I’m a lefty in a right-handed world, and have been mostly unfazed by that; the few places where it actually makes a difference are pretty easy to adapt to, and there are times (tennis and ping-pong come to mind) when it’s actually an advantage to be a lefty.
However, I have gone by my middle name for my entire life, and I must admit that having the name I use generally reduced to an initial gets under my skin.
Especially now that there’s no apparent need for it: all the software designers have to do is have fields for first, middle, and last names, and a flag for whether you go by your first or middle name. I could program that myself, and my programming skills are fairly rusty these days.
Anyone else bugged by being a middle-name person in a first-name, middle-initial world, or am I the only one?
I feel your pain. It’s especially bad if it’s something that no one on this planet could pronounce in the first place.
…or if you change schools a lot when you’re a kid, “we have a new student, his name is NoRjabedoiNg” …tehehehehe
It does come in handy though, later in life.
If someone calls, asking for the MuTaNt, I know that they’re probably going to try to sell me something.
Sometimes I say, “this is he, and if you’re from a collection agency, I’m supposed to tell you that the papers have been filed and you’re not supposed to call me anymore. Do you want the lawyer’s number?”
It’s funny, how many of them had the wrong number all along.
… prolly a Y2k thing …
No, you are not (alone), and yes it bugs the crap out of me.
Badges, applications, I’ve got IDs with my name bass ackwards since I put my middle name in the first name field. Talk about a Y2k type problem made personal.
The upside is, it lets you know when to hang up the phone. e.g. …
Them: Is this Robert …
{Oh Oh … Long distance carrier switch alert !!!}
Me: Click
Small consolation though …
A point in every direction is like no point at all
My middle (“first”) name is not common, but almost everybody’s heard it before as a last name whereas my last name is uncommon and Norwegian. Wherever I have to give a clerk my name they’ll insist on putting my last name down as first so they can make my middle name my last.
I apologize for the digression, but since this topic is people being unable to handle unusual circumstances with names…
I have a fairly common first name spelled in an unusual way - Ileen instead of Eileen. You would not believe the agony this seems to cause people. Whenever I am asked to give my name I immediately follow with the spelling, and even then they can’t seem to get it right.
If I say something like “Leave the first E off” I often get a blank look, and I have to spell it out, often several times. I’ve never really been sure why this is such a problem for people, but it sure seems to be.
I’m with Jovial. Whenever someone calls asking for that name, chances are they’re selling me something. It was a real pain in the ass in the Army, though
I was named after my father and have used my middle name all of my life. It used to really bother me now I use a nickname at work that’s a total of three names that I go by. It comes in real handy now I use it to help me separate my friends from my co-workers.
Mac slowly slinks off to lurkdom. slink slink slink
I lurk therefore, I am. Or at least I might be?
I go by my first name but the problem is that it is Beth. Just Beth–not Elizabeth.
When I was in elementary school, my teacher called my mother to school because they were having a “behavioral problem” with me. Seems the problem was that we were taking standardized tests and we were required to use our complete names and I “just refused” to write “Elizabeth.” After the teacher spent fifteen minutes explaining to my mother the importance of using correct, complete names, my mother just silently produced my birth certificate—complete with my entire first name–“Beth”–never had any more problems (from that teacher at least)
I’m glad to hear from some people who have had problems going by their middle names. However, sometimes it can be a blessing in disguise. My brother-in-law has gone by his middle name all his life because it beats being a cute little five-year-old named “Orville.” (Oh, and it does help with that pesky telemarketer/creditor identification problem.)
“Cristi” is not just my screen name, it’s my name IRL. I couldn’t think of anything clever when I was signing up, okay?
It’s also a nickname, off my middle name, which is Christine. Note the spelling. “Christine” is spelled in it’s most common way. “Cristi” is spelled in it’s least common. This was my mom’s idea. Repeated questioning as to why she chose to do this funky thing to me only results in a snappish “It was the thing to do at the time, okay?” I was born in 1967, so I guess I can sort of buy that.
But my first name is Laura. What’s wrong with Laura? Nothing. I rather like it, in fact. But by the time I was old enough to make the decision as to what name I was going to use, well, I’d been Cristi for so long it just wasn’t worth trying to get everyone to call me anything else.
Oh yeah–my family & closest friends call me Cris. I don’t mind that one. Ya’ll can call me Cris, too, if ya want.
“The quickest way to a man’s heart is through his ribcage.” --anonymous redhead
Well, at least you didn’t get stuck with Christienne for a first name (something I’ve never understood, since neither of my parents are religious). After years of going by nicknames like Chrissie, and seeing it spelled every possible way but the correct one (Christine, Kristi Anne, even Christian once or twice), and not being able to fit it into blanks on forms that only had spaces for eight letters, I decided to go by my middle name. My middle name is Wilhelmine. People promptly shortened it to Willie. Nobody knew how to spell it. And it still didn’t fit in the blanks on forms. And on top of everything else, I had the same problems as the OP. So, I threw up my hands disgustedly and went back to Christienne. Sigh. Maybe I’ll just change my name to Amanda Jane or something.
Name fun - gotta love it. My last name isn’t hard to spell - just like it sounds, and it is a common word. But I still get people that ask me to spell it. I must say it funny.
Know a guy who’s a third, with his son a fourth. He has an official nickname of “Trey”, as in three. Works pretty well, and he signs things that way all the time. He named his son some bizarre concoction to stand for four - “Reyth”. There’s a story there, but it will bore you silly and you won’t care if you don’t know the guy, so why bother.
My dad’s name is Charles, and he does not like to be called nicknames such as Charlie or Chuck. (Or Chas). So much so, he went out of his way to make sure us kids didn’t have names with customary abbreviated forms.
I always thought it weird that “William” was shortened to “Bill” - never made sense to me.
from evilbeth:
What, it’s not “Evilbeth”? (Should have written that on the form.)
Saw a girl in a fast food place with a name tag written “Apryl”. I asked her about it, and she said a friend named Sheryl dubbed her that way, and it stuck. (Real name is April.)
Know a Cynthia that uses “Cyndi”.
from neuro-trash grrrl:
Have a friend whose name is Shelly. She decided that was too cheerleadery, so she started going by first and middle name - Shelly Lynn.
Let me add my (middle) name to the list of middle namers. My first name “Earl,” was my dad’s idea. My mom said “fine, but we’ll call him David.” I’ve shortened it to E. David, but still Tons of problems. A new one lately, American Express had decided to call me “Ed.” Definitely useful in screening calls. I just hate “First Name __________ M.I. __,” don’t we all?
Anyone ask you why don’t you just go by your first name? I get that occasionally, or worse, I’ve known people who insist on calling you by your first name.
My parents deliberately did not give my two sisters middle names. They reasoned that the maiden name would become the middle name at marriage? How about you(I’m assuming you’re female, if not, uh, never mind).
I always use my middle initial when giving my first and last names. I mean, always. I’ve done this ever since fifth grade. You would NOT believe the amount of software out there that has NO space for a middle name or a middle initial whatsoever!
GAH! I am “Roger M. Wilcox”! Not “Roger Wilcox”! “Roger Wilcox” is what you say on the radio if you’re a pilot, followed by “over and out”. As Lieutennant Commander Data said on an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation from the show’s second season, “One is my name. The other is not.”
I think we ought to get J. Paul Getty, L. Ron Hubbard, and J. Michael Straczynski in here, and do something about this!
Speaking of names, I forgot to mention one of the worst I’ve heard.
A friend’s kid was named “William Robert Seth ___” That’s right - Billy Bob! I was told that when he started school he would go by Seth, but they were calling him Billy Bob as a baby, so I imagine that would stick and the transition to Seth would be a major hurdle. Glad I wasn’t him.
