[QUOTE=Rick]
In the army that person would be known as Alphabet.
[/QUOTE]
I had a guy with a name like that in my unit. He had to get special nametags to fit all the letters in the alloted space. It was always entertaining to see a new NCO attempt to address him. They would stand there, staring at his nametag, while the gears in the language center of their brain made grinding noises.
We kidded him by telling people that his family was too poor to afford any vowels.
I can’t find it on the *Onion * Archives Search page, but during the Clinton administration, they ran an article in which the UN was airlifting vowels and dropping them into the Balkans, intending them for cities and people just like those referenced above.
“Throatwarbler-Mangrove”
[sub]22 posts, and y’all ignore te obvious joke? You people are slipping! :D[/sub]
Robin
[QUOTE=MsRobyn]
“Throatwarbler-Mangrove”
[sub]22 posts, and y’all ignore te obvious joke? You people are slipping! :D[/sub]
Robin
[/QUOTE]
Post #9.
Isn’t this GQ?
[QUOTE=MsRobyn]
“Throatwarbler-Mangrove”
[sub]22 posts, and y’all ignore te obvious joke? You people are slipping! :D[/sub]
Robin
[/QUOTE]
Nice to know I’m on your “ignore” list. 
<ducking and running>
[QUOTE=CC]
I can’t find it on the *Onion * Archives Search page, but during the Clinton administration, they ran an article in which the UN was airlifting vowels and dropping them into the Balkans, intending them for cities and people just like those referenced above.
[/QUOTE]
I think you’re referring to a Dave Barry article on the Balkan Vowel Drop. I can’t seem to find a copy on line, but there are references to it. Google “Dave Barry Vowel Drop.”
Nope, I’m remembering an Onion article. Probably before they had an on line presence, as they say. I’ll keep looking. xo, C.
[QUOTE=DSYoungEsq]
Nice to know I’m on your “ignore” list.
<ducking and running>
[/QUOTE]
I was so busy thinking of the joke, I missed your post.
::throws herself on a sword::
Robin
[QUOTE=CalMeacham]
News reports never did get the hang of John Paul II’s real name, Karol Woytyla.
[/QUOTE]
Wojtyła 
I used to know, slightly, a guy whose last name was Przybyszewski. Pronounced “SHOO-ber-SHEV-skee.” Don’t know if that’s typical.
[QUOTE=VernWinterbottom]
In my town, the Sealer of Weights and Measures/Petroleum Inspector is named Przybyszewski. (His name appears on stickers on all of our gas pumps.)
[/QUOTE]
[hijack]
Our guy’s name is Charles Bronson!! 
[/hijack]
[QUOTE=CC]
Nope, I’m remembering an Onion article. Probably before they had an on line presence, as they say. I’ll keep looking. xo, C.
[/QUOTE]
I remember the Onion one. Here’s a copy of it.
Beautiful! Thanks!
[QUOTE=Flander]
[hijack]
Our guy’s name is Charles Bronson!!
[/hijack]
[/QUOTE]
Yeah, that’s amusing to me, because I just can’t imagine committing some minor infraction in commerce and having Charles Bronson come after me! :eek:
[QUOTE=aldiboronti]
Potrzebie.
[/QUOTE]
Wow! Not to hijack but after 40 years I now know how to pronounce that word.
MAD lives!
[QUOTE=pulykamell]
One name I always stumble with is the German “Koch.” I know how it’s pronounced in German (kinda like “loch”), but here, it can be “Coke,” “Kotch,” “Cook,” “Cock,” and who knows what else.
[/QUOTE]
I know someone who pronounce her surname Koch “Kah”. That seemed like a stretch.
[QUOTE=jackelope]
I used to know, slightly, a guy whose last name was Przybyszewski. Pronounced “SHOO-ber-SHEV-skee.” Don’t know if that’s typical.
[/QUOTE]
We had an exchange student who pronounced it “zja-BEET-zki”–at least that’s what it sounded like to my earnest-but-thoroughly-American ears.
[QUOTE=NajaNivea]
We had an exchange student who pronounced it “zja-BEET-zki”–at least that’s what it sounded like to my earnest-but-thoroughly-American ears.
[/QUOTE]
Hmm. You sure his name was Przybyszewski? Because I can’t see any way that name (pronounced approximately “pshih-bih-SHEF-ski” in Polish) becomes “zja-BEET-zki.” That name would be spelled something like “Zdziabitski” in Polish (going by your phonetic rendition), but there’s no such last name, to my knowledge.
At school, she was Ms. Shibbish.