Thai blogging life: Hit me with your comments stick (reply to the Shrink)

Boyfriend Maiyuu is hopeless. Or maybe the problem really lies with me...

Newcomers to this blog are probably wondering which is true (and why they should care).
In recent months, regular reader the Shrink has volunteered much advice about what I should do with my relationship.

Sometimes, I get annoyed and say so. Once or twice, I have even deleted his comments, as I thought they went too far (well, I assume they were his - he posts under the 'anonymous' label after all).

Yet am I justified in complaining?

Someone who writes for an audience should expect that sometimes readers might not agree with him, or offer views on his life which he doesn't want to hear.

I accept that some of what regular reader the Shrink says is hard to take, and that occasionally friends and even members of my family have said much the same thing - boyfriend Maiyuu is a waste of time, manipulative, and so on.

However, I stand by my assertion that no one is in a position to know as much about what is really happening as the actors involved - me, him, and people who know us or who have met us.

I will stay in the relationship for as long as I think it is going somewhere. Should we meet problems, then we will have to sort them out ourselves. Ending the relationship is a drastic solution to something which could still be repaired.

Why we bother trying to fix things if they break? Usually because they still have some value to us. When they cease to have that value, we trade them in or discard them for a new good.

I would like to thank the Shrink for adding colour to this blog. A while ago, I declared that reader responses were the best part about any blog, and for the last few months have encouraged more of them.

Someone left a message yesterday saying he could understand why some readers liked to bitch about Maiyuu and me - because I wrote in such a way that almost demanded a response, or was angling for comments.

True! I want comments, and the more the better. I won't like them all, of course, but I don't care.

When I started writing this blog, readers rarely commented, and nor did I welcome them. I thought I could do it on my own. Blogging was a way to vent, or prove to myself that I could still write. Boring!

Now, I feel differently. A blogger is just one voice. If readers take part as well, then many voices are represented on our little stage.

If readers are interacting with 'content', then that content takes on a new life.

When I realised how much I valued reader comments, I changed the way I write, to draw them out more often.

Yesterday I invited the Shrink to become a regular contributor to this blog. Judging by his latest response, the Shrink doubts my motives.

Actually, I am keen on inviting someone else to write for this blog, and thought the Shrink might make a good choice, as he appears to have a good command of English.

The arch, bitchy, moody queen in him comes across clearly. By which I mean, he has a good writer's voice.

I did not extend the invitation merely to 'marginalise' his opinions, though if he was to write in this space then he should expect readers might well subject his stories to as much scrutiny as they do mine.

We are all interested in each other's lives. The question is, are we willing to 'share', to use the ghastly modern parlance?

Apparently, I made some outrageous 'projections' about Shrink's conduct with boyfriends. Sorry about that.

Now that I have said sorry, I hope we can move on.

Message to the Shrink: If you're worried that I would attempt to undermine stories about your life, by making other 'projections' about what it might all mean, then I think you should rest easy.

If you are even half as good a writer as I hope, then your stories will cry out for reader reaction. Regular visitors to this blog will pile in to leave their views: how they feel about decisions you have made your life, especially where Thais are concerned.

Like me, you might find some of the responses hard to take. But those who dish it out are usually just as good at taking it back in return. Right (cough, cough)?

However, in any event it seems 'personal circumstances' might conspire against you taking part. 'Personal circumstances?' Almost everything about blogging is personal.

If you lack the courage to tell us about your life, then just say so. No need to be a bashful queer!

The last word should go to The Shrink:

'You have characterised me in other critical posts as someone who probably "has a different young English-speaking boy in his bed every night".'

That was intended as a criticism? How remiss of me...I must have succumbed to an envy attack. In most circumstances, my response would be: 'Good luck to you, dear!'

Now, how about telling us those stories!

Thai blogging life: Invitation to the Shrink

Here's an invitation to the Shrink, a regular critic of this blog's author.

I like the way the Shrink writes - he has a fluent, convincing and easy-to-read style which would not look out of place on this blog.

Are you interested in leaving accounts of your life in the Land of Smiles?

Maybe we can compare.

Ennui is a friend of mine

No reaction from The Shrink to yesterday's post. Has he worn himself out with all that couch talk?

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The boyfriend went out last night. He is cunning, so that when he wants to go out, he is always out the door before I get home from work.

That way, I can't stop him. He sends an SMS telling me he's going out. He also makes sure he cooks a meal for me before he leaves. Last night, he left for me chicken pasta, wrapped inside a crepe envelope.

Only a curmudgeon would object. I sent Maiyuu a thank you message as I usually do, and wished him a happy night out.

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The money for the pushbike and sofa which Maiyuu wants - okay, which we both want - is likely to arrive tomorrow. After rising from his slumber, Maiyuu's first words the other day were:

'When will I be able to buy a bike?'

No 'Good morning', or 'How did you sleep?' Such polite fussiness belongs in the West.

Lately, Maiyuu has looked bored and unhappy. Now that we have settled in to our new condo, there's nothing to do.

Maybe people are only happy as long as they are striving for something. When it finally arrives (a nice place to live, in this case), the novelty quickly fades. We start looking for something else to worry about.

We want to buy a bike, so he can scoot off to the supermarket to buy groceries when he needs them. Martha Stewart's cooking show gives him ideas for cooking, which he usually likes to act on straight away, while the inspiration is still with him.

We want a sofa so we have somewhere to sit while watching TV. At the moment, we lie on awful fold-out soft mattresses, which in the old place served as Maiyuu's bed.

We sleep together on those mattresses occasionally, as the afternoon ebbs into evening, and we feel in need of rest.

Once we have those things, Maiyuu assures me, the condo will be finished.

We won't have to spend anything more on doing it up, or equipping it for our needs.

Yet I do not kid myself that a smart pushbike will make Maiyuu happier.

It will give us perhaps a week's worth of excitement - the novelty of riding on a bike, which I have not done for years, and Maiyuu, perhaps not at all.

After that, we will go back to feeling the way we do now - bored, flat, as if life is just drifting along. No challenges, no excitement. It's almost as if we need something to go wrong to recover some passion in our lives.

Computer trials, The Shrink pays a visit

A computer repair man came yesterday. My computer is less than 12 months old, but is already playing up. I suspect the problem originates with the CD player. I hear a strange clicking sound, then shortly after, the computer shuts itself down.

Maiyuu called a computer repair man who makes house calls. He charges a flat price of B1500 and fixes the thing at your place.

Previously, we have carted the hard drive to a computer repair shop at Pantip Plaza. This time we called someone to fix it at our condo, as it takes less time, is less bother, and most importantly perhaps, ensures we can keep an eye on the repair man.

He spent two hours while I was at work last night inspecting the machine, looking for faults, but could find none.

'If the fan stops working, it can shut down the computer,' he suggested.

A Thai computer repairer's first recourse in times of doubt - or whenever anything, in fact, goes wrong - is to download a new version of Windows.

Usually the repairers are young guys who have no particular training in how the inside of a computer works. But someone has told them that rebooting and downloading a new version of Windows is a Good Thing which will clear up most problems.

They make a copy of your files first, of course, and usually ask if they can wipe your hard-drive clean which is what happens if they install a new copy of Windows as a catch-all for all those hard-to-find bugs.

My problem with this approach is that their solution does not always work - and if they could just be bothered looking properly under the hood in all the usual trouble spots, they might find the cause.

Luckily, the boyfriend was on hand to rein him in. 'He asked if he could download a new version of Windows,' he told me.

'He had an illegal copy of Windows XP. We have a real version of Windows Vista. I said if he downloads his bogus version of XP, we end up with illegally copied software, in place of our genuine stuff.

'Apart from that, downloading a new version of Windows may not be the right fix,' Maiyuu said.

Well done, Maiyuu. I have been using the computer for an hour today, and can report no mishaps.

The repair man says fan problems are common in Hewlett-Packard computers such as mine.

He tells me that if the problem recurs, I should turn off the computer, give the fan another chance to start drawing air, and start again.

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A lengthy discussion in the comments section of the post, 'Thai condo life: Let's take a look inside', appears to be winding down.

Among the contributors were Kimoochii21, Mr Anonymous aka The Shrink, and fellow Bangkok blogger BB.

Point of interest? A discussion about the higher barriers to entry which foreigners must cross if they want to get close to Thais, compared to those who are happy to spend their time in Pattaya bars.

Who is the Shrink? That's the first time I have coined a name for him. He's the reader who has put forward a theory on this blog previously that I adopt a defence mechanism to avoid intimacy, which is why I have ended up with a boyfriend as distant as Mr Maiyuu.

In the discussion, The Shrink tells BB that he is probably adopting the same tactic.

The Shrink has not met either of us in real life, of course, but on the other hand, where else can you get such penetrating psychological insights for free? Here's a taste, from this comment he left for BB:

'It may be that you are selecting unconsciously for people who won't connect with you or will do so the wrong way. It is a defence mechanism often used to avoid intimacy, frequently employed by those who come from dysfunctional families.

'In some cases, it is used to avoid all connections whatsoever (which seems to be happening in your case) and in others it is used to avoid real, nurturing relationships even though a 'relationship' or something with some of its characteristics seems to be happening (that is what I would surmise about BKKdreamer's relationship choices).'

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Does the Adsense bot crawl the content of comments, as well as the posts themselves?

Instead of giving me condo ads for the post on my Bangkok condo, Adsense was serving up rubbish about content filters, self-defence, car seats, and safety harnesses when I checked a moment ago.

Readers in different parts of the world might get different ads, but here in Bangkok, they look lame. Has the poor little bot read all that psycho-babble at the bottom of the post and taken fright?

Bicycle action man, flash argument

You can't do anything yourself,' the boyfriend complained, after I knocked on his bedroom door to tell him the internet was not working.

The broadband internet box is in my room. Maiyuu has his own computer, as do I.

While we share the same line, I am usually the first to know if the net is working, as the box with the flashing lights tells me whether we have a signal. This morning, the light where it says 'internet' refused to light up.

'That's not why I knocked. It was to tell you that if you want to use the net, you might have to wait,' I protested.

'No, it's not...I know the real intention. It was to drag me out to get the net working again. I am exhausted with handling all the problems in this household as it is,' said Maiyuu.

I shouted at him until he shut up. Miffed that I raised my voice, he stormed back to his room, shut and locked the door.

I went to my room, and sent him a text message. If the net was working, I could have contacted him on Messenger instead.

'Before I went overseas, I had lost confidence in my ability to manage things and look after myself, it is true.

'However, while I was away, I realised I could do it, as there was no Maiyuu over there to help. Don't flatter yourself - I don't need you that much,' I wrote.

Maiyuu's reply was just as unkind.

'If you can do it yourself, then go ahead, boss.'

Arguments at our place can flare up from nothing, like that one. However, they can end just as quickly.

Moments later, Maiyuu left for the supermarket. He made steak, roti bread, and potato pie for lunch. He knew we had forgiven each other, but just to make sure, I gave him a hug.

'We know you're good at everything, but sometimes I do like to do things for myself,' I told him.

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We are thinking of buying a bicycle, for Maiyuu's daily journeys to the supermarket to get groceries, mainly food.

The other day, I walked with him to the nearest Tops supermarket, about 1km away on a narrow street with a poor footpath. It was his second trip that day, which he normally takes by foot.

'A bicycle would make it easier, as I could put the things in a bag and sling them over the handlebar,' he said.

Maiyuu thinks we could also put it to another use. 'I could pick you up at the mouth of our street when you come home from work.'

I have not seen a Thai guy giving a farang a ride on the back of his bicycle, though it probably could be done. It would make for an unusual and romantic sight.

For the time being, we might keep it simple, and buy it for grocery runs instead.