What's in a name, Part 2

I don't know exactly how this came about but I was having a conversation with Lisa and the topic turned to names. Next thing we knew we spouted off all sorts of funny name-related anecdotes. I mused that we could take the transcript of that IM and title it "What's in a name?"

As the conversation progressed, I thought-- well, why not?

A few highlights:

It was Allan who started it all (isn't that just like him-- always starting something!). He's got a rather unique spelling of his name-- most people go by "Alan", some by "Allen". His version is the rarest of them all. Ironically, it's the (originally) British spelling and yet I understand that, like in the US, "Alan" is more common than "Allan" over in the UK.

Then we got to talking about alternate spellings of common names, like "Aimee" for "Amy", which must've been popular around the time I was born, because I went to school with more Aimees than I can remember!

One of my favorite "One Big Happy" cartoons involves a punk teenage babysitter showing up at the door, proudly proclaiming her name and emphasizing its strange spelling: "My name is Typhanni".

When I was a little girl I was enchanted by the name "Kyril". Never mind that I never actually heard of anyone with that name. But "Carol" or "Karen" or even "Kyra" just seemed too ordinary. Later on I settled for a more conventional "Elizabeth".

I know a girl named Jenniper, whose name is a cross between Jennifer and Juniper. Poor girl is always having to emphasis the "p", just like I have to emphasize the "H" in my name, which most people want to say/write as "Kelly".

I also knew a girl named Jennifer Ann. One day she decided that "Jenny" wasn't glamorous enough, so she legally changed it to "Gabriella" ("Ella" for short). But then there was the problem of what to do with her middle name-- keep it as is, make a new one, what? So she decided on a middle ground: she smushed the letters of her original name together and became Gabriella Jenniann. I remember calling her at home once. She wasn't in, I talked to her parents and left a message. The thing I remember to this day was the fact that I referred to her as "Ella" while her parents kept saying "Jenny". Guess they weren't too thrilled with her changing the name they picked out for her?


How about nicknames?

Allan's immediate family calls him "Al" most of the time-- a name I can't stand. It sounds too greasy and seems more like the name of a Mafia don than an ordinary husband and father. Lisa's daughter has the opposite problem: Family uses the given Jessica, "Jess" to everyone else.

One of my uncles (who grew up and lives in Asia) didn't realize that "Charlie" is a nickname for "Charles", and so basically the same name. In his desire to give his sons English names, he named one Charlie and the other Charles.

And terms of endearment?

Well, Allan and I very rarely refer to each other by name-- it's always "Sweetie". We've gotten so used to it that the last time we visited with his family, Allan kept accidentally calling his sister "Sweetie"! I don't know who was more grossed out-- him or Debbie ;-)

How about you? Any interesting name-related tidbits to share, whether anecdotal or from real life?