What's in a name...?

Gee, nothing written in a couple of days.  I was just putting breakfast away, and for one strange reason or another that dreaded phrase by the late comedian Jim Varney: "know what I mean Vern?" just popped into my head...   ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Varney )

There was a time when I wished my first name could have become my last, and I could have a more 'normal' first name like 'Andrew' or 'Mike' or even 'Steve'.  But no, the fates (and my parents) determined that I should forever be the boy with three last names and no first (I won't mention the middle name)...  The big reason was that hardly anyone it seemed had the worldliness to understand that it was a traditional Dutch name, that my first name wasn't 'Van' (a mistake some still insist on making today) but rather a variant of the German 'von' meaning 'from' or 'of'.  The other irritant bit of trivia is that some would clumsily insist on trying to pronounce the 'd' at the end of 'Zandt', not understanding that it is silent.  Some 'Van Zandt's' have even long since dropped the letter from their name.  Perhaps just to avoid the frustration of hearing it.

One day while sitting in class in Junior High School, I was summoned to the office over  the intercom.  Someone in the front office had handed a poorly written note (some irony here I'm sure) to a student who's sole duty it was to earn extra credit by mangling names over the intercom. She had uttered my name in such a way as to sound a bit like "Varoom Von Zip".  The class erupted in laughter as I tried to slither out of my desk, along the floor and under the door into the hallway...  (A musician friend of mine actually wanted to form a band with that name after hearing the story)

But I have to admit that Jim changed all that.  Thanks to all his hill-billy antics on TV,  I only hated my first name.  Mostly because I couldn't go a day without hearing some smart-ass repeat that nonsense as if they thought they were being original and funny...   But as time went on, I got used to it and realized that I could do the joke and get a bigger laugh than anyone over it.  After Jim Varney died, so did the joke and life went on a bit less goofy.   But I don't blame the guy, nor do I gain satisfaction in his passing...if anything experience helped me to grow a skin and learn to take but one more joke.  And after all he paid a pretty hefty price for all of his success and the abuse of cigarettes.

Thanks for all the laughs Jim...