This is starting to get cool, like name riddles or something.
I was hoping no one would notice , thats why I didn't say anything. But, I meant to type in: The Y comes before the R.
I was really angry at the time, and typing as fast as I could to relieve the stress. Sound stupid? Yep. It is.well, so far, BillyBoy is the closest. to relieve your anxiety, I’ll try to type it phoenetically:
pe trool’ yeh
often I hear petrolodge or petrolli or just petrol… uh, petro…
My mother’s first name is Aija which, being mostly vowels, really screws everybody up. It’s pronounced Eye-ah, but most people think it’s pronounced like Asia the continent.
A good friend of mine is a teacher at an inner city school. She has a student whose name is written this way: Aurtha. But his mother insists that it’s pronounced like “Arthur”. My friend keeps asking, “Where’s the r?”
My mothers maiden name was Dutch and 7 letters, 3 easy, 4 hard: van Rijn
I’m blessed with a 4 letter Italian name, though people fuck it up more than you could possibly imagine, the spellings are atrocious and the pronunciations are just silly:
Mellie
Malay
Melly
Melie
Mily
Mellay
Meelie
It shouldn’t be hard, but give it a try. [mel-E]
Thinksnow - Van Rijn:
Hmmmm… Van (of course) Rrrine?
I haven’t read all the responses to the original post but I don’t know what the big deal is. I have a very unusual German last name and it gets butchered all the time. It’s so uncommon in the US that I was able to recently secure the website of my last name…there are only about 90 10 100 of us in the US with my last name, out of 275 million people.
That’s life, deal with it. Even people with German ancestory butcher my name.
I am sure your step-father is used to his name being butchered.
:rolleyes:
yeah, not too tough, though it’s sort of an “airy” r-h sound, like you’re putting more breath behind it, sort of a “hu-rine” without as much “huh.”
and mine is actually spelled: Meli, for the record. (I believe it means “Honey” in Italian or Greek, how about that!)
Meli, (Meeelie - lie as in lie down. Right?) its like honey or darling in Greek. All those years of listening to my grandmother ramble on in Greek, just rubbed off on me. Sometimes, when I’m having a conversation with my friends, words like “scata” (phoenetic) or “chlori” will slip out.
Try a silent x on for size.
It’s Ledoux, La-doo; not la-dux, or la-duk or about 500,000 other stupid combos. I guess around here, people are just more used to seeing french names, so when a telemarketer calls, usually from some far off place like california, I give them a break.
We too use the pronunciation test to weed out telemarketers, but instead of hanging up on them, it goes something like this:
ring ring
Me: Hello?
Them: Hello! May I speak to Miss Audrey ::hesitation:: Ka-… Cow-… Ka-ree-oh-kee…, please?
(I have to admit, “karaoke” is kind of close to how my last name is actually spelled and pronounced.)
Me: Uh, she’s not here right now. I’d be happy to take a message, though.
Them: Well, okay. Could you tell Miss Ka-ree-oh-kee that the Advertiser is now offering some great rates on home subscriptions, and that she can give us a call back at xxx-xxxx?
Me: Sure. I’ll pass the message on to her as soon as she gets in.
Them: Thank you very much!
Me: My pleasure.
click
Nope, it’s actually mel-ee (mel as in “mel” and i as in “eek”). See, another point made with a simple name!
My bad. Sowwy.
I have an Italian last name that’s sort of similar to several other names. People always ask me if I’m related to Mr. so-and-so, who has one of the other names. No, dumbass, I’m not.
Speaking of Italian names, and to hijack slightly, people also ask me if I’m in the mafia. Again, no. I’ve even had people go so far as to suggest that my family must be in the mafia and I just don’t know it. Fuck you and the horse you rode in on, butt munch!
The mafia? Whats your last name?.. Soprano?