from verte

[helenic]

Oh, go on, then. I actually filled this out when I first saw it on jacinthsong's journal, but never got round to posting it. The meme: write out your friends list, replacing their usernames with their first names. Anyone you don't know should introduce themselves, obliquely or otherwise!

I've missed out all my own journals and all duplicate journals, which means you can't do a straight comparison from my friends list to this. But then, the only person you need to recognise on here is yourself...



#: Daniel
_: Clare, Katy, Toyin
A: Tish, Alec, Alix, amberspyglass (god, I'm sure I know this, but I can't remember for the life of me - I keep thinking Angela instead but I know that's thedarkamethyst), Andrew, areia (argh! sorry!), Lucy, Sally, Joanna
B: Michael, Ed, Laura, Helen/Josef, Gabrielle, Baz, Nana, Robert
C: Kieran, Cristian (ok ok, Casby), John, Sarah, cravenlite, Tim
D: Dave, Denny, detroitpainter, Richard, Adam, Ross, drella
E: Elise, Matthew, Nicholas, Emilie, Nick
F: Kyrsten, Tim, Jo, fever_dream, Mark, Idil, Danny
G: Jodie, glaszt, gnimmel (I should know this one, really)
H: Elizabeth
I: Nadiah, Tom, Liz
J: jacinthsong
K: Kara, kiad, Iain
L: Jasmine, Leander, laughingwoman, leafofgrass, Mark, likepatsycline, Dave, literarywitch, liviaplurabelle, Russell (is that how you spell it?)
M: Lou, Sam, Alex, Diana, Lisa, Renee, Rebecca, Elly, modestic (I know we've been introduced, but it's eluding me), Ed
N: Richard, nautical_mile, Neil, Sarah, Marina
O: oddcellist, Julietta (is that your real name? it'll do.), Oli, Ariela, other_self
P: Paige, papercrane, pesk, Liam, pistorius, Charlotta, Louisa, San
Q: Adam
R: Chris, Brian, realdoll, Robert,
S: Erika, Richard, Leni & Pola, sisuphos (it begins with a J! I know your surname! bah!), Sam, Paul, Jess, Michael, Zeina, sunday, Mark, Rupa, Leon
T: Rick, Lucy, Catriona, Liz, the_waves, theobscureone, Rachael, translucent, Helen
U: Lucy, Matt
V: Alex
W: Lucy
X: xenikos
Y: Jess, Yves
Z: "Ady"!

Comments

[erika]

Hey, you know my name. Wow.

[detroitfather.livejournal.com]

I am Paul.

[areia.livejournal.com]

For shame! I am outraged and appalled and um... quite proud of myself for actually remembering your first name.

It's Kate.

[kiad.livejournal.com]

I'm impressed! I don't think I'd be able to get even 10% of my friends' first names. (=

[lanthanum.livejournal.com]

ooo, this one i think i'd actually like to do one day, when i can sit down and paw through the list. :)

i wanted to ask -- where did you get your cartoon-self icon? i see them everywhere, but i've left a few comments asking about it and no one answers!?

[sisuphos.livejournal.com]

I'll answer to 'J'. Or to my surname. Or 'Sisuphos'. I'm not overly fond of 'Sissy', however.

[glass-world.livejournal.com]

Aww, you know my name. Bless. I feel all un-invisible.
xx

[glass-world.livejournal.com]

Wait, that's dumb, I KNOW you know my name.
xx

[libellum.livejournal.com]

Well, you do talk to yourself sometimes in entries :)

actually, I think I picked it up from comments. I got your email, and will try and find time to answer it later on - but don't worry if it takes me a day or two; I have exams :)

[libellum.livejournal.com]

Of course; I remember you writing recently about the pun on ABP. Thanks for the reminder :)

[libellum.livejournal.com]

okay, right :) thanks, I'm lame - and, to be fair, when I met you I was very pissed. I saw someone else I met at that party a couple of weeks later and I couldn't remember her name either. In fact, I still can't.

do you and M want to come to my birthday drinks on the 28th?

[libellum.livejournal.com]

well, I managed 120 out of 149. Not too bad ...

I take it you're happy to continue to be called Kiad? At least tell me how to pronounce it :) Is it Kye-ad or Key-ad?

?

[disfigurine.livejournal.com]

where did you get your icon?

[theobscureone.livejournal.com]

Understandable with me, of course. I keep it deliberately unmentioned, mostly due to extreme paranoia. If you wish to know, though, of course you may.

[libellum.livejournal.com]

it's here (http://illustmaker.abi-station.com/index_en.shtml) (I posted the link in this (http://www.livejournal.com/users/libellum/56657.html) entry)... it took me a little while to work out, and the options are kind of limited, but I've seen some really convincing ones :)

Re: ?

[libellum.livejournal.com]

see this (http://www.livejournal.com/users/libellum/57925.html?thread=883269#t883269) comment :)

[libellum.livejournal.com]

is that "J" as in "Homer J. Simpson" where he never knew what it stood for, and then found out it stood for "Jay"?

I find calling people by their surnames an extremely intimate thing to do. Bit of a paradox, I know - I suppose it's like taking the piss out of people; if you're actually friends with someone, you have to know them quite well before you can take liberties like that. In fact, if it isn't military/PE teacher-style, I tend to see it as a flirtatious/sexual thing, although I'm not sure why ... hrm.

Re: ?

[disfigurine.livejournal.com]

ah! you are quick! & thank you!

[libellum.livejournal.com]

well, it doesn't matter that much, of course. One of the reasons I hesitated about posting this at first was that it might compromise people's privacy. I don't need to know it, of course, so you are perfectly welcome to maintain your aura of mystique :)

[libellum.livejournal.com]

haha - I have met you, albeit briefly (and I'm fairly certain I was stoned at the time). Although I still haven't quite adjusted to your having seperate journals, so part of me still calls you Jodieandemma ...

[sisuphos.livejournal.com]

I actually have a friend, the mathematician (http://www.math.harvard.edu/people/LobbAndrew.html), who has the middle name Jay.

In these dog days, flirtatious/sexual is fine for me.

[areia.livejournal.com]

No worries - I'm terrible with people's names. I try to use them in conversation but I still have to write them down when I get home if I want to be really sure.

M is off walking (as you may have read), but I'm sure he'd be up for coming out on the 28th. So we'd love to. :)

[translucent.livejournal.com]

Sarra-pronounced-Sarah. Handshake, greeting, must dash before someone notices I'm raiding LiveJournal. ;)

[glass-world.livejournal.com]

This is true, you have indeed. Um, I do remember you saying you'd spent most of the weekend stoned, so it's a safe bet. But still, I am meek and shy so it's a safe bet that you very probably only remember me as 'girl who doesn't say much'.

Aww, JodieandEmma. That's fairly cute. Bless. She has her own journal now, but she never updates it... I think she thinks she's too cool for that kind of thing these days.

xx

[mrpyro.livejournal.com]

On an entirely unrelated note, I was wondering if you'd seen this particular piece of horror:

Iliad cut back for text generation (http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/06/06/1086460175666.html)

[libellum.livejournal.com]

Oh. Dear. God. Surely a hoax?

[whatifoundthere.livejournal.com]

My name is unusual enough that I'm actually kind of uncomfortable with strangers knowing it. Since I almost never hear it when it's not referring to me specifically, it always gives me a bit of a jolt when it's spoken aloud.

But just in case you need a reminder, my post about my name is here (http://www.livejournal.com/users/amberspyglass/60856.html). Not Angela at all :)

[libellum.livejournal.com]

raiding Livejournal? Are you raping and pillaging it as well?

Salve :) I assume you know my name ...

[libellum.livejournal.com]

Ah, but it begins and ends with the same letter. At least, I think so - I now know how to pronounce it, but not how to spell it!

Names are even more odd when they belong to more than one person. My own name has always seemed very alien to me - in fact it's only since I started keeping a livejournal that I've actually begun to associate the sounds with me. But I mean, when I was obsessed with Laura, the name became momentous - it was a very different name to the name everyone else called Laura had; it resonated differently. I don't believe I pronounced it differently at all (perhaps there was more of an element of Löra to it than normal) but there was a huge distinction. There still is, for anyone I'm at all close to - for example, Chris has a very different name from the name "Chris", which anyone can have. I suppose when I think my own name to myself, it is with that personal emphasis - but when I hear it spoken, it is the impersonal version, which anyone can be called. This really isn't making sense :)

[papercrane.livejournal.com]

i am stacia (pronounced stay-shuh). and you are helen, yes?

[mrpyro.livejournal.com]

I'd love to be able to tell you that it is.

Sadly, Microsoft have released a statement on their own website confirming it (http://www.microsoft.com/uk/press/content/presscentre/releases/2004/05/PR03267.asp)

The only good news is that the link that says it takes you to the "translation" is broken.

[the-waves.livejournal.com]

I'm Rebecca
(most call me Becca, though)


*shakes your hand*

:-)

[modestic.livejournal.com]

I am Ash.

[whatifoundthere.livejournal.com]

I now know how to pronounce it, but not how to spell it!

Oops! Well, if you do a Google search on my last name, which I do spell in that post, the first hit you'll get is me. You'll see that no letters are repeated in my given name after all :)

This really isn't making sense

Actually, it makes quite a lot of sense. I was in a gaming group once that had two guys named Paul (actually one was named Paull, but that's another story). Very soon it got to the point where not only the Paul(l)s, but everyone else, could generally tell who was being addressed if someone yelled "Hey, Paul(l)!" The guys were very different, and their names somehow reflected that. If you are listening, you can hear the difference.

So I can definitely imagine a big difference between the pronunciation of your name and the pronunciation of the name of that chick from Troy. Especially since you're so much prettier than she is :)

[liviaplurabelle.livejournal.com]

My name is Carmen (...though I would have liked Anna Livia better)

*un abrazo*

[libellum.livejournal.com]

Anna Livia is rather lovely. I like the softness of the first contrasted with the harshness of the second; not so much in sounds as in associations. Karenina and Caesar. Would you call a daughter that, or is it too much your own?

[libellum.livejournal.com]

of course you are. *forehead slap* I am darft.

[libellum.livejournal.com]

nice to meet you!

I had heard your name before, I think - probably in comments - but I couldn't remember it ... I tend not to remember a name unless I've actually used it, either in talking about someone or to their face. Although you don't tend to use people's names to their face unless you know them very well, or you're trying to get their attention ... which isn't usually necessary on the internet!

[libellum.livejournal.com]

I am indeed, Stacia :) (I had heard your name before, but I forgot it!)

Interesting how you pronounce it - I'd have instinctively gone for either Stay-see-a or Stay-shya. It's hard to pronounce "Helen" wrong, though ... :)

[treasure-box.livejournal.com]

It's hard to pronounce "Helen" wrong, though

Would that were true...I divide people into those I like and those I don't based largely on how they pronounce my name. People I like pronounce it correctly, viz 'Hel-un'. Those I dislike, and condemn to tongues of hellfire, pronounce it 'Hel-in', which sounds bloody *dreadful* :-(

[modestic.livejournal.com]

Darft? I thought you were Helen...

: )

(Sorry, poor joke; couldn't resist!)

[liviaplurabelle.livejournal.com]

That association you mention has made think again about this name and now I like it even more... I see more of me in it because I think I have those two sides, the softness and the harshness. that nick, as you no doubt know, comes from Joyce's Finnegan's Wake. I chose it because I liked how it sounds and its symbolism. Anna Livia is in constant transformation, always changing, always unchanged.

It's not a very common name here in Spain, but If I had a daughter I would probably give that name to her.

[libellum.livejournal.com]

I've never had that ... there is a slight difference depending on the amount of emphasis put on the first syllable; Helen of Troy, for example, is very much (in my mind) a Helen, with very open vowels - almost Helenn - whereas my name, like yours, has the schwa (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schwa) in the second syllable.

Nick/pet names are odd things. They almost define me-as-I-am-with-that-person. Thus verte's "H" is inevitable and - in no way negatively - slightly different in emphasis from the "Helən" I am in my head; and both are certainly very distinct from the "Helna" I used to be to an ex.

The problem I have had, believe it or not, is spelling. It's been spelt Hellen, Helan, Hellan and various other vowel combinations - most recently by colleagues at temp jobs, but previously by teachers writing school reports ... !

[oddcellist.livejournal.com]

Coming through the comment-field, I learned your name. Pleased to meet you - I'm Jeremy, by the way.

[treasure-box.livejournal.com]

I think the 'Hel-in' pronunciation is in part a local thing - the Worcester 'accent' is really horrible - but I've also heard it from people who should know better, such as actor Robert Hardy. My parents used to watch that James Herriot vet thing when I was a kid (All Creatures Great & Small??) and it used to set my teeth on edge every time he referred to James' wife, who was called Helen. My parents chose my name partly because it couldn't be shortened, but of course inevitably I became H or Hel, particularly at school.

[glaszt.livejournal.com]

Wow, impressive! I certainly wouldn't know that many real names from my friends list. My name's Blair by the way. x

[jacinthsong.livejournal.com]

I'm a Laura, like 94% of the other girls born between 1983 and 1989 :)