The Name Game

I have always enjoyed giving inanimate objects names and referring to them as he or she (mostly he), but, as my friend Colleen and I have discovered, not all inanimate deserve a name because they are all not very interesting. It's like in Finding Nemo, when Dorey names the little jellyfish, "Squishy."

"I shall call him Squishy, and he shall be mine. My Squishy. Owww! Bad Squishy!"

Okay, so maybe a jellyfish is not an inanimate object, but the same principle applies. By naming the baby jellyfish, Dorey is defining it's character. Here are just a few things of mine I have felt necessary to name:

Dexter, my car. Or sometimes we call him Dex for short when he wants to be cool. Dex is named after the cartoon kid from Dexter's Laboratory, an eccentric genius with a really annoying sister. I think I named him that because, well, he's white, and kind of dorky looking.

I always name cars. The other two I've had (or driven, whatever) are Hurati and Melvin. Hurati (my green Tercel) was named by my sister after this group of assassins in The Lazarus Vendetta. I kept the name because it sounded kind of sports car-ish, and Hurati thought he was a sports car. A ninja name also suited him because he was a bit of a showoff with a loud engine. Melvin was quieter. He was a Rav4 but he seemed shy, if not a bit dorky with his purple interior. I named him after Melvin O'Neal in Bruno and Boots.

Amaryllis is my computer. She is one of my only female inanimate objects. Those of you who knew me when I was little recognize the name, and no she's not named after the character in Music Man I played when I was 12, she's named after the flower, because she's pretty and white.

Ruby is my external hard drive. Yes, yes, you are all thinking what kind of wacko names their hard drive? Well, I only named her because when you plug her in, the icon comes up as No Name, and that's just depressing. So I named her Ruby because she's bright red. I could have dug deeper, but what other character are you going to get out of a hard drive?

Humphrey is the vacuum I use at work. I named him after Humphrey Bogart because he's this big hulking vacuum that doesn't do much but make strange, uninteresting noises.

For the longest time, I had no name for my camera, but the longer I used him (yes, that was already decided) the more I knew he needed a name. After the number of escapades where I'd be doing something dangerous and nearly fall to my death with my only concern being my camera, I named him Clarke after Superman.

I was talking to Colleen, who was trying to think of a name for the picnic table where she eats lunch at work (don't ask. Just trust me, this table has character) I was talking about my desk chair, which is a bit of a character. The arm rests are adjustable so you can raise and lower them as much as you like. The only difficulty is every once in a while they get a mind of their own and decide they'd much rather be down low then up high the way I like them. It happens at least once a week that I'll be sitting, minding my own business when my armrests go crashing down.

Then there are the wheels. One of the wheels is broken off so it's a little tippy. Sometimes it leans over when I'm trying to move the chair, and the broken wheel makes an awful scraping noise against the plastic mat. Or, I sit with my feet resting on the wheels. If I forget and don't move the broken one to the back, I step on it and pitch myself towards my monitor. Or if I lean back to far, I tip back and fall. I have been forewarned that the other intern fell right out of this chair. It's a hazardous place to sit.

And so, this sneaky chair deserves a name. His name is Snidely, after Snidely Whiplash, the bad guy in Dudley Doright.