Funny work quote OTD

[figmo]

Yesterday Sal Castaneda asked me, "If I were to refer to you as 'Lynn Gold' in front of other people, would you scream at me or anything?"

I looked at him quizzically. "No. Why would you even need to ask such a thing?"

"I figured if I'm telling folks who's around, I'd want to mention your name. Is that the name you usually use?"

"Yeah. After all, it's the one on my driver's license and my birth certificate."

Sal looked at me a little confused. "I've known you all these years, yet I wasn't sure which one was your real name. I thought you might've made it up or something."

"No," I replied. "It was my parents' idea."

Comments

[keristor.livejournal.com]

It happens all the time in fandom, and even more in the SCA and similar organisations. Lots of people look blank when they use my real name, and then realise "Oh, you meanKeris, why didn't you say so?" I've come across it outside as well, even at work where I often can't remember the surname of a cow-orker because we hardly ever use it. And then there's places like China, where people have a Chinese name and then an 'English' one for use with foreigners (often with an anglicised form of their family name as a 'surname').

And of course a very large number of celebrities don't use their birth names, and in many cases their birth names have been hidden from all except family...

[figmo.livejournal.com]

Years ago I went to a job interview where the woman interviewing me was very much not fannish. In her office as I approached, I saw a long-time fannish friend. Unfortunately, I'd only heard his real name mentioned once and knew him only as "Renfield."

Without thinking, I started to exclaim "Hi," and realized I couldn't call him "Renfield" at work and stopped.

Fortunately, he saw where this was going quickly and, without missing a beat, exclaimed, "Why Hi!"

(Yes, I got the job. :-) )