I was reading Whammo’s thread about his cat, Maxwell, but thought it inappropriate to go off on a tangent there. (I’ll continue to send the best vibes I can muster for Maxwell.)
As I mentioned in Whammo’s thread, I held my 16 year old cat, Bert as he was put to sleep a little over three years ago after he had become very ill and had only a few days to live. This post isn’t about his death though; it’s about his name. (Anyway, I focus on his life, cuz it was a great 16 years. :)) A couple of years after adopting Bert, we bought a lovely Siamese and named him Ernie. (Yep, it was a Sesame Street theme.) When Bert left us, Ernie just wasn’t himself. A month or two later, we bought another Siamese.
Well, we had to come up with a name for our new kitten. The family wanted to stick with the Sesame Street theme, but I had other ideas, namely that I wanted to name him after an artist. Then it came to me!!!Oscar!!! That satisfied the goofball family and they had no idea – until I filled them in a week or two later – that Oscar was named after Oscar Claude Monet and not after Oscar the Grouch. I’m brilliant.
So, does anyone else have any pet-naming tales? (HEY! I made a pun and didn’t even realize it until after previewing my reply! I really am brilliant!)
My dog’s name is Daisy-Bob.
When we decided to get a dog, I was heart-set on getting a male dog just so I could name him Bob. I was hoping for a bull-dog. I just thought that was too cool. A bull-dog named Bob.
Then we found her. That little angelic shaggy drooling face begging us to take her home.
We came up with her name in the car on the way back from the pound in something akin to an epiphony(sp?).
“How about Daisy?”
“Perfect!”
“But, what about ‘Bob’?”
The perfect solution - Bob can be her middle name.
Voila - the (symbolic) birth of Daisy-Bob.
When we got our dog from the shelter, I had a heck of a time naming him. I went through all of the stereotypical names, and then was trying to get creative. However, nothing was coming, so I sat down to watch some T.V. Playing was a show called Doghouse. It was about a person whose mind got switched with a dog’s right before he died. Thus the dog (uncle) was now living with his family in his dog form. He used to be a cop, so he got the family into some crazy trouble. Anyway, the dog in the show was a St. Bernard. Well we had gotten an Akita, but by some weird coincidence it had the exact same colouring as the St. Bernard on the show. Hence he was named “Digby.” Which was apparently very apt, because he loves to dig up gardens, flower beds, etc.
I used to have a cat named Skidders. (All white cat except brown on her tail. Party with drunk fellows, skid marks, blah blah.) The last cat I had (::sniff:: I still haven’t found her) was named Kitty because I couldn’t think of an appropriate name for her.
When I got my first dog, he was just a tiny puppy. He would baarely fit in the palm of my hand. (I was in the fourth grade!) I was haveing a terrible time coming up with a name until one day we were playing and he started barking. This tiny little squeeky bark, but he wasbeing soooooo fierce. I got to laughing and told my dad that “He’s so fierce, we need to call him Fang!” It stuck. And of course he grew up to be forty pounds of very muscled dog. His bark grew up too! But, he was the gentlest of dogs. I was the only person he ever bit and that was when we would play and wrestle. If a stranger came on to our yard he would bark like the devil until they got close then he would try to lick them to death. He was everybody’s friend.
My friend Megan named her cat the most brilliant name for a cat that I’d ever heard: Airport.
Now, I know what you’re thinking. “What kind of name is that for a cat?” Just keep repeating it to yourself. It’ll come. Try saying things you would normally say to a cat, but callling the hypothetical cat Airport. Pretty soon you’ll realize how amazingly feline airport is, and how damn cool.
They also have a goldfish named “Pharmacy.” They’re visual artists; mabye that explains it.
I’m mostly a bird person.
My theory is, the smaller the pet, the larger and more grandiose the name should be.
I’ve had a parakeet named Jones the Rock and Roll Parakeet, one named Sparks Powderflash. The last parakeet I had, which I had to give away before I moved to Vegas, was named Grand Moff Tarkin, Governor of Imperial Outlands. My cockatiel is Parker Charles Yardbird.
Our current dog, a German Shepherd/Doberman mix (we think), is Annie, as in Little Orphan. We found her when she was about 6-7 weeks old, and she’d been crying and howling up a storm. Another orphan we took in was Heidi, who is now living with my cousin.
Hmm… “Get off the couch, Airport”… “Don’t shred the curtains, Airport”… “You take that dead sparrow right back outside and eat it yourself, Airport”… I’m not seeing it, BjorkBoy.
The cats currently cohabiting with my Mom are Spunky (born with deformed hind legs, but still does everything the other cats do, better, and would rather hunt than be fed), Diamond Li’l (grey with a diamond-shaped white mark on her face), Origami (nobody’s sure why, but we just call her “baby” anyway), and Oliver (after Twist; he begs). The dog is named Arfur T. Bowser, or just Bowser for short.
Some folks down the road from me had a beeeg black tom cat when I was younger, they called him Snowball. That f****r was pretty mean.
There’s a lot of dogs here called Freeway, after the tv show (Hart to Hart).
The next dog that I get will have a proper christian name, like Roger or perhaps Derek.
About ten years ago my parents were given a Pekinese. The dog had been male once (neutered when he was very young), and as if that hadn’t been enough was given the name Daisy. My brother and I took offense at this great injustice, and decided to name him Wodan (Germanised name for Odin) to make up for the insults. Turned out that, given the dog’s disposition and attitude, we should have named him Satan. No Rottweiler or Saint Bernard was safe when Wodan roamed the streets. Still miss the little guy.
Some years later my parents got a dog that kind of resembled a King Charles Spaniel. She also looked like a Gremlin. So we named her Gizmo.
My sister had a couple cats named Big Mac and Happy Meal. She also had a 400-pound pig she named after her sister-in-law. Of the two the pig was the looker.
That truly is much too funny! It makes me wanna get a pet pig. I wouldn’t name it after any of my sisters-in-law, but I’m sure I could find an appropriate namesake.
I don’t get the “Airport” thing. Huh? “Look, Airport – I cleaned your litter! Does Airport want his tummy rubbed? Awwwwwwww What a loud purr, Airport! Hey, Airport? Get down off the counter before I get the squirtgun! Keep your claws off those speakers, Airport! Airport? I see a spider; will you kindly get over here and eat it? Airport! Get outta my bedroom, you hairy thing!”
I’ll have you know that Oscar and Ernie are giving me the strangest looks at the moment. They’re probably thinking, "Mom really is nuts! Why is she talking to an invisible cat named Airport?
I have an orange tabby I got when I was in college. I was desparate to have a Russian Blue, but such hi-falutin’ cats were waaay out of reach to a poor college student. So I got the tabby from the pound, and gave him a good Russian name - Arkady. 'Course, by now, everyone just calls him Ardy.
I’ve had several goldfish named “Purina”.
When my ex and I got a puppy, he thought that she looked like a dog sled dog, you know, like the mushers have. He suggested naming her “Mush.” I said “That’s a stupid name for a dog!” He said, “Well, we can go with the Russian theme you started with Ardy, and call her Mushka.” I said, “That’s even stupider.” We called her Mushka until 5 years later, my ex managed to allow her to play in the middle of a highway and she was no more…
Lucky to be Alive. This cat was born in the winter in Ohio and the mother(a stray) died the day after Lucky was born. Had to send my then 7 year old daughter under the cabin to pull out the 2 kittens. Runt, the smallest, died within the week, but Lucky hung on. For the last 10 years, Lucky has used up more than her share of 9 lives, living up to her name.
later, Tom
Our first cat, Oreo, was named for his coloring. He’s a tuxedo cat so he’s mostly black with a wide white stripe running from his nose all the way down his belly. That’s his “cream filling”. Before his month long “adventure” (he disappeared) we had been calling him “Double-stuffed” since he was getting plump. Since his return, that nickname doesn’t fit anymore since he lost 3 lbs.
Our kitten, Taz, is also a tuxedo but he was named for his temperment. His favorite toys are these puffballs of rabbit fur. He goes psycho over these things and growls menacingly if you try to take in away from him. One night, before he’d been named, I was trying to get one of the toys away from him and called him a little devil. My husband, huge Loony Tunes fan, suddenly blurted out “especially rabbits”. When I asked what he meant he reminded me of the cartoon where Bugs is reading a list of what Tazmanian Devils like to eat and rabbit was the last item on the list. Since the kitten was so psycho over rabbit fur toys, he was dubbed Taz that very night.
