear a few hours later to handle it's business. The way my mumsy used this thing can only be compared to the way Wolverinee uses his claws, there was a technique involved in summoning the TTC and it usually went like this:
It's 3:34pm and I've just broken the expensive flower vase on the dinning table despite the 15min warning we got the day it was brought home. With Every passing hour since then my fear has heightened and at 6:45pm I'm just a heap of sweat, tears and fright. 7:15pm she drives in 4rm work and my brother and sister run into their room abandoning me, I greet her and using her psychic skills she senses that something is wrong. She gets in the house and notices the dinning table is looking a bit vacant. She asks for the flower vase...I stutter...she asks again reducing the volume and pace of her words....I keep stuttering, her words gather more pace and volume...my eyes begin to water and I hope they can buy me some more painless minutes and ultimately mercy...a futile effort. She tells me to wait in her room and comes in a few seconds after me, as she's staring at me and telling me how she going to whoop me so bad i won't be able to sit for a week (in igbo lanugae cos it's more dramatic) the TTC appears in her hand... I think it's the fear of the impending lashing than distracts me 4rm noticing where she pulls it out 4rm. All I know is when you are told to wait in the room it's like sending a someoen to Guantanamo bay. The TTC is the perfect weapon, it's can mete out long range attacks so when u scamper to the edge of the bed she'll still reach you wiv minimum effort and it can deal devastating short range attacks that will make you reconsider if you are planning to come in on her close enough to grab her and beg for mercy. There us to be a time wen she'd tell me she'd give me 12 strokes and I'd be counting in my mind, by the time she gets to 10 I start to count out loud and then she says "So u are counting, you are not even serious....M piakasi gi aru ehn, e man' sa'aru n'una a ozo" (Translation: I will flog u so bad that you won't be able to take a bath in this house again)

The TTC terrorised us in that house and I took the major share of the terror. My bro and sis didn't get as many whoopings as me cos as a child I was somewhat "Adventurous" and "Curious". My dad never used the TTC cos he never really like the idea of hitting for correction...except wen u lied, my dad flipped wen we lied to him, you cud steal his money, sell his car or soak his TV in water but if he asked you who did it and you lied and he found out it'll be like Zeus zapping a mosquitoe wiv a lightening bolt. My dad was always the one who saved us from beatings from my mum but we weren't always lucky and sometimes you'd commit a crime, she be poised to beat you, my dad wud save you and it'll be like all was forgiven...then by 4am she'll wake u up and in the comfort of your own bed she'd use the TTC and harrass the hell out of ur snitching hide...it was like the Mafia catching a snitch who'd been in witness protection. A few weeks back I was tellin my Uncle, my mum's younger brother, dis story and he just started laughing at me, I asked him why he was laughing and he said that when they were kids their mum (Grandma) use to do the same thing to them and my Mum use to be a very regular victim of the 4am whoopin..."So it's a either family tradition or Revenge!!" I screamed lol

One day I was in the sitting room wiv my mum and we were watching a movie where a kid was telling his mum to shut up and leave his room. We all shook our heads and then my mum goes into this long speech about how kids need a smacking sometimes to set them straight...I just started smiling then I looked at her and said.."Mummy, you know u've flogged me shege in dis life?" She laughed and said that if she hadn't whooped me like dat as a kid I'd be irresponsible and wayward! Well I agree and like a true son of the soil I will continue the tradition...if only my prospective children knew wat was in store for them lol!

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