Cheers Tim!
Perhaps like you, I have spent a lot of time thinking about modern Australia.
And then once I settle on a point of view, I remind myself that, in these moments, it's probably best to keep things on the down-low, just chill for a while, don't post to social media, hold your tongue, not everyone wants to hear your opinion, and silence is golden.
I try, I swear, but we're not all built the same.
ABC's Radio National entertained me on my weekly commute to Hobart while the newspapers tried to convince me that a floating stadium in our capital city was the great oval unifier that we have all been waiting for.
By the way, how good does York Park look now!
Irish band The Corrs certainly think so...
And while last week my colleague columnist, Barry Prismall, mused about pop god Taylor Swift (he's late to the party), I swiftly tried to get my head around a sudden interest in American Football because of her new squeeze.
Every second reel on my social media feed detailed the war between Israel and Hamas or the new relationship between Taylor Swift and Kansas City Chiefs tight end, Travis Kelce.
Tragically, you could not watch two more different fortunes unfold before your eyes.
Recriminations about The Voice to Parliament and the highly successful No movement across the country dominated the early part of weekly discussions with First Nations people asking for space to think and grieve and reflect while the No camp quickly got on with life like nothing had really happened.
It's one of the great challenges we face, a mechanism for change becoming a political football where a yes/no question unsurprisingly divides people.
Some said the Prime Minister got it wrong because there should have been two questions: one for Constitution Recognition and one for The Voice.
If that is true and the implementation of the Uluru Statement from the Heart should have been incremental, then every other Prime Minister who has posed a question to the Australia people bar eight have got the question wrong.
And to round off last week, one of my favourite Australians, Tim Minchin, released a commissioned song celebrating the 50th Anniversary of the Sydney Opera House.
The deeply ironic tune, Play It Safe, describes an Australia that has locked itself away from change, focusing on sticking between the lines, looking questionably at out of the box ideas, failing to walk in others' shoes, and leaving creativity to countries like Denmark.
The successful design for the Sydney Opera House was part of a worldwide competition won by Dane Jrn Utzon who was one of 233 to submit.
And although he won the competition, there remains a rumour that his design was initially rejected due to its outlandish architecture.
The construction of the Opera House was both significantly over budget and delivered significantly late, yet it is now a UNESCO World Heritage Listed Site attracting more than 10 million visitors per year.
The much talked about Australian Constitution states regarding constitutional change:
The proposal be put to the electors qualified to vote in elections for the House of Representatives between two and six months after the passage of the law.
A majority of Australians vote to approve the change, as a total and in a majority of the six states (this is referred to as the 'double majority').
The detail prescribing constitutional change is found in the Referendum (Machinery Provisions) Act 1984, an Act of Parliament passed into law by politicians.
Since Federation, there have been 45 referendums put to the Australian people.
Only a handful of Prime Ministers have achieved success in achieving a yes vote.
In 1951 Prime Minister Robert Menzies offered:
"The truth of the matter is that to get an affirmative vote from the Australian people on a referendum proposal is one of the labours of Hercules."
The Referendum (Machinery Provisions) Act 1984 was recently reviewed by a parliamentary committee in 2021/2022 with amendments focused on modernising the process with a focus on the distribution of information in a modern Australian whereby many citizens receive their news via social media.
There is now an argument to be made, backed by the likes of constitutional law expert Scientia Professor George Williams, that with only eight referendums for constitutional change passing in the affirmative, it's as Menzies offered more than 70 years ago - far too difficult to make change.
After all, Hercules was the Greek god of strength and heroes, not the Australian god of constitutional reform.
Prime Minister Albanese will be ridiculed, demeaned, and abused for being on the losing side of a referendum.
History was not on his side but perhaps he should have heeded the words of Tim Minchin in ironically describing the building of a modern Australia via the iconic Sydney Opera House some fifty years ago:
"Play it safe
Know your place
Know your lines
Know your limits
Find a doctrine
Get it locked in
Build a box and stay in it"
Cheers Tim, your irony is not lost on any of us.