A
Rant By Any Other Name
"Insanity in individuals is something rare; but in groups, parties, nations,
and epochs it is the rule."- Nietzsche
 Before
I launch into my usual tirade I need to ask for your
help.
I have a nephew who's graduating from high school soon and
the family wants to throw him a party. But we old folks are
kinda vague on what constitutes real fun for an 18-year-old
boy these
days...
aside from booze and broads. That's a gimme.
So if you have an idea for a fun event send
me an email and I'll
award an original, hand-signed Raging Pencils cartoon
(my choice) to the most intriguing entry.
And thanks for your help.
=mike=
----------
 I
always thought my name could be safely considered unique
as, even in a city as big as Dallas, there were only two
Stanfill's
in
the phone book, and one of them belonged to my brother.
Then the Google came along and a vanity search or two quickly
dispelled any notion of exclusivity. In fact, there are
so many other Mike Stanfill's out
there
I'm considering
forming a club. A small club but an interesting one.
Do you know how they name children in Iceland? If it's
a boy they take the first name of the father and add the
word "Son" to the end of it to form a brand-new
last name. If it's a girl they do the same thing except
they add
the word "Dottir"
(pronounced
"dochter"...
it's
a Germanic
thing.)
So Jonah, son of Utrecht is Jonah Utrechtson, and Betty,
daughter of Joanna, becomes Betty Joannasdottir. It's sounds
odd but
at least they don't end up with a country full of
John Smiths. Or Mike Stanfills.
Long before I learned of Iceland's unique method of assigning
identity I'd always thought that we here in the States
should do something to inject a little variety into life,
if not
the phone book.
My idea was create new names when people married, to take
the bride and groom's last names and sort of moosh them
together and extrude into
something
unusual,
as
in "Smith"
and "Jones" becoming "Smones" or "Jith" or "Jonth".
Yes, I realize men don't traditionally adopt new names
when
they marry but if the pracice is good enough for the ladies
it's good enough for us men-folk. Right, men-folk?
So with a father named Stanfill and a mother named Dobie
I could have instead been Mike Standobie. Now THAT would
have been unique.
=mike=
|
