A Girl Named...

Names have interested me since I was little. Let me put it this way, I used to keep a list of possible names for my kids. I started this list before high school. Lots of Russian or Hawaiian names dominated the list. The older, the better. I was definitely more fantasy than sci/fi when I was little. I would always ask our school librarian if she had any books on unicorns. "Not this week." Couldn’t she just order one? Wasn’t that her job? Anyway, I digress. I’ve had issues over the last couple of years with the way people pronounce my name. Yeah…it’s rather an insignificant thing to bitch about. And it’s pretty much the only claim that I really enjoy taking to my Yankee background. Do you know how annoying it is in the South when someone asks you where you’re from because they just have a certain feeling that you’re not one of them, and when you reply "Chicago" they feel the need to imitate and mock you by saying "Oh yeah, Chi-CAW-go"?! I feel like replying back a la Toot from "Drawn Together": Well, DUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU UUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU UUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU UUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU UUUUUUUUUUUUUUH! Spittle and all. Of course, it could have been worse. My maiden name rhymes with "oil" and my parent’s claimed that they were considering naming me Olive Oil or Standard. Good times.