Anyway, I guess we will find out in the morn, or of the morn, or however those old people say it when they are describing their medication schedules.

Ttfn

This is my vomit face.

Politics makes my medulla oblongata hurt.  I never liked you in high school, I don’t know if I like you now.  But I am getting to know you.  And the more I know, the more I want to know, and the less I like you.

For now, this is about Penny Wong.  (I don’t know if I would ever write about politics again.  It depends on how much punishment I can take before I projectile vomit.)  The knee-jerk reaction to her agreeing with her party’s policy is one of outrage.  That’s normal, and even after my disgust subsides, I realise it is the right response.  This is me trying to explain how I get from A (rage) to Z and then all the way back to A (fauxrage).

In the game of politics, the players are there because the spectators can’t or don’t want to play the game.  We love them, we hate them, we hate them more often than we love them but we love to hate them.  We’re just glad that we’re not the ones playing, glad that we don’t have to be hated, glad that we don’t have to compromise our integrity to play.  It is the players’ job to play and part of that job is to be hated.  They understand this before they start playing the game and they prepare themselves for this.

I don’t honestly think that Penny Wong is against same-sex marriage.  In everything that I have read, I haven’t come across her personal opinions (please enlighten me if I have missed something).  Even in this latest statement she uses the words “party’s position” and “party’s policy”.  It is easy to assume that if you support your party, and if your party supports discrimination, you, too, are publicly and privately discriminatory.  But it is also easy to see that she is playing the game.  Even if you don’t understand political theory, you should understand that if you fuck with your caucus (I think they’re a group of players that get bitchy if you aren’t loyal), they’ll fuck you right back and kick you off the field.  The caucus thing doesn’t apply to Malcolm Turnbull apparently.  Don’t ask me why, I don’t know, it just doesn’t.

So Penny said what she said so that she could stay in the game.  But she also knew that if she said it, the hypocrisy would be palpable.  She prepared for it.  In the locker room, the coach slapped her across the face a few times with a glove full of needles after the pep talk and sent her out into the stadium so that all her adoring fans could throw rotten tomatoes into her callous-covered face.  That’s her job in this game; she knows it.

Players like Penny are necessary.  We need to be grateful for her.  But it doesn’t mean we have to proclaim our unconditional devotion for her.  On the contrary, we need to burn her at the stake like the bwitch (fake public bwitch, not real bwitch) she is playing even if we know she’s secretly trying to tear down the man from the inside.  The why is coming up, I promise.

Penny is playing a two-faced game on one side of the boundary lines.  As spectators, we too have our own two-faced game to play on the other side.  Despite the glacial pace of the players’ game and their fucked up rules, our role is to pretend to play (not as players) the unhappy campers.  Nothing will satisfy us.  We want more blood, more tears, more distress from our players because that is how we change the rules.  The players understand the need for external pressure, and so should we.  The players plead “we’re doing our best, we need to make everyone happy, it takes time” and the spectators retort “rah, rah, not good enough, more, better, faster, now!”

Penny is making the most of a bad situation.  But if spectators supported her and in turn supported her “party’s policy”, it would do nothing to change that bad situation.  She wants to foster change just like everyone else.  If she didn’t expect to be criticised, she would have kept her mouth shut, or instead, run as an independent.  If we all supported her stance to support her party’s policy, her unpopular stance would have been all for nothing.  The caucus would think they are right to discriminate and the balls that Penny had to craft from her unused ovaries to shield herself from the barrage of gay tomatoes would have been wasted.  Don’t let her unused ovaries go…unused.

Penny has to deal with her caucus.  It doesn’t mean we have to.  We are free, and should remain free, to be horrified at her because, like Bob Brown, we have nothing to lose.  If nobody hated the players because everyone understood the game (and didn’t want to play the part of fauxrager), there would be no spectators, just players.  Then everyone loses.

I helped my sister write a doozy of a letter when she was trying to break up with a dude.  The letter wasn’t all that successful because he had something going on with his eyes (or his head) that prevented him from reading (or understanding) it.  My letters have a tendency of not doing what they were supposed to do.  But I try, oh how I try.  The dude is an ex now.  So it still worked out.

When I received a formal written letter (all official with the typed font and the letterhead on real human paper) from my Owners Corporation about complaints against me for “Alleged Breach of Rules, Undue Noise”, I was more than a bit pee-worthy excited.  I had a real reason to write a letter because “If the allegation is disputed, please respond to our office in writing.”  And I had some disputin’ to do, some real hard, and long, disputin’.  I gave them my disputin’ good.

So, in the immortal words of the MasterChef MasterClasses on Friday nights, here are some of my top tips when writing strongly worded letters:

• Be right.  Whether it be standing up for your right to wield sharp blades or tearing the heart out of an unsuspecting partner, use facts wherever possible.  Avoid truthiness if you can.  If the letter is about laws or rules, do your research.  You may end up sounding like a pretentious douche but at least you won’t be a lying pretentious douche.
• Sound right.  If you don’t have truth on your side, make it seem that you do.  Be honest when you are at fault but don’t focus on your flaws.  Exercise brevity, or if you are really desperate, exclude falsehoods altogether.  They’re not lies if you leave it out.  It’s like masturbation; nobody will know unless you tell them.  Except god.  He might.  I should probably start typing with both hands now.

Letter one:

Thank you for the written notice of the noise complaints. I didn’t wish for it to come to this but if it means that all parties concerned come to a mutual understanding of the Owners Corporation’s Rules, then it will be all for the best.

As far as I am aware, I have only received complaints from one neighbour, namely the gentleman from [redacted], as he is the only one who has approached me personally. When you specify that multiple “neighbours” have complained about noise coming from my unit, I would appreciate knowing who the other neighbours are so that they can air their concerns and I can modify my behaviour if necessary.

The gentleman in [redacted] approached me to two occasions. First was at approximately 9:30pm when he knocked on my door and complained about a beating or thumping sound coming from my unit. To the best of my knowledge, the noise was due to the music that I was playing, which I admit, did have a regular beat to it. Even though I did not believe I was breaching any Owners Corporation’s Rules, I immediately obliged to his concerns and stopped the music. From then on, at his request, I have never played music with an “electrical amplified sound reproducing equipment” for a time longer than one minute outside the hours of 9am and 7pm. I now listen to music through headphones.

The second occasion was on a different night, at 7:05pm. Again, he knocked on my door because he was unhappy about a thumping sound. At the time, was preparing dinner by cutting vegetables. More specifically, I was chopping a raw carrot. I showed him my kitchen bench through my open door and reminded him of the time. I was visibly annoyed because I had complied with his earlier requests even though I did not think I was at all at fault on the first occasion. He asked me if I could cut my vegetables more softly but I am unable to see how this is possible with a raw carrot.

On this second occasion, he also brought up another noise complaint he had about a whirring sound that was coming from my lounge room at midnight. I advised him that I am in bed by 11pm and so I could not understand how I was responsible for this complaint. After some thought, I believe that his complaint may have been regarding my electric toothbrush which I use at approximately 10:30pm before bed. Even if my electric toothbrush was used after 11pm, the Environment Protection (Residential Noise) Regulations 2008 excludes “electric equipment or appliances for personal care or grooming” under Group 5.

I am in bed by 11pm and I have my alarm clock, which plays music, set for 7am so that I can prepare for work. Even if I cannot sleep, I remain in bed in silence. I live alone. Between 11pm and 7am, I do not engage in any activity other than using my toilet. I turn off the alarm after I awake. I do not allow the music to continue to play.

I recommended that he seek out the rules regarding noise in multi-dwelling units or bring the matter to the Owners Corporation if he still believed that I was being unreasonable because I believed that he did not have a complete understanding of the appropriate regulations.

The Owners Corporation’s Rules, as of January 2008, specify “noise and other nuisances, including noise from domestic air conditioners, musical instruments, televisions and stereos and lawn mowers between 10pm and 9am.” I do not own any air conditioner, musical instrument or lawn mower. The gentleman from [redacted] has personally stated to me that my television use is not an issue. I have modified my behaviour regarding my stereo even though I have not used it to cause undue noise between 10pm and 9am even before the first complaint.

I hope that you would advise me if any of my above-described behaviour is unacceptable and in breach of the Owners Corporation’s Rules before you begin to charge me $121 per hour for all of your time spent on the matter. If I am not at fault, I do not see why I should be responsible for this cost. I do not believe that my behaviour has changed since the new owner occupier has taken residency of [redacted]. I had not received any personal or written complaint from the previous owner occupier.

I would greatly appreciate prompt response to this matter because I would like to resume living my life without fear of being a nuisance or breaking any laws as soon as possible.

I suspect the anonymous question was in reference to a series of tweets I made about David Campbell, George Alan Rekers, Jason Akermanis, Anthony Callea and Tim Campbell.  Lacking further specification, this is my assumption as the question in question arose at that time.  But I’m sure there are other ‘chains of insults’ that have offended sensitive readers in the past.  Please, I invite you to enlighten me.

In no way do I regard myself in a similar league as Catherine Deveny.  I think she is a fine writer (or, she has a lot of strong opinions and she isn’t afraid to voice them and when she can’t eloquently express herself in the written word she has a good editor).  I find some of her tweets funny (but not all of them).  I didn’t understand the humour in her Logies tweets until she explained their context (I am slow like that).  I think she is an ordinary comedian.  I never considered her a comedian before her Comedy Festival show and even after I *gasp* paid money to see her, I still don’t consider her a fantastic live performer.  She lacks the timing and delivery of a seasoned professional but I still enjoyed the show for the content.  And I respect any person that has the balls to stand up in front of any crowd and entertain.  I criticised Melinda Buttle‘s humour but I still respect the fuck out of her and also paid money to see her.

So, do I think The Age should have fired her?  Fuck no!  Call her unfunny, unfollow her, criticise her writings, ignore the retweets or the comments about her.  But to claim that all of her tweets are the express opinions of her employer is bullshit.  Her abrasive personality was the reason The Age hired her to write for them.  Jason Akermanis’ unpopular views are the reason the Herald Sun published that piece.  The Age only fired her because it was convenient for them at the time.

I have the advantage of not being in the public eye but my humour or opinions are not how I earn a living.  My views that marriage inequality is wrong, that political hypocrisy is disgusting and that religion thrives on misogyny and discrimination will never get me fired.

People use Twitter in many ways.  Some will comment on the weather, or how tired they are, complain about work but then tweet something about the silver lining so they don’t come across as negative.  I follow these people.  But I don’t judge them for it, or ask anonymous questions criticising their tweets’ quality.  If I really had a problem with them, I would just unfollow them.  Just because I follow them, it doesn’t mean that I have to tweet in the same way.  I use Twitter to find out what people are talking about.  Whether it be scathing commentary about MasterChef contestants or the outrage that builds from Jason Akermanis recommending AFL players to stay in the closet.  It’s not a reliable news source.  It’s filtered to what a select community are discussing as well as to what I want to read about.

And when I comment on news that I interests me, I try being funny, or what I think is funny.  I don’t expect everyone else to find it funny.  If I direct them at you and you find it offensive, then I apologise.  If I direct them at a public figure, get their people to contact my people, we can workshop their offence and figure out an agreement.  Criticism comes with the territory.  But to find something that is not about you as insulting just because you don’t agree with the message or share the humour will lead to a life of insults.

So if you really want to know what I was on about with my tweets yesterday afternoon, I was trying to make fun of how the spread of gossip on Twitter can become like Chinese Whispers.  If I remember it correctly, it started with Ricky Martin and/or Carl Williams.  I saw a tweet saying “I can’t believe Ray Martin is gay” (from Tom Ballard I believe).  I followed this with “I can’t believe Carl Williams is gay.”  Then, I think, “I can’t believe Justin Bieber is gay.”  Then more recently “I can’t believe David Campbell is dead.”  I am aware these statements are false.  I tried to muddy the news waters further with the hypocrisy of George Alan Rekers, the former officer of the National Association for Research & Therapy of Homosexuality (NARTH) who hired a male prostitute.  In all honesty, I confused David Campbell with Tim Campbell and because I disagree with the gay power couple’s stance to distance themselves from the gay community Tim Campbell’s acceptance as an ‘influential gay Australian‘, I threw in Anthony Callea as well (I’m petty, so shoot me).  He’s small like a gerbil (so am I by comparison, I can relate) and his partner is a gay man who may or may not roger him (again, I can relate).  For #rogeringgerbils, see Miranda Devine.  And if you are this far already, I really don’t think I need to explain #Akermankiss.

As for the compliments, I still need to work on that.  I don’t know any of the people who I follow well enough to pay them a compliment.  Any comment I make about them that I need to condense into less than 140 characters, to me, will sound insincere.  That is probably not how compliments work.  We pay them to make others feel better even if their intention is sometimes superficial.

And with that, Twitter (like formspring as Mr Gartside has so eloquently pointed out to me) is not the best place to get to know someone.  If you think that these people are off-limits to criticism or ridicule, then everyone, including myself, should receive the same treatment.  If you think you know them, because they are in the public eye, or you think you know me, from a bunch of tweets, then you are sorely mistaken.  I’m not defined by the one-dimensionality of Twitter, nor by a series of insulting tweets that make up only a part of my stream.  But I can see how Helen Razer feared being pigeon-holed by it.

I DO understand this part of myself Mr Anonymous.  But it’s not Twitter’s job to make you, or anyone else, understand.  I will share what I choose to share and my followers will take from that what they choose to take.  It’s like Chinese Whispers.

This time, I stopped because I had ignored pain from a shin splint for far too long.  I didn’t need an expert to tell me that.  I thought I had given it up for good.  My body was telling me to just stop trying so hard.  I almost listened.  But no matter how many times I stop, no matter how many injuries I sustain, there is one reason, above all others, that manages to drag me right back.  And I always forget it because it is the last thing on my mind.

It’s not the fitness.  It was the fitness.  That’s what started me running.  It isn’t any more.  After reaching a plateau with my weight, I realised I wasn’t getting any further with resistance training, just more injuries.  I was never a good runner.  My sister was running.  I thought the only people who ran were people who ran good.  Like those that speak good.  Thank fuck I got past that.

It’s not the feeling.  The feeling that you’re collapsing from the inside and that every extra step is like shoving the knife another inch deeper.  The feeling of death that makes you feel alive.  It will sometimes beat the fuck out of you until you give up and start walking and other times it will become your bitch.  That feeling of accomplishment and defeat is the same.  The successes and failures don’t define you as a runner so they force you to prove to yourself, and the rest of the world, that you won’t be beaten.  That your last time won’t be your last time.  It drags you back for more, every fucking time.  It is still a big part of it but it’s not the only thing.

It’s not being sociable.  I’ve run with family, friends and in larger groups.  The benefits of sharing advice, stories or just getting out there are invaluable.  But I could easily choose some alone time in my warm bed over chitchat with others in the dark cold of morning.

It’s not the competition.  The fun runs are fun.  They push you to achieve personal bests.  The drum of pounding feet from the mass of bodies around you is comforting like a hug.  When a single individual immerses themselves among the facelessness of a massive hivemind with that one clear goal, your insignificance becomes all the more intoxicating.  But I’m not competitive.  I despise comparing myself to others.  I still do it of course.  But it fucks with your head.  The cautious joggers that you pass near the starting line and wheezing first timers throughout the race come with countless others on the other side of the coin.  The old woman that overtakes you.  The prepubescent boy who is doing the half while you are struggling with the 10km.  The chubby mum that doesn’t break a sweat as she pushes her pram past you.  The PBs when you’re sick, the knee pain when you’re fine.

If it was any of these things, I should have been well on my way to a marathon by now.  But I’m not there, and that really isn’t my goal.  A lot of people will never understand that, runners and non-runners alike.  Putting yourself through the pain, the distress, without striving for a holy grail.

It’s the escape.  For that 17 minutes and 9 seconds last Saturday morning, the world was gone.  All the disappointments, the failures, the problems and the mistakes meant fuck all.  All that was left was my mind, and the only thing that mattered was getting my head to that last marker.  Once it was there, it didn’t matter how my body felt; nothing could stop me.  All the petty little issues of the past week were trampled into the ground with every stride.  There was no turning back, no obsessing over every broken piece of my fucked up head, no analysing why life was so shit.  It was all literally behind me.

But it never stays there.  That’s why I keep running.

Dear neighbour,

I hope you got a better sleep last night than I did.

No doubt you have heard the drunken party last night at unit [REDACTED] that went on until 4.00 am.

If you are unhappy about the loutish drunken behaviour that kept us awake all night, please call or email [REDACTED] of [REDACTED], (the Body Corporate Manager) and voice your displeasure, to ensure that such event does not happen again.

Other days, I’m glad to shut it out, cut it off.  I don’t want to be ‘on’.  The disconnection trumps the validation.  These days, I’m glad that I have a choice.

Unless you accidentally shoot me of course.

What started out as a post to prevent people from calling me Alfred, Alvin, Calvin, Kelvin or Kevin has turned into a sweeping saga of my evolved moniker.  So be forewarned that this is longer than my other posts and, yes, get used to the fact that I write most of my body first and then attempt to create a somewhat coherent introduction.

I’ve been called a lot of things during my 26 years on this planet.  I’ll stick with the names that weren’t directed at me as insults.  The light-hearted tales of the irreparable damage inflicted on me as a misguided child shall be saved for future musings!  I don’t want to overwhelm you with warm feelings and fuzzy thoughts.

So, in order of occurrence if memory serves me correctly:

Albert is the name that my parents blessed me at birth.  Embarrassing confession number 1: my father named me after Albert Einstein.  This might explain a little bit about my upbringing and how that makes me the person I am today.  Albert is what my family uses.  Unless my parents, in vain, try to speak to me in Vietnamese and call me Khoa.  Embarrassing confession number 2: I have always had difficulty pronouncing my name.  As far as I can remember, I’ve never had a lisp or stutter as a child but I’m sure the lack of my two front teeth didn’t help.  The bitch of the situation still haunts me as an adult, especially under lubrication and despite the ful hed o’ teef.  The two syllables in my name are unbelievably awkward to say out loud.  For those of you playing at home, have a go with me: AAllllb-b-berrrtttt.  It requires so much damn effort.  It’s the kind of word you give to fluffers so they can exercise their mouth to prevent them developing lock-jaw on set.

But despite all this, I’ve never felt inclined to change my name, no matter how many times I need to repeat myself as I struggle to introduce myself.  If I have been heard correctly, my name is simple enough to not need correction.  I don’t need to point out that “It’s spelt with two Ts, three Ls and an F thank you very much.  Please remember this in future”.  I can at least be thankful for that.

In primary school, the kids shortened my name to Alby, possibly because people were sick of watching me squirm as I tackled with my incurable inability to enunciate my syllables.  I was fine with that.  Nicknames are never my doing.  I just go along with them.

Then I progressed to high school where nobody knew of my naming history and I had a fresh start.  That’s where I would be known as bui.  It was easy to remember and say, and the lack of originality conformed with all the other lazy nicknames ending in an eeee sound.  Again I didn’t mind it because as long as you people weren’t using your full Christian name, it meant that you at least had some level of social acceptance.

One variation from high school I remember that never took off was bui-b.  Boy bands were popular at the time which meant that stupid band member names like Howie D and Stevie G were something to imitated.  I asked why I wouldn’t be called Alby B instead but they shot down because nobody knew me as Alby.  Go figure.  The flourish of the internet in the late 90s also meant that bui is what I used to squat on the best user names, email addresses and websites.  Most of the time I was successful.  One exception was the era of ICQ (Remember that time people?  Yes, I WAS THERE) where I used my 8 digit UIN with bui to create a horrid Hotmail account (Yes, THERE TOO).  Those were dark times.

Then I moved on to uni, where I retained some high school friends who continued to call me bui.  But the new uni friends needed to come up with something completely different.  So they chose Albo.  I have no idea why.  Possibly because it sounded like elbow and I have been known to write nasty words on other people’s arms to detract attention away from the unholy worship that my biblically sexy joints commanded from others.

Following uni, another variation to Alb that work colleagues invented was Albi.  This was clearly distinguishable from Alby because it was repeatedly written so that the ‘I’ could be dotted with various cute symbols like circles, stars and hearts.  It was quite gay and ‘turn-ing me ON’.

Surprisingly, it took over 20 years for anyone to ever call me Al.  Again, because I never tell anyone to call me a nickname.  I don’t pretend to be all chummy with anyone I don’t know.  Meeting new people is squirmy and icky.  Faux familiarisation is fucked.  And I like to use awkward alliteration wherever possible.  I also never wanted people to mistake me for an Alastair.  But when I think about it, it would be better for them to call me Al and then, if they’re curious, ask me what it was short for so they should remember that I’m not an Alfred.

The last incarnation of my identity has become @bui.  Don’t ask me to explain it.  It’s a long story.

Why the fuck does all of this matter?  Well, I may not pretend to be your mate when I introduce myself but I’ll also never be so anally retentive as to tell you to call me Albert and nothing else.  I’ve met far too many people who insist on being called their birth name and will tie your balls to your toes (apparently ‘jump down your throat’ is a WordPress cliché) if you shorten their name in any way.  “My name is DeBOREah and her name is DiANE.  We are NOT nor have we ever been Deb, Debbie or Di.  Please use them correctly in future.  Thank you for your co-operation.”  I detest these despicable demons of defining designation.  That one was a bit of a stretch but I’m no fucking poet.  Awkward I said, AWKWARD, and I used two D names too!  I’m trying and still learning (no Ian, not the Art of Love).

So in closing (yes, I had a stint in the debating team too), the immortal words of the adorably cute Paul Simon said it best with “I can call you Betty, Betty when you call me..”

Chin up my dear. The light shines from above, not below.

Take a compliment.  No matter how hard it is to take, just fucking say thank you, move on and you can process it later.  Ignore it and you will make it out as though you don’t deserve it, will never deserve it and you’re telling people to never compliment you again because it makes you uncomfortable and awkward.  If it takes you a long time to recognise a compliment, err on the side of positivity and say thank you even if in doubt.

If you somehow manage to fuck it up and you start thinking the compliment is an insult wrapped in sarcasm, do everything you can to avoid deflecting. You are almost always wrong if you think there is some hidden message or ulterior motive behind the compliment.  Becoming defensive or patronising will guarantee that you will never again receive a compliment.  Every man and his short-sighted dog can pick up on your low self-esteem.

And this part is probably the hardest.  Pay a compliment.  For the people living in the real world, compliments are good things that are meant to make us feel better.  So don’t assume that everyone hears compliments in the same messed up way that you do.  It’s like that bad joke about farting alone.  Smile, and the world smiles with you.  Unless, of course, you enjoy the smell of your own ass.

Rap battles: the intellectual's foreplay