Mine is “A Monkey With a Gun”. I chose it for two reasons. One is that it it conjures up an image of funny unpredictability, and the other is a personal joke. Humans just aren’t that smart. The only thing that sets us apart form the other animals is our unsurpassed competence in using tools. There is a note of humility in that. Humans are just monkeys with guns. Since I’m a human, well, there you go.
Anyway, that’s why I chose my usename. Why did you choose yours?
My first name is John, I bet you can’t guess what letter my last name starts with! 
I like Discworld and all the good names (at the time) were chosen. I’d probably go with Adorabelle Dearheart if selecting a new name, or possibly Igorina.
Until a couple years ago, I owned ferrets. (Two rabbits these days.) There’s a phrase about “herding cats,” generally used to refer to a difficult and pointless activity; I’ve said that herding ferrets is like that but the critters in question act like they’re hypercaffeinated and have teeny-tiny attention spans.
I love absurdly ridiculous names, and Mike G. was already taken.
Because I make you mule deer.
My favorite character in my favorite movies, and the year of my birth. I started using the handle on message boards in the mid-90s, and just kept using the same name on different boards so I didn’t have to keep remembering different names. 
Well, gadgets were once largely based on analog technology…then things became digital…
Actually, I wasn’t feeling very creative when I signed up. I had lurked for a while, and finally decided to answer a question. I picked this because I work in cell phones, and…well…the thing I said above.
Then I decided my name was too long to actually deal with, so I thought I could go by D/a as a nickname. (Capital D for the new Digital. Lowercase a for the ‘old’ analog). Most of the time, people either type out the whole name, or call me Digital. Occasionally someone uses D/a…and I smile a bit.
I suspect I’ll change my name at some point. I hear Shoplifting Octopus is available.
ETA: After I joined, I learned about AnalogSignal. While we’ve had one or two fun exchanges over the name, I sometimes feel like I’m somehow…insulting? making fun of? something? his name with mine. Totally not intended, and I really hope he doesn’t mind.
-S/o
we’ve had these threads in the past, but I like talking about me.
“Cal Meacham” is the name of the way-brainy hero of Raymond F. Jones’ novel This Island Earth. They adapted the book into a 1950s movie, in which Cal was played by the tall, dark, handsome, and deep-voiced Rex Reason. It’s a classic case of compensation, in my case. I’m none of those things. I see that Rex has a website. he’s still around, bless him. And he’s sti;ll bette-looking and better-sounding than me, damn him.
In any event, CalMeacham is an appropriate hero. The book is much better than the movie, which dumbed down the parts it did copy, then threw out most of the book and substituted a plot apparently written by looking at a lot of 1840s SF pulp covers and fantasizing about them, rather than reading the contents. A film that’s ripe for a remake.
It’s the name of a pet lizard.
In 1992, I made the acquaintance of two girls—best friends, both bright, and both irreverent. I was 17, they were 15.
I met them through mutual friends, one of whom was dating one (and would later date the other). We bonded, and spent the summer between my junior and senior year (their freshman and sophomore year) hanging out. The two gave nicknames to everyone they met or knew, often yelling the nicks out at the top of their voices in the high school halls. e.g. all of the cheerleaders were R.O.U.S.es, one guy was Old People, another was Muppet, etc.
Anywho, these two couldn’t come up with a nickname for me. They’d already named my truck (1971 Ford F100) “Beasht”. One lovely spring afternoon (’93) we were driving around downtown Hays, America, (that’s an inside joke…) and the private Catholic primary school had just gotten out. With their powder-blue uniforms, they were known as “smurfs” in town. I made an off-hand crack about how I should just drive them over. The two looked at each other with an expression of absolute delight and dubbed me “azraiel,” as in Gargamel’s cat from the “Smurfs.”
I’m not named after the “angel of death”. I’m not a gothling. I was given my nick by two silly 15-year-old girls almost 20 years ago. Named after a cartoon cat. But I’ve used it as an online ID since 1994, so why change? And anyone googling my nick is going to find a whole lot of weepy emo shite, and not me. So fair play.
This, my favorite as a very small child.
From one of the songs in That Thing You Do, which also happens to capture my living situation and interest in urbanity.
Don’t. I like it.
I have a tattoo of a Leafy Sea Dragon on my left arm.
I like odd, esoteric things that tend not to make sense to the masses.
I like cars.
voilá!
Sisu as this is how I would like myself to be.
endurance, resilience, tenacity, determination, perseverance
an inner reserve of diligence, capacity, the ability to face head-on and always overcome
craziness: the recklessness that inspires a person to take on something in the face of incredible odds
bravery, empowerment, inner strength
Sisu means that you finish what you start, you don’t quit in the middle of a job, and you don’t whine.
“It doesn’t take sisu to go to the North Pole; it takes sisu to stand at the door when the bear is on the other side.”
It started as a joke about GW’s three ended axis of evil. After that it just seemed to have that je ne sais quoi, which is a French term for something I can’t describe.
12 years ago, I had just re-read A Wrinkle in Time and it was on my mind. Now it’s my online persona all over the damn Internet. Funny how that works. (I mean, shit, I like the book and everything, but not that much.)
