Thursday, October 16, 2008

so this is how you treat a spelling champion?*

being someone with not only a hyphenated last name, but one that is spelled the true french way, i am no stranger to spelling blunders.
being someone who was called a name all my life (kitty) that in no way resembled the name on my birth certificate (ramona--gasp!), i am accustomed to explaining myself.
being someone who uses her middle name as part of her first name, i am used to ALWAYS being misfiled.
being that my middle name honors my grandfather joe, and not jo from the facts of life, i'm used to e's being dropped.
people ask me, "do you know that you spell your name wrong?" with frightening frequency. really? you're going to tell me how to spell my own name?
i am also amazed that about 25% of people want to spell 'kitty' K-I-T-T-I-E. like the I-E might help to distinguish me from a kitten.
it seems that no part of my name is exempt from slaughter.
i've long since stopped correcting people when they say, 'steamery' instead of 'sainte-marie'--like i come from some place where there's condensation all over the walls.
but the turkish kitchen's annual 10% off coupon takes the cake and never ceases to induce giggles from me: just in case it's too small to read, let me capitalize that for you.

KATTY JOE STEMARCE

hey. at least they got the joe part right.

*maybe someday i'll tell you about my spelling crown.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

I can relate. That's Naomi, spelled NIOMA. Love ya.

Anonymous said...

Katty? KATTY? And I really love the Stemarce.

People always misspell my name, too. Eugenia becomes Eugena. Or Ugena. Gratto becomes Grotto. (At least grotto is a real word, so I can kind of understand that...) And even when I say "Genie. G-e-n-i-e. Like with the lamp," people still write down Jeanne or Jeannie.

It's pathological.

peakie said...

Maybe that's your double persona? For example, when people come up to me and say something like, "boy, you were an a-hole yesterday" I always blame it on my doppleganger.

"Ah, yes, that was Pat Meake. He IS an asshole."

kim said...

I keep trying to pronounce STEMARCE and it isn't pretty!

Anonymous said...

nioma--i'm surprised you didn't comment on the confusion of your full name--NAOMI CAMPBELL. i know that one's been a barrel of monkeys for you!

genie--you will forever be 'like with the lamp' to me now. i always say 'it's kitty, you know, like hello kitty?'

peakie--pat meake IS an asshole!

kim--i haven't really figured out the pronunciation of my new name either!