muckefuck: (Default)
muckefuck ([personal profile] muckefuck) wrote2003-04-15 05:21 pm

Name droppings

Every so often, I Google™ myself. Like masturbation, I'm sure it's something everyone tries, but most people are probably too embarrassed to talk about. (Not [livejournal.com profile] lhn, though!) Today's vanity search pulled up much the same hits as past searches--mostly old Usenet posts that have been archived someplace or other.

So I chopped off my given name and did a surname search. It's distinctive enough that it never pulls up that many pages. Everyone who bears it is for a close relative (i.e. first cousin once-removed or better) anyway. So I was intrigued to find someone with the given name "Tommy", since I've never met a relative named that. The cite mentioned my Dad's home town, so I wonder if this might be some obscure cousin. (We've pretty much lost touch with Dad's younger brother and his first wife, so who knows if one of them has spawned a "Tommy" or not.) Next time I talk to Dad (two weeks at most), I'll ask.

But I was absolutely floored to find a "Heinrich". In all my years, I've never, ever found my name in German context--despite its German origins. The explanation is that a ü became a i either when our ancestors migrated or shortly after. Even variants with ü (or, in Belgium, u) are thin on the ground. Breathlessly, I clicked on the link, only to find the page was in a character set my system doesn't recognise. Nuts! I paged further and found another cite, this one to a complete listing of names of characters who have appeared in Dragon magazine. Heinrich was, oddly enough, a denizen of 13th-century Novgorod.

The other shoe dropped: I searched the title of the article and, as expected, found [livejournal.com profile] princeofcairo's byline.

[identity profile] rollick.livejournal.com 2003-04-15 04:06 pm (UTC)(link)
*snicker* You've been plaigirized. Not your work… you yourself.

[identity profile] princeofcairo.livejournal.com 2003-04-16 12:46 am (UTC)(link)
The verb you're looking for is "Tuckerized." And wait until [livejournal.com profile] spookyfruit sees who he is in GURPS WEIRD WAR II.

[identity profile] rollick.livejournal.com 2003-04-16 07:51 am (UTC)(link)
So is the Tucker in this case the name-steal-ee, or the name-steal-or?

[identity profile] princeofcairo.livejournal.com 2003-04-16 02:22 pm (UTC)(link)
The name-steal-or, from Wilson Tucker, a mediocre SF and mystery writer whose great claim to fame was putting his friends and fellow sf fans (or their names, at least) into his novels.

[identity profile] bunj.livejournal.com 2003-04-16 08:12 am (UTC)(link)
Ironically enough, our sister's genealogical research has shown that Heinrich or Henry is a family name (used as a first or middle name by our great-grandfather and great-great-grandfather). Yet another instance of Prince of Cairo's eerie prescience.

[identity profile] muckefuck.livejournal.com 2003-04-20 04:59 pm (UTC)(link)
Has Beckage given you the latest update, all about William Henry and Henry William and their bittersweet lives in this country?

Re:

[identity profile] bunj.livejournal.com 2003-04-21 07:15 am (UTC)(link)
No, I'll have to give her a call (and apparently talk to our father and step mother as well, since they haven't talked to me about their visit).

[identity profile] muckefuck.livejournal.com 2003-04-22 07:35 am (UTC)(link)
Did you even remember they were coming, Mr "Let's Game Because I Have No Plans That Weekend"? Once again, I got the dope because I called them. I was hoping to fill you in at Meinl, but time was too short and too filled with humourous talk of home improvement.