My two are; Cosmo, after the drink of the same name (all the rage at the time) and answers to ‘Motor’ ‘Mo’ and ‘Buddy’. The other is named Loki, after the Norse God of Mischief (wow was THAT ever a self fufilling prophecy) and answers also to ‘loke’ ‘choochie’ and the weird whistle/kissing noise I make.
My last dog’s name was Belton. We always used to get our dogs from the pound (knowing they’d probably be gassed if we didn’t), but for various inexplicable reasons the pound kept being closed when we went to get a new dog. When it was finally open, after several fruitless trips, we got our wonderful, friendly, sweet new dog and my dad said, “Well, better late than never!” The family couldn’t agree on a name otherwise, so we took that as an acronym: BLTN = Belton. He was a skinny, light brown-and-white mutt, mostly beagle, I’d say.
We have a cat now, Sal, who was named by his previous owners. The little girl of that family wanted a girl cat and had named him “Sally,” which we shortened to “Sal.” We don’t know if he has any Italian blood, but he doesn’t seem to mind! Sal is a standard-issue American shorthair cat, mostly black with a little white under his chin and on one leg.
Tegan was my favorite, too.
My dogs are Joe and Katie. Joe is a Border Collie/Black Lab cross. At the time I got him, I had a dog named Sam. Sam and Joe. It just sounded right. Katie is a Bassett Hound. She is really my son’s dog and he named her. He was 5. He told me she just looked like a Katie.
Mahershalalhashbaz
“O, Hasten To the Spoil” – From the Bible book of Isaiah
The dog was a Norwegian Elkhound who ate everything in sight. This was about 20 or so years ago. Tho the name is male, the dog was a female. I usually called her Boz.
We’ve got a German Shepherd/Shar Pei mix named Sienna. Her ears happen to be that particular color.
My dog’s name is Pepita. (She is Hispanic)
This is her fetching a stick:
Here she is going upstream to spawn (she is 1/4 salmon):
Bailey - Jindo mix/Humane Society Special - Named for the Irish Cream liqueur.
Kirin - Shiba Inu, red coat - Named for the beer (mrsgnu’s favorite).
Raven - Shiba Inu, black and tan coat - Kirin’s littermate named by the breeder, fits the theme by being a black and tan. (I’ve also found a Raven beer, too.)
My dog’s name is Chili Dog. It comes from my (then) 4 year old being funny. We debated on the name, didn’t want the typical chihuahua names and then my son offered “let’s call him Chili Dog!” We all got a good chuckle out of it and the name stuck.
We have 2 barn cats named “momma cat” for obvious reasons and “mr moo cow” because he is white with brown/black cow spots and was a very fat kitten.
The best pet name we ever had was a black cat with one white paw that I had when I was a kid. His name was Pyewacket. Bonus points to anyone who (without GIS or Wikipedia) knows the reference.
Dickens?
I have a shih tzu named Houdini.
How he got his name? See this OP (from 2003)
The short version:
Four days after I adopted him, he escaped from a locked and running car. After he locked himself in on his own…
I have 2 Boxers: a 17 month old (mostly) white male named Loki, after the Norse God of Mischief; and Freya, a 14 week old seal female named after the Norse Goddess of Misadventure that we got just this past weekend. If you know Boxers, the names are very applicable.
Neither has a pet nickname yet, both are generically refered to as ‘Butthead’. A bonus I found out yesterday was that Freya (the dog) was previously named Godiva because of her dark brown color, and there is a candy company in Norway named Freia that makes chocolate…
Previously, we had a French Bulldog named Maddy (short for Madmoiselle Brie), with a nickname of Fuzzbutt; another (deceased) Boxer named Satin and called Satan; and the first Boxer of my adult life was Sadie the VunderDog, with too many nicknames to count.
My wife had a jack russell when she was younger. When she bought a new one 2 years ago, she thought he looked exactly like her other Jack, so she gave him the same name, Bandit.
When we moved to Florida from Virginia we left our kids behind (old kids), but soon Bandit was a bit lonely. So we took him to the dog store and let him pick out a companion. He chose a little female Jack and I got to name her.
To me there was only one name possible, Carrie. Sally Fields’ name from Smokey and the Bandit movies. Her nickname was Frog but I didn’t want to have species identity problems.
She had puppies a year later and Wifey named them as they were born: Hercules, Blaze, Timmy, Jesse, Katy, Bela and Star (later Starbuck).
and we are all living happily ever after.
I don’t have dog per se, but we have a beagle in the house where I live called Gromit, named after the ingenious dog in the animations of “Wallace and Gromit”.
He must be smart, because he always gets away with it…
Has something to do with witches, but I can’t remember any specifics. As for the significance of the black cat with one white paw, I don’t have a clue as to how that ties in, except for black cats and witches being forever linked in most people’s minds. I’ll have to do a search now, darn your cat’s eyes!
I probably would’ve named him Michael. (Shake yer body on to the ground)
Bell, Book, and Candle. Jimmy Stewart and Kim Novak, Kim displaying IMO the most smashing movie wardrobe of the '50s.
I used to have a dachshund mix named Henry. He got his name because he was a long fellow. I’m sure all of you that get this are groaning now, but I thought it was funny.
Ah… see…, I was apparantly thinking of the Pyewacket associated with Matthew Hopkins and the confession of one of the Essex witches. Silly me.
Bonus points awarded. I would have accepted Bell, Book and Candle as well, but am very impressed with NoClueBoy knowing the earlier reference.
As an aside, I work with people’s passwords all day long, and one day had to comment on a lady having “piewacket” for a password. She had no clue where it came from, but had heard the word and named her cat that. Later, her vet told her it was a reference to the cat in Bedknobs and Broomsticks (as many times as I have seen that one, I honestly can not remember if the cat even had a name) – so I got to fight some ignorance that day. Of course, my supervisor pinged me for “personal conversations” oh well…
</hijack>
Currently, we have two dogs.
Our Yellow Lab is officially named “Smith’s Sweet Sandy” – so she’s Sandy to us. Over the years, though, she’s had a variety of other nicknames: Thumper (for tail-thumping), Staple Snoot (when she had staples in the top of her muzzle after an odd encounter with a Mexican bayonet plant), and Damn Dog (after she went over the six-foot block wall fence for the tenth time).
Our Belgian Malinois is named Buddy because that’s his personality – he’s your buddy, he’s your pal.
The most unusual name we’ve come up with is the one for our black Lab mix (who was put down last December at 12 1/2 years old). She was a pound puppy, and we sat around for a couple of days trying to figure out what to name her. Her coat was so bright that it GLEAMED when it was clean. At the time, the hubby and I were playing Magic: The Gathering. One of the cards in it was called a Mox Jet. So I suggested we name the dog Mox Jet and call her Moxie. The hubby liked Moxie and it stuck.
I have two dogs. Minnie is a Maltese and was very small when I got her. Minnie was also my grandmother’s nickname. Coco is a brown toy poodle. Her full name is CocoPuff because she looked like a little Cocoa Puff when she was first brought home.