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(Partially from a comment elsewhere)
My dad grew up with unusual first and middle names, and he says he "wouldn't do that to a dog." So all three kids have names as plain as can be. I know multiple other Carol Jean Smiths.
When I arrived at MIT and was introducing myself around French House, in the hopes I could take up residence there, I got the response "Your middle name is Jean, right?" This boggled me, because it was and I hadn't said so. It seems CarolYN Jean Smith lived just downstairs. My sophomore year, my phone number was removed from the student directory as an "obvious duplication." I think it was also that year that CarolYN graduated, after untangling some kind of paperwork snafu with her "phase two writing requirement".
My senior year, I phoned up to ask whether any of the upper-division electrical engineering or computer science classes I'd taken had checked off my "phase two writing requirement", and I was informed that I had completed it in my sophomore year with some kind of paper on blood clotting. Suddenly I knew what had happened to CarolYN. I said "thank you" and hung up.
Even the Army sometimes couldn't figure it out, and they're pretty good at creating systems that will work no matter who's using them. A grizzled sergeant showed up, in a room of twenty or thirty people, asking for "Smith". We asked which one. He got annoyed, looked at his paperwork, and said "C. Smith." Cindy and I asked which one. He was seriously peeved by then. How do you make sergeant without knowing Smith is a common name?
If I go into some kind of business establishment and a clerkly type asks for my last name, I know not to bother going back. They're too stupid to earn my business.
It's kind of nifty being hard to Google. Photographs of a woman in a compromising position? Why no, that's not me. Nor am I the machinery shop, the music studio, the nineteenth century portrait artist, or the Illinois fishing resort. I wonder what happened to the basketball player. He used to be on the first page of Google hits too, but I didn't find him this time.
My dad grew up with unusual first and middle names, and he says he "wouldn't do that to a dog." So all three kids have names as plain as can be. I know multiple other Carol Jean Smiths.
When I arrived at MIT and was introducing myself around French House, in the hopes I could take up residence there, I got the response "Your middle name is Jean, right?" This boggled me, because it was and I hadn't said so. It seems CarolYN Jean Smith lived just downstairs. My sophomore year, my phone number was removed from the student directory as an "obvious duplication." I think it was also that year that CarolYN graduated, after untangling some kind of paperwork snafu with her "phase two writing requirement".
My senior year, I phoned up to ask whether any of the upper-division electrical engineering or computer science classes I'd taken had checked off my "phase two writing requirement", and I was informed that I had completed it in my sophomore year with some kind of paper on blood clotting. Suddenly I knew what had happened to CarolYN. I said "thank you" and hung up.
Even the Army sometimes couldn't figure it out, and they're pretty good at creating systems that will work no matter who's using them. A grizzled sergeant showed up, in a room of twenty or thirty people, asking for "Smith". We asked which one. He got annoyed, looked at his paperwork, and said "C. Smith." Cindy and I asked which one. He was seriously peeved by then. How do you make sergeant without knowing Smith is a common name?
If I go into some kind of business establishment and a clerkly type asks for my last name, I know not to bother going back. They're too stupid to earn my business.
It's kind of nifty being hard to Google. Photographs of a woman in a compromising position? Why no, that's not me. Nor am I the machinery shop, the music studio, the nineteenth century portrait artist, or the Illinois fishing resort. I wonder what happened to the basketball player. He used to be on the first page of Google hits too, but I didn't find him this time.
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