When I was on my deathbed last week, I’d had a really rotten day and thus plotted out how I would explain why it is a nickname seemingly EVERYONE has taken to calling me gets on my damn nerves; about how I’d just gotten cool with—dare I say, even proud of—people calling me by my last name only in recent years and OH THE DRAMA and a whole bunch of other things about which y’all probably don’t give a shit.

Since my lover once again saved me from drowning in my own snot and blood (oh yes, there was blood this time around, and a lot of it, too), I’ll save y’all the histrionics and get to the point, which is this: The nickname everyone thinks is so cute! and fun to say! or whatever gets people goofy about it has a tendency to make me feel like I’m not being taken seriously ("Awwwwww, c’mon, [redacted] ...!"), and that’s offensive. Worse is when someone gets all butt-hurt because I lay down an edict to not call me it—it’s like, “Well, hell! I’m sorry for not allowing YOU to call ME something that’s making me want to stab you in the ear right now. Can you EVER forgive!?”

(And before I hear all about how I can and often do shorten and make a nickname out of anything resembling a name, ask yourself if a) you’ve ever asked me to stop calling you whatever I call you, and b) if you have, if I’ve ever blown you shit for it. That’s what I thought. No no, not someone on your behalf—YOU, and did you ask me in a straightforward way, non-dick way.)

So there it is.