LJ usernames

[yendi]

So, I thought about doing this as a survey. But I want people to be able to write as much as they need to. So just respond in the comments. My question: What's the meaning/origin behind your LJ username? I'm asking about the actual unchanging userid (i.e., yendi), as opposed to the morphing item in the "name" field, although you're welcome to talk about both. I know the origins of some of your names, and can figure out others, but I'd love to know why you all chose the IDs you chose.

As for me, I've been a fan of Steven Brust's Dragaera for at least fifteen years or so. I've used all sorts of variants of names from the books online over the years, but I eventually settled upon Yendi, because they were the group of Dragaerans I most enjoyed reading about. They tend to be the ones who are not only subtle, but so subtle that folks forget how subtle they can be. As someone who almost always goes unnoticed and gets overlooked, I've always liked the idea that I can get away with being more than anyone expects or realizes. And yes, of course that's egotistical. :-) I've been using variations of this handle pretty much everywhere online for the last few years. I don't necessarily

As for my current name, well, it's a another Brust reference -- my favorite Yendi character from the books.

So, I've told you mine. Now tell me yours.

Comments

Easy

[bethynyc.livejournal.com]

My name is Bethy. I live in NYC.

My email addy is the one that gets questions. Agnes Leigh was a rpg character. She started as a Call of Cthulhu character, then she was embraced as a Malkavian vampire when I started running a Vampire game, and she was my NPC. I've played her live, and actually got quite a bit accomplished. then she metamorphosed into a GURPS system 350 point Archon, in a game which lasted for two years and it still peeves me that it ended when we finally got assigned to another Justicar.

I love Agnes. She is my lesbian conspiracy theorist occult investigator alter ego.

[galdrin.livejournal.com]

Nothing as exotic as yours ... my real name is Robert which means "bright and shining with fame". Galdrin, which was created by my EX utilizing my copy of _The_Languages_of_Middle_Earth_, is a Tolkein-elvish extrapolation of the meaning of Robert and comes out literally as "shining rememberence"..

[tarpo.livejournal.com]

http://www.livejournal.com/talkread.bml?journal=tarpo&itemid=397103

Posted my nick desc here.. Didn't add that the person who actually came up with the name was murdered by his lunatic GF.. Pretty shocking.. he was a nice guy

[martinhesselius.livejournal.com]

Always have liked Brust. Though the one time that i met him, 'twas to tell him to say hi to roommate Nate, who was in a 'zine called Apalogia with which I dabbled for a short while at the invitation of my late friend Vashti/Ruth. (As was security guru Bruce Schneider...)

Martin Hesselius - a medical doctor studying the occult who is alluded to in Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu (http://gaslight.mtroyal.ab.ca/lfanumen.htm)'s Green Tea (http://gaslight.mtroyal.ab.ca/greentea.htm) and Carmilla (http://gaslight.mtroyal.ab.ca/carmilla.htm) (the pre-Stoker vampire favorite, far better than Polidori IMNSHO).

Geros Tragos - I chose "Geros Tragos," Greek for "Old Goat," both because it is a mildly humorous epithet in English and because I am told that like the Spanish epithet cabrón - definitely them's fightin' words, equivalent to cuckold, quisling, or mofo - it is much harsher in Greek, indicating brutishness, stupidity, and like. The dark side of Coyote, indeed, and one that I know that I have.

Why? Because I have my good sides and my bad sides, and am deeply aware of the latter. But, and I do desperately hope that this does them no harm, I am redeemed by the caring and attention of my Lady K and my friends. It is Grace in action. I am awe-struck.

[gothwalk.livejournal.com]

The gothwalk is a "dance", also known as the gothic two-step. It consists of stepping backward and forward, somewhat off the beat. Handwaving and looking angstridden are optional.

There was a MOO in TCD when I was there. One of the commands was "gothwalk", and the result was "The air darkens noticably around you as you gothwalk here".

So when I was looking for a unique handle, to stop me getting confused between billions of different ones, I remembered that and settled on this one. Nobody else ever uses it, anywhere.

[piratejenny.livejournal.com]

Well, Jennywren was taken, so I had to add the extra n.

Jenny Wren was a nickname given to me by my grandmother, something she always called me, and it just seemed to fit. Of course, my first name really is Jenny (or rather Jennifer), and I've rather identified with the wren in my life--kind of an ugly duckling thing. Inside it, the wren hides the most beautiful voice. Mind you, I can't sing for shit, but it was the plainness hiding something else.

Then I discovered a very obscure character by the name of Jenny Wren in a few of the more obscure Robin Hood ballads (the thing that kills me is that I can't recall the titles). Hot damn, my nickname is a character in the Robin Hood ballads, though I.

I know yendi knows this, but some people may not for some reason, but I've had this Robin Hood, um, fixation since I was a very small child. Used to throw tantrums when the parents would change the channel if I was watching the Errol Flynn movie--I don't remember this, my mom told me. Even did my medieval studies thesis on Robin Hood (and, I always have to clarify, pre-Costner thing).

Speaking of Robin Hood, the video game is out!!!! I'll be getting it this weekend, since my job is a wonderful place and gave us a 20% discount at WaldenBooks and Borders this weekend, and it CAN be combined with the preferred readers cards. And if Borders doesn't do video games, I'll just get it on my way home.

[piratejenny.livejournal.com]

There's very little worse than Polidori . . .

[chelona.livejournal.com]

Mine is hopelessly easy, it is my name, and my username on most school and corporate systems since I was in high school. Of course, back then, it was a little shorter. ;)

Turtle, of course, is another, longer story. One I think I have put in my memories list.

[bethynyc.livejournal.com]

Fixation is putting it mildly. (gdr)

[hotcoffeems.livejournal.com]

Hotcoffeems is a shortening of Hotcoffeemississippi – it should actually be read as Hot Coffee, MS. The full is too long as a handle, but I use it as my LJ name. Hot Coffee, as you may have guessed (particularly if you’ve seen the pic on my info page), is a real town. I love the name, because it is silly and euphonious and has many double letters. Ifirst used it as a Yahoo name; it was the only thing I tried that wasn’t taken (I have an aversion to having random strings of numbers following my name). Long, yes, but I like it. I suspect some think it means “Ms. Hot Coffee,” though.

Re: Easy

[yendi]

She is my lesbian conspiracy theorist occult investigator alter ego.

We all need one of those.

[juanfandango.livejournal.com]

Juan Fandango ees my name.

Eet pre-dates Greem Fandango.

Eet ees nothing to do weeth a dance.

Eet ees my name. I am thee Mexeecan vampire.

[piratejenny.livejournal.com]

Oh yes, most definitely. Jason Connery ain't bad either!

I actually remember this show from when Showtime aired it in the US when I was in high school. My mom decided to switch our cable thingy at some point during the series. I was not happy. But I did eventually catch the whole thing on PBS. Now I just need a US compatible DVD version.

Oh, and the stupid powers that be haven't released the Errol Flynn version on DVD yet.

[vill.livejournal.com]

Villanelle is a charcter in Jeanette Winterson's The Passion (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0802135226/qid=1037371934/sr=8-1/ref=sr_8_1/104-1223136-0283160?v=glance&s=books&n=507846). It's also a poetic form and the name of one of my cats. (I got two at once and named then Villanelle and Sestina.)

But Villanelle from Winterson's novel is really the source of the name. I think I picked her because of the whole exchange with Villanelle and Henri. Villanelle says she can't love him because she has no heart, she's given it to a woman. Henri says, "Villanelle, you'd be dead if you had no heart." But he listens at her chest and there's no heartbeat...And they have to go find her heart before this other woman weaves it into a tapestry.

Alas, Villanelle was already taken when I started my LJ. So I shortened it to vill, the nickname I acquired in the few IRC chat rooms I used to frequent.

[malinaldarose.livejournal.com]

Well, my original username for CIS was Starsong (well, actually, it was a string of numbers longer than my social security number, but that's not important right now). A few years back, on TH, galdrin did Tolkien-Elvish translations for all and sundry. Mine was Galialar. Since I use that elsewhere, I didn't want to use it here. So, Linithiliel is actually my own mishmash of Sindarin and Quenya words meaning approximately "starsong". And there you have it.

[malinaldarose.livejournal.com]

A few years back, on TH, did Tolkien-Elvish translations for all and sundry

There should be a "Galdrin" in there, but I guess I screwed up the tag.

[ariedana.livejournal.com]

Well, Dana is my real name, as you know.

Ariela used to be my predominant online name back when I was involved in an online community, and my friends called me Arie. That came from a script treatment that I wrote for an X-Files episode where Mulder and Scully met their kid, who was made by the Conspiracy from Scully's stolen ova and sperm stolen when he was kidnapped at the end of Season 1. She was in her early 20s (genetic engineering, y'know), and she basically was an interesting mixture of the two of them. I kind of feel like I look like that (red hair, tall, etc.) so she's a little modeled on me. :)

I liked the name. Of course, after this they used the name Ariela in two different episodes, lol.

[voltbang.livejournal.com]

Martin's grandson Kristian (http://sports.yahoo.com/nhl/players/2/2131/) plays hockey for the florida panthers.

Ruthvenning!

[martinhesselius.livejournal.com]

::Grin::
He had interesting friends/patrons, but not an interesting writing style. Well, at least not 'interesting' in a good way.
::Smile::

[martinhesselius.livejournal.com]

LOL!
It's not an unusual name...

[teapot-farm.livejournal.com]

I hate having to come up with names - and I didn't want to use my RL name. And I was thinking about dormice and server farms (since I was at work, and sleepy). That's as much sense as it's ever going to make :)

[ariadnesthread.livejournal.com]

I adore that novel. I read it for two courses in college (The first was one on British novels, which took a swath all the way from Daniel Defoe's "Roxana" to Winterson's "The Passion" and Barbara Pym's "Quartet in Autumn." Would've been a perfect class if we hadn't had to read Dickens's "Little Dorritt" in the middle!. The second, at a different school, was a great women's studies course called "Rhymes with Witch: Gender Stereotypes in Postmodern Literature." What a reading list THAT class had!).

One of my favorite take-aways from "The Passion" is the recurring theme/statement "Believe me. I'm telling you stories." The whole unreliable narrator idea, the frame story, the delirious dreaminess of much of the book....lovely.

Re: Ruthvenning!

[piratejenny.livejournal.com]

Exactly.

Lord Byron, mmmmm.

Oh yeah, he's my other "fixation."

Re: Ruthvenning!

[yendi]

[snark] But he was such a good medical doctor![/snark]

[melvh.livejournal.com]

Prety straight up, actually. Mel is the short form of Melissa that I chose for myself after putting up with another nickname for entirely too long. VH are the initials for my surname.

"Mel, Just Mel" is my classic response to folks who insist on calling me Melanie or Michelle or some non-nickname other than Melissa. It became a litany when I began working for a hispanic Stupidvisor that insisted on calling me Melly.