Do you name your stuff? It's your weekly free thread!

February 24, 2025 12:34 PM

About 1 in 4 people name their cars. And of course people name their instruments (Atlantic, ungated). Does your car or guitar (or crouton) have a name? Share it - or anything at all you want to talk about! (except politics) - it's your weekly Free Thread!
posted by kristi (168 comments total)

I will be calling this thread Herbert. You may, of course, call Herbert whatever you like.
posted by kristi at 12:35 PM on February 24 [13 favorites]

Nothing I own has a name. Well, apart from my Allen keys and Stanley knife.
posted by pipeski at 12:43 PM on February 24 [8 favorites]

Heh. I have named one of my four cars. I guess that makes me Mr. Average.

In my defense, only one of them had a huge amount of personality.
posted by bonehead at 12:44 PM on February 24 [4 favorites]

My car is named Princess Leia because it's white. My previous car, named by the friend I got it from, was Queen Sheba. Otherwise that's about it for inanimate names for me.

Herbert reminds me of The Harold in improv.

So for those who might not have seen: Hamlet turns out to have gone over better than expected. Very small crowds (I'm talking 11-28 people, but that shocks me not), but we didn't trainwreck all over the place, and the people who completely blank out/can't improvise/freeze up for 5 minutes did not do that nearly as much. The tech had been failing all over tech week--we only got lights or sound at the very end of it--and the projector was finally working by opening night. However, the film we made...did not. I asked if we could watch it at 6:30 (show started at 7) and he was all, "oh, we had to send Cheryl home to fix it." Me: How will we know if the film got fixed? Director: "Oh, I'll tell Harry on headset." Reader, he did not. So we improvised the film's content on the spot, which I thought was hilarious and the cast vastly preferred it to the video, which finally worked on Saturday night.

Issues with the video: obviously showing a computer screen, bodies/heads cut off, and per someone's husband, the silent film aspect of it did not make sense to him. We tried unsuccessfully to argue to either improv it again or do improvised voiceover ("it's a silent film!") with the director, though he did wink-wink say if it's "not working" on Friday.... I note that I've been told the local reviewer may come that night. (Local reviewer is a friend of mine, it will make no newspapers on week 2, and she is determined to not give bad reviews, so no worries with that topic.)

At any rate, we made it through, I had a few theater friends who did go and gave me compliments, so that was a big yay. Now to collapse for four days and try to get some sleep.
posted by jenfullmoon at 12:46 PM on February 24 [14 favorites]

We bought a Nissan Leaf last year. Second-hand, but it was new to us, so our new Leaf.

We call it Turnover.
posted by Major Clanger at 12:46 PM on February 24 [35 favorites]

I call Alfie the Corgi “Officer Pupke” because he trots around stoutly keeping a watchful eye on things.
posted by Lemkin at 12:46 PM on February 24 [11 favorites]

Our current car isn't named - I have named my car in the past, but never really used those names in any regular fashion. Even our cat we mostly call "Kitty" except in more formal contexts (w/ the vet and cat sitter, etc). The main exception is our vacation property, which we call Buffalo Waller (or just "the Waller") after Jett Rink's property in Giant.
posted by Pedantzilla at 12:47 PM on February 24 [2 favorites]

I have always wanted to name my car, but have failed everytime. I think because to me it's the thing I drive and I don't spend a lot of time in it or maybe I'm just not a namer.
posted by Art_Pot at 12:48 PM on February 24 [1 favorite]

I think about how in Lord of the rings, almost every object had a name, because everyone was unique and the product of skilled and thoughtful handcraft, not unlike titling a work of art. It seemed to me this was recalling a pre-mass-production pastoralism that may or may not have been as real as The Shire.

I am not a namer, I play several instruments some with distinct sounds and personalities but have never felt like I had appropriate names for them, but I did once have a bong I named Grand Moff Sparkin’.
posted by Jon_Evil at 12:53 PM on February 24 [10 favorites]

I name my current laptop 'Samantha'. Been doing this for decades. It's a direct reference to Samantha in Philip Greenspun's "Travels with Samantha", which I read shortly after it appeared on the Web, effectively making it the first digital book / long digital read for me.

I read it again recently, after remembering meeting him in 1996. Some bits are interesting, some don't hold up that well in 2025, some bits seem shockingly very long ago history (early 1990s). If his name rings a bell for the greying/graying demographic of MetaFilter, Philip had an interesting early Web history including e.g. ArsDigita and photo.net, and was mentioned regularly on MetaFilter around 2001.
posted by Wordshore at 12:54 PM on February 24 [8 favorites]

I don’t name many things. But my house is nicknamed Chez Milles Chats. I’m not even much of a French language person, but houses need to be Chez Something, that’s the rule!
posted by notoriety public at 12:55 PM on February 24 [3 favorites]

my partner named their little hatchback Feisty and our older F-150 Fordy

I don't really name things, but I enjoy the shit out of their naming things
posted by ginger.beef at 12:57 PM on February 24 [3 favorites]

I call my chopping block "Stumpy", partly because it's made from a tree stump and partly as a shop safety reminder.
posted by jedicus at 12:58 PM on February 24 [12 favorites]

My motorcycle (BMW R1200R touring bike) is called “donkey” in part cause I load it up for big long trips and also as a short form for Don Quixote.
posted by whatevernot at 12:59 PM on February 24 [6 favorites]

I have always named my cars. There was Fortinbras, a down at heel Ford Tempo. There was Rosamund, a sprightly little Toyota Yaris. When I was a kid, I named a pair of bear slippers Vein and Sternum (I do not know why).
posted by Kitteh at 1:00 PM on February 24 [8 favorites]

I used to name phones and laptops after words I really enjoyed, and then I realized I didn't have a good enough memory to remember which device was "therapod" or "hylozoist" or whatever and it was actually making it harder to deal with backups and such. So now they're just called shit like "2022 laptop" and it's sad and dull but practical.
posted by Birds, snakes, and aeroplanes at 1:01 PM on February 24 [4 favorites]

many of my houseplants have names:

Ferny Branca
Figgy P (P for Pudding)
Bella (there are 2 of them)
Philbert

the umbrella nickname for all the plants is "Fluffy"

mr supermedusa has firmly refused to consider naming the car (he's no fun!) but it would be a Japanese name since its a 2007 Fit (made in Japan).
posted by supermedusa at 1:01 PM on February 24 [7 favorites]

I grew up with named cars, and my own first car was either Battleship Potemkin (because it was big and solid and grey) or The Driverless Car (because it was so big I couldn't look over the steering wheel but looked through it), but since then they've just been Car. However, I also call my dog Dog most of the time. Among other things because he looks so much like Dog that people have stopped me on the street to tell me so. I know, you know.
posted by mumimor at 1:03 PM on February 24 [3 favorites]

The minivan, a Ford Transit Connect, is "Hank" -- short for Hardcore Hank, (a pun) because he's hardcore despite looking like a soccer mom's bus. The SUV is "Connie", short for Conquistador, because the license plate I had for a few years (starting with a F250 pickup) was CNQSTDR, but then I started feeling bad about the colonizer-vibe of it, so we still call her Connie even though now the license plate is HMRFORE.

Wait, you ask, what's HMRFORE?

(pounding nails)

I have had exactly one person fall for the dad joke. Well, technically two, but he was a French exchange student whose English was OK but I felt I needed to explain the wordplay joke rather than just laughing at him. I almost got a highway patrolman to say it but he didn't format the question correctly, so I was sad. (He still thought the license plate was funny and only gave me a warning).

The house we're renovating in a small town: when we were looking for a cheap foreclosure, as we were taking our second tour of this property, my wife said "Esmerelda." Oh, shit, I said, she named the house, now we have to buy it.

Film student update: The camera test last Saturday went very well; the director and I were on the same vibe (not surprising given we've worked together multiple times before with good results); my 1AC joined us -- my first time having a camera assistant, their first time being a camera assistant -- and I think we've got a good vibe too, and figuring out lighting went the way I expected given my research. The director wanted a warm look and was happy with how the footage looked in the monitor, but on looking at the output footage, I think it's too warm, so we may still be tweaking on set but we're well on our way to getting it right.

Sunday morning there was a last minute call for extras for a student film my friends are working on, their capstone, the big project before you can graduate. It was set at a pub/dive-bar, filming from 8:30am to 11:00am (opening time), and I sat with a non-student friend of mine (an actor) and a woman I'd acted with in another project, and we goofed off, and watched the time tick away, and nothing had been shot by 9:30, and then we watched them shoot a bunch of scenes with the camera pointing directly away from us....and then 10:00 rolls around and the film crew seems to be getting concerned about time, and we first get a warning that we may need to return for a second day of filming -- but then, 10:15, they block out just the scenes where we're in the background and finish all the shots needing extras. Hooray!

My next coming weekends aren't even available for being an extra: the film we did the camera test for starts shooting this coming Saturday, and we've got scenes shooting every weekend until April -- not always full days, not always both Saturday and Sunday, and there's a couple evenings thrown in, but I'm super nervous and super excited and I really think this is going to turn out really well. I have some work left to do on it -- planning shots, making sure the shooting schedule lines up right, etc.

Also coming up quickly: The Fargo Film Festival. I was on the "Experimental" jury and jurists are also expected to help run the festival, so we have a volunteer meeting tonight, and then in two weeks I take off several days of work, live off popcorn and soda, and watch as many of the films as I can when I'm not at the merch table or wrangling filmmaker Q&As.
posted by AzraelBrown at 1:03 PM on February 24 [6 favorites]

Speaking of BMW motorcycles, my old BMW R1100s was yellow and black. Appropriately, it was called "The Bumblebeemer".
posted by tommasz at 1:05 PM on February 24 [13 favorites]

And, how many of you actually name your cats? Or do you just cycle thru a set of nicknames?
posted by es_de_bah at 1:06 PM on February 24 [6 favorites]

I have an acoustic guitar named Sandy (because it's all sanded down to just the raw wood) and a Fuji bike named Suji. I think I had a guitar in college named Mama Angelina, after the restaurant my roommate and I would go to all the time, but she's long gone :(
posted by donuy at 1:07 PM on February 24 [3 favorites]

Only my first car had a name and that was because my roommate Amy named it: Ol' Bertha.

We call the GPS lady on our phones Samantha. They're all Samantha, regardless of whose phone it is.

Our old old router's name was Jeff, the God of Biscuits. The old router was NSEA Protector, and the new router is NSEA Protector 2.

I've named pets and children over 20+ years and that's a lot of names.

Oh, and my egg baby in high school was named Brittany Paige, which is SO VERY TYPICAL of a small town high school girl's idea of the perfect name in 1986.

(reader, I did not name my actual human daughter Brittany Paige. For the record.)
posted by cooker girl at 1:08 PM on February 24 [11 favorites]

And, how many of you actually name your cats? Or do you just cycle thru a set of nicknames?

Both! they have 'formal' names and a string of ever-evolving nicknames, and songs, and silly little rhymes. duh.
posted by supermedusa at 1:08 PM on February 24 [10 favorites]

My cats barely have names, in that each of the 4 of them has about 7 different names and answers to none of them. Which is not true, 1 of the 4 reliably comes when called by me, a different one when called by husband. But not Fennario, he does what he wants when he wants.

In terms of objects, we acquired a practically junk 1980 Ford Bronco at one point that I tried hard to name Bertha. But my family just cannot make personal names for objects stick.

I do love to annoy my 11 year old by inventing new names for household things, not like personal names but for example:

Potholders? No. They are Hottie Holdies.
Spatula? No. It's a Flipper.
Etc.
posted by fennario at 1:10 PM on February 24 [4 favorites]

Way back in the day, I was casual friends with a guy. I was over at his house one day, and out came this cat. It was a sweet cat, though it looked sickly. He told me it had diabetes (among other things) and then launched into this *extremely* complicated care routine that he went through regularly for it -- including giving it shots and buying expensive foods to help it avoid being too overweight and / or liver damage. After a bit, I realized he hadn't told me, so I asked: What's your cat's name?

He looked at me like I was nuts and said: ".... it's a cat."
posted by heyitsgogi at 1:11 PM on February 24 [22 favorites]

My Chevy Sonic is named Bert, after the Muppet. Originally because he has a unibrow (black strip all around the hood, above the headlights) but also because I want him to be boring and steady and reliable. That's why I bought him. He's Bert. (My spouse and I are also very clearly Ernie and Bert analogues, so in a way I was naming him after myself.)

Previous car was named Jenny, because I got a new license plate when I got her (state-assigned number), and as I was trying to memorize it I realized that it was very easily singable to 867-5309 JENNY, and that's the only way I can remember it. (It transferred to Bert when I got him but he didn't have the right vibe for the name.)

The car lineup before that was Sterling North, Ramone, Ludwig Van, and the Beast.
posted by dlugoczaj at 1:15 PM on February 24 [5 favorites]

I got solicited to write a SF story for the first time last year. I submitted some ideas, they were rejected. Some more, also. Some more, yay, 1 was accepted. I wrote the story, sent it in, came back with significant revisions. Did the changes, finally got it accepted.
It was hard.
I got paid for the story and used the money to buy a nice, 5-string Cort bass. I had it for almost a year, but never really vibed with it. It had appreciated in this time, so I sold it and used the exact amount to buy a more expensive guitar, a Solar A2.6. It's beautiful and sleek and black and metal as fuck. Look at it!
So, obviously, I named it Lockheed after Kitty Pryde's dragon friend.
posted by signal at 1:17 PM on February 24 [8 favorites]

First car, a needy Ford Tempo, Lola. Whatever Lola wants, Lola gets.
Second car, a Ford Focus wagon, Romy. After Romy Schneider.
Third car, a Honda Fit, Sue. After Sister Street Fighter, Sue Shiomi.
Fourth car, a Nissan Kicks, Yoko. After Yoko.

Cars work better if you name them and talk to them. That's just science.
posted by Capt. Renault at 1:18 PM on February 24 [8 favorites]

We had a lovely ol’ lazy chubby cat called Dagny (yes, Atlas Shrugged reference long story) which was quite hilarious as she’d just laze about the house (good n selfishly) but not contribute to capitalism at *all*.

She was referred to as “Dags”, “The Dagster” or the “Dig-dag-diddly-doo”.

I might re-read Atlas Shrugged if Hank Reardon called Ms. Taggart “The Dagareeno” throughout but I’m kidding because it’s an unreadable mess.
posted by whatevernot at 1:19 PM on February 24 [7 favorites]

Actually, Lockheed the dragon is purple. The guitar is named after the SR71 jet that the dragon is named after.
posted by signal at 1:20 PM on February 24 [4 favorites]

My bicycle is named Falkor. It wasn't what I had in mind but it's what he said he wanted when I took him out of the shed and did a little naming ceremony. He's very yellow and has a lot of Mardi Gras beads dangling from his handlebars. Mostly from the Krewe of Hermes because, well, god of speed and travelers.
posted by egypturnash at 1:24 PM on February 24 [9 favorites]

one time my husband picked up a new hairdryer for me from Costco. it was huge and purple, so of course I had to call it Barney.
posted by supermedusa at 1:24 PM on February 24 [4 favorites]

I used to drive a red Mazda 2 that my wife and I named The Little Tomato, after the song by Pink Martini. We usually just referred to it as The Tomato. Now I drive a black Mazda CX30 that is named The Licorice Whip, though in reality we never actually refer to it as anything other than "my/your car." The Little Tomato was just a special, little car.
posted by mrphancy at 1:26 PM on February 24 [4 favorites]

My old Saturn was named Batly because I magically got a regular Maryland license plate that said BAT on it, and, well. My truck is called Moby because it is a great whale. I would like to point out that I honestly did not think of Moby the musician but was purely thinking of the book and my newly acquired giant 06 F150. Moby has been a good truck but he is being replaced soon, so we'll see what the new car gets named. My son's truck is alternately called Fancy Nancy or LuxeTruck; we do this to bug him. The Roomba is named Mopsy because that is supposed to be its job, although mostly it seems to exist to entertain the cat, whose name was Binx at the shelter and I have changed to Mr. Binks as having more gravitas. I named Harvey the dog after the Stardew Valley doctor who is always worried and I'm still not sure if I sensed that deep anxiety or if it was a self fulfilling prophecy. I just named the wifi network TooSmallHouse because it is. I like naming things (obviously) but mostly the names never stick. The whole family is like this. My son comes up with enthusiastically weird name ideas "We're not going to call them blueberries anymore! They're bloobs now!" my daughter named all her cats after food for a while: "This is Okra! And Cereal!" and my granddaughter, who is new to this game, insists on naming everything Rainbow Sparklepants Unicorn Froo Froo or some variant thereof.
posted by mygothlaundry at 1:27 PM on February 24 [6 favorites]

My spouse and I are also very clearly Ernie and Bert analogues

Are you a Chaos Muppet or an Order Muppet? This appears to be very common in marriages. I posed this question in relation to my marriage to our common Facebook friends, and they were hilariously unanimous and accurate. I'm the Order Muppet.
posted by AzraelBrown at 1:33 PM on February 24 [3 favorites]

We just saw The Monkey yesterday and it was *chef's kiss* for people who can cheer a well-executed comedic decapitation and can chuckle at the thought of inevitable death.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 1:33 PM on February 24 [2 favorites]

A rowdy looking orange tabby used to come courting my girl cat. Like any over-protective father, I frowned on the relationship. “You stay away from that trashcan Romeo,” I lectured her.

He was then Trashcan Romeo after that. When she crossed the Bridge, I hoped he would be there waiting for her.
posted by Lemkin at 1:38 PM on February 24 [14 favorites]

99% perfect nickname but it's "Trashcan Romeow" please :D
posted by supermedusa at 1:43 PM on February 24 [16 favorites]

There's a good cat name (and a good cat) in the 1885 girls' novel I've just read. He's Timagenes Trotter, Esq., M.R.S.M.C. - when he is promoted to Fellow, we discover that this refers to the Royal Society of Mouse-Catchers. His owner, a widow, has a watercolour showing him as "quite the beau-idéal of an amiable, well-to-do, and gentlemanly puss".
posted by paduasoy at 1:43 PM on February 24 [4 favorites]

Also Shemp has stopped gracing our home with his presence; he vanished after spending a freezing night inside with his mom and sisters. He was a friendly orange stripey boy who we sometimes called Shempuel Shempington the Shempty-Shompth.

We do not know his fate. He just stopped showing up for breakfast and dinner outside, stopped lurking around the house. We hope this is because he decided he'd had enough of living with the rest of his family and exercised an option he had to be an indoors cat somewhere else in the neighborhood. But we will never know for sure.

Cats just kind of appear down here in New Orleans, and leave when they leave.
posted by egypturnash at 1:51 PM on February 24 [6 favorites]

I've owned various vehicles; I started out with a handful of motorcycles over the course of about 15 years. After that came, for reasons outside my control, a long run of boring soulless econo-boxes; I hated them then, and I still hate them in retrospect, none of them were ever worth referring to as other than "junkbox" or "craphole" or "shit heap". After that I drove a shabby old '71 VW Westfalia Bus that had just enough personality for me to initially name it ("Beethoven", because it was a camper van...), but that was really just a cheap joke and I didn't keep up the effort. I still miss it sometimes. My current car, which is a hell of a lot of fun to drive, nevertheless doesn't warrant a name; it's simply an excellent well-engineered tool.

I've also owned quite a few musical instruments; it never occurred to me to give a name to any of them.

All but one of the cats I've cohabited with more or less kept their original name; the one tgat didn't slowly morphed from Lady Grey to Gray Cat to Graykie and finally to Mang (because that's what her meow changed to as she got older). Mang was a wonderful cat, she lived to around 19 years old.

As you might have guessed by now, I've never petted a crouton.
posted by Greg_Ace at 1:55 PM on February 24 [4 favorites]

My wife and I always name our cars. We had Bessie (seafoam green Prius), Le Plus (a Toyota L.E. Plus, but pronounced as if French), Steve (a very generic Prius) and Violet (a Prius V).

Other objects don't get named.
posted by skullhead at 1:55 PM on February 24 [4 favorites]

When I was a younger man, my cars were always "S.A.V. Mk {number}" for suburban assault vehicle whichever number I was on. Then I moved to California and that stopped for years until I got my Volt, which instantly became Sparky.

Now I have a pickup truck that in my head is named Neko, because, naturally, it's a Tacoma.

Also, just found out that one of cats of many names - Osiris, but usually Oz or Ozwald - has terminal cancer. They give him 2 months - 6 if we did chemo successfully, but given that he's always been our ninja bandit man who put a few deep holes in my hands when I tried to take him to the vet a while back - I can't see doing that to him. It's a shame, he might cross the 12 year mark, but he's recently started to come out more and get more love and we've debated if it's because he is dying. (which runs counter to my experience with my other cats). All of his bloodwork is absolutely normal and in the zone, but a big mass on his kidney and apparent spread into his lymph nodes is coming fast. Meanwhile, Isis, his sister, continues to chug along as a big fat happy black velvet marshmallow.
posted by drewbage1847 at 2:05 PM on February 24 [8 favorites]

I am not one to name objects, but once upon a time, maybe 25 years ago, I bought a cheap down jacket, imported from a Nepali co-op, for $50. It was navy blue with red trim, ridiculously puffy, and shed feathers wherever I went. Naturally, I called it Puff Jacket. Not long after, its namesake went on a name-changing spree and my parka had to follow, becoming P. Jicket and then just Jicket in short order.
Fittingly, I settled down and my wife made me stop wearing it. Jicket had been banished to a basement closet for some years when the latest news broke, and now I wait for an inmate number to assign to it to complete the circle.
posted by cardboard at 2:05 PM on February 24 [4 favorites]

I tried to make Lola stick for our new VW (cause German and accelerates on a dime) but no luck, the personality isn't quite right. Maybe I should have gotten in a couple of accidents early on.

We named our new cats Agnes and Jacques, for similarly cinematic reasons.
posted by Bryant at 2:08 PM on February 24 [2 favorites]

I rented a car for a solo cross-country road trip; my only requirements when I made the reservation were that a) the car should be red, and b) the car should have a functioning sound system. I did indeed get something red; for some reason I named the car "Lolita" and bonded with it so much that a full month after the trip, I was coming out of a bookstore in Manhattan and saw another red Chrysler parked nearby and did a take and squealed, "Lolita? Is it you?" and was wandering over to it with starry eyes until I saw the owner looking at me funny.

One of our neighbors when I was a kid had a cat named Inspector Fuzz. This is still one of the better cat names I think I've heard.

....

In other news - there's signs of hope on the job front, and this Oscars is gearing up to be quite unpredictable.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 2:08 PM on February 24 [9 favorites]

omg "Velvet Marshmallow" is absolutely my new Grrrrl band name.
posted by supermedusa at 2:11 PM on February 24 [3 favorites]

Also a Leaf owner. I named it Leafeon. It's a '15 base model with the 24kwh battery (9 bars @ 52k miles, which is really good). Perfect for my weekly driving which is maybe 60 miles a week.

Previous cars: Tom Slick 1 ('84 Station wagon), Tom 2 ('70 Barracuda), Lester ('88 RX7), Fagen ('97 Miata), Alice ('86 Suburban)

Cats: They all had set names and a ton of nicknames. The ones I named had middle names too.

Free Thread: Not lamenting being single because the exes are not okay.

One of my exes sent me some bitter AF messages on 2/14, and a few hours later acted nice like nothing happened. (He's done this many times, and each time he swears it'll never happen again. Dude, just because you don't lay a hand on me doesn't mean you're not being abusive!)

I blocked him on social media and unfriended him on Pokemon Go. Then I remembered he hasn't paid his share of storage fees for our shared spaces in 2 months. I took last Friday off work so I could rent a car and run up to the storage places I have 1.5 hrs from home (aka where I lived for 5 years) so I could change the locks and update access codes. If he wants his stuff back, he owes for storage and for the money it cost me on Friday to accomplish the task.

Figured while I was in the general area, I'd see a couple of friends (separately) I rarely see due to the distance. Glad I did, as I've known these friends for a long time and they're great people.
posted by luckynerd at 2:12 PM on February 24 [8 favorites]

I call my house "el fin de camino", cause I plan to be here for the duration...

My last few cars were Hondas named "skeeter bug" and "june bug", and a elderly Ford pickup named "Elton" (in honor of an uncle who left me a little inheritance which financed it's purchase.
posted by TwoToneRow at 2:12 PM on February 24 [4 favorites]

I had a Honda Civic that was white with a black cover on the front hood to conceal the cracked bumper. I called it "Bandit" in reference to the bandit mask. It was perhaps fate that it was stolen by local teens and driven into an embankment.

The car I replaced it with was also a civic Civic that was black and of a newer and more rounded design. I felt attracted to the name "Bullet" but I thought better of it, after the prophecy in its predecessor's name. Seemed to be inviting misfortune. I call it "Mev," after some of the letters on its plate.

All of my boats and spaceships in video games have been named "The Thunder Road," taken from the space traveling Tilt-a-Whirl in The Explorers. They've had better luck, generally.
posted by Phobos the Space Potato at 2:15 PM on February 24 [4 favorites]

I once knew a guy that had a green AMC Hornet that he called the Green Hornet, naturally enough.
posted by TwoToneRow at 2:16 PM on February 24 [3 favorites]

I don't tend to name cars or inanimate objects around here, but I do name most animals - a relic of my childhood where naming something makes it somehow less scary. Angus (for ACDC's guitarist and his knobby knees) the huntsman spider brought his huge 7-legged girlfriend in the house and now there's a bajillion teeny baby huntsman spiders in my bathroom. The girlfriend is retroactively called Agatha, because it was Agatha all along. I also had to evict Russell the blue tongued lizard from my kitchen (again!) - so named because even if you can't see him, you can still hear the garden rustle. Although, he's so big and fat that I have a feeling he might be a pregnant she and so will probably have to be renamed (blue tongues are viviparous, btw). I am taking suggestions at this time.
posted by ninazer0 at 2:21 PM on February 24 [3 favorites]

Oh I forgot about the fish. The tank of glofish are unimaginatively named by their colors, so we have Pinky, Yellow, Big Greenie, Little Greenie and Purps, who is purple. The catfish is named Lil' Plecky because their predecessor was a plecostomus and they inherited the name along with the job when the original Lil' Plecky tragically passed.

Little Greenie has some sort of weird neurological issue that makes them swim sort of vertically in strange hops, if you can imagine hopping while swimming. They seem to be completely healthy otherwise and have survived as long as the others, and grown to be almost the size of Big Greenie, so, hopefully it is just a personal quirk. It is however hilarious and Three can imitate them swimming to great effect.

I used to have bettas on and off and I named them all Fang, from Fang I to Fang VII, which frankly I had lost track but I like the number 7. One Fang, Fang IV, I think, lived to be three or four years old, quite a triumph. Our last betta's name was Fez and he was doing very well until the sad day he was apparently raptured. We never found the body but I have long nurtured dark suspicions about Harvey and Okra, our then cat, working together.
posted by mygothlaundry at 2:24 PM on February 24 [3 favorites]

I never did this, but my wife has names for everything. It's in her family... a large family, and many of them use nicknames. Like names that were invented for them when they were kids and they still use these names. Her dad is Frank, but he's really Francisco. But a lot of people call him Kiko. My wife's sister's nickname is "Chott" which has absolutely no relationship to her real name (it's a common USA woman's name that sounds nothing like Chott). But everyone calls her this except me and a few of the other people who married into this family. The origin has something to do with when she was an infant, but the story is really vague and I don't think anyone actually remembers this anymore. This woman is 70 years old.

Anyway, my wife had a BMW that was a beautiful warm gray color (wish they still made this color). She decided it looked like the color of mink fur, so the car was "Minky."

We then got a blue sedan that didn't have a name. We had to get a second vehicle which is a sort of hatchback... like a tiny SUV. She calls it "Fat Car" even though it's not particularly rotund.
posted by SoberHighland at 2:29 PM on February 24 [3 favorites]

I'm not generally a big namer of things, but if I were going to name my car, I'd have to call it Autumn.

Because it's a red Leaf.
posted by nickmark at 2:29 PM on February 24 [12 favorites]

The plates on my new (used) car start with “KVP” so I’ve been trying out ”Kevin Pollak” as a name, but I’m not sure it’s going to stick.
posted by baseballpajamas at 2:30 PM on February 24 [2 favorites]

Cars work better if you name them and talk to them. That's just science.
I'm not usually one for naming things, but my wife named him George the first time she saw our old truck and George he remains. At 63 years old, George needs all the help from science he can get, so it's good we named him.
posted by dg at 2:30 PM on February 24 [8 favorites]

Two cats now - Howard and Walter. Old man names ftw.
posted by whatevernot at 2:31 PM on February 24 [3 favorites]

We rented an Alfa Romeo Tonale for our upcoming road trip in Southern Italy this June. Comrade Doll has a heavy foot and those are formidable roads, so the upgrade will be a blast for her. (Especially after she drove a hybrid through the Croatian mountains the last time we rented a car overseas. Its engine screamed and cried the entire time and we still barely made it to the speed limit.)

We may have to at least temporarily name this car.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 2:32 PM on February 24 [3 favorites]

The cats: Spicy, Numan, Alethia (Ali), Chadwick, Cha Cha, and Grace. Plus foster Burt.

Speaking of Burt: anyone in the Chicago area who is looking for a charming young male companion, he is now ready for adoption! He is extremely playful, friendly and affectionate. I just started letting him integrate with the other cats on Friday and he’s doing well there. They don’t actually like him yet, but they are tolerating his presence pretty well, and there haven’t been any big fights.
posted by notoriety public at 2:32 PM on February 24 [5 favorites]

Give Burt a noogy from me!
posted by whatevernot at 2:38 PM on February 24 [3 favorites]

Since I could drive, all of my cars have names rooted in mythology. The cars that were named after nice beings didn't last long. Currently, Rhiannon in the 4th year of her reign. Computers are named after sky beings. Hard drives after ancient historic sites. It all comforts me in a silly way.
My legal first name is shared by one of the three Chipmunks. It's an adorable coincidence that my street take another of the trio's names. It's only right that my wifi network is the Chipmunk People's Republic.
posted by moonbird at 2:59 PM on February 24 [4 favorites]

My tumor was named, although not by me. A fellow I was working with called it Fred. Name stuck.
Fred is three years dead, baybee. (And partly imprisoned in a paraffin block.)
posted by cobaltnine at 3:02 PM on February 24 [12 favorites]

cars of my life that earned names:
1986 Toyota 1/4ton pickup: Pepe
1984 Honda Civic: Mitsuoko
1996 Honda Civic: Webster
1999 Honda CR-V: Hermie
2016 Hyundai Tucson: Didi
posted by mcstayinskool at 3:04 PM on February 24 [3 favorites]

When I was given some sourdough starter back in 2020, my friend insisted I had to give it a name. So I did: Marcel Proofed.
posted by dnash at 3:08 PM on February 24 [8 favorites]

I call my Honda Element "Tantalum."
posted by doubtfulpalace at 3:10 PM on February 24 [3 favorites]

Oh, and my egg baby in high school was named Brittany Paige, which is SO VERY TYPICAL of a small town high school girl's idea of the perfect name in 1986.

I named mine Crystal because I couldn't think of anything else other than jewelry.
posted by jenfullmoon at 3:12 PM on February 24 [5 favorites]

The household car is a Hyundai Veloster Turbo Ultimate.

Its name is “땡” (pronounced “Ddaeng”). In Korean that word has got something like 12+ different meanings.

The car is named after a BTS song called “땡” with massive levels of wordplay , conveniently explained here by a Korean speaker.
posted by Pirate-Bartender-Zombie-Monkey at 3:23 PM on February 24 [4 favorites]

We have a tradition that the kids name our rental car when we go on vacation. Our vacations involve a lot of driving to places like national parks, so the car is almost an honorary family member. The last two were Chicken Wing (Honda CRV) and Turkey Leg (Toyota RAV4).
posted by qxntpqbbbqxl at 3:27 PM on February 24 [2 favorites]

My wireless network is "Crux of the Biscuit"
posted by SoberHighland at 3:29 PM on February 24 [3 favorites]

being from Michigan oddly it doesn't seem a big thing here. I'll make exceptions for kit cars, muscle cars, restored vehicles, historical vehicles.
but never named a car. I asked my father why ships were referred to sometimes as she in his time, in the 50s.
something something Royal Navy?

now I have seen people, when they pulled into the garage I worked at, refer to their vehicle as 0le Betsy, this tends to be with older people. People tend to use more adjectives when pulling into the garage.
yeah, it's like: the buick, take the chevy, we're going in the Monte. do not party in the Winnebago.
posted by clavdivs at 3:31 PM on February 24 [2 favorites]

I named my new car Lucy, after my much beloved, long deceased cat. Because it is silver and small and as spunky as a Volvo can get these days.
posted by theBigRedKittyPurrs at 3:45 PM on February 24 [3 favorites]

ninazer0: Russell the blue tongued lizard ... so named because even if you can't see him, you can still hear the garden rustle. Although, he's so big and fat that I have a feeling he might be a pregnant she and so will probably have to be renamed (blue tongues are viviparous, btw). I am taking suggestions at this time.

Sussura? Pitter-Patty?
posted by Greg_Ace at 3:47 PM on February 24 [3 favorites]

So the car was "Minky."

Do you have a lisonce for yeur Minky?
posted by Greg_Ace at 3:48 PM on February 24 [5 favorites]

I name my plants. Oscar is a Hoya; Fern Brady (RIP) was a fern. (RIP to the fern Fern Brady, not the Scottish comedian Fern Brady, who I presume is alive and well.)
posted by Jeanne at 4:00 PM on February 24 [3 favorites]

I had a Suzuki Swift Sport - lovely, fun little car. Since gone to the great wreckers in the sky. It was called Fizzy Biscuit. I now have a BMW hatchback that's a lovely orange colour. It's Jaffa, naturally.

My dog is called Tofu. But more often or not he's called Bean, short for soy bean. Sometimes he's called dog bean. My children, of course, are referred to as child beans.
posted by tim_in_oz at 4:31 PM on February 24 [6 favorites]

My gorgeous custom-made belt-drive bicycle is named Jacaranda, because that's what color she is. (Yes, I gender my bike.) I paid quite a sum for her, but she's been worth every penny, the last eleven years. (And arguably has paid for herself and then some in car-ownership cost avoidance.)
posted by humbug at 4:38 PM on February 24 [2 favorites]

I had a black Kia Soul that in the winter got snow tires on steel rims. The snow tires made made quite a bit of road noise so we dubbed it “the rumble wagon”.

Last week we saw an immature bald eagle at the landfill. It looked like a clump of stuff in a tree, so we’ve named it Clumpbert. Now when we go to the dump I’m always on the lookout for Clumpbert.
posted by eekernohan at 4:41 PM on February 24 [3 favorites]

I didn't really name my car (a Nissan Leaf) but I guess I have. My buddy has a vinyl cutter and when I got my car he wanted to help me easily identify it with a sticker and the only thing I could think of that fit was "Electric Funeral"
Years ago I had a white Chevy Cavalier we had named White Shadow, because it never spent time white. I also have a Vespa named Magdalena, for no reason. Most of my other vehicles (bicycles, past cars) and objects didn't get names.
posted by evilDoug at 4:52 PM on February 24 [3 favorites]

I have a Chevy Spark. It's red and it's been a good car (like genuinely a good car -- I've only had to do basic maintenance beyond replacing the brakes. It's about 10 years old). I love my car and it was the first car I figured out how to buy as an adult (I was in my 30s but ... hey ...) and not just "well, I need a car now so let's just get what is the easiest."

I didn't really have a name for it but my partner at the time -- who is good at naming things -- decided it was called Viv. This was both for Viv Albertine and that Tom King's run on The Vision comic was happening around at that time and the daughter was called Viv (let's be clear that we are those very specific types of nerds). So she's Viv.

I did name my beautiful bicycle Louise for reasons that are too complicated to explain.

I don't really name things otherwise, other than stuffies. Mostly because if it has a face, it needs a name.
posted by edencosmic at 5:34 PM on February 24 [3 favorites]

"My dog is called Tofu. But more often or not he's called Bean, short for soy bean."

tim_in_oz, you say this and neglect to share a photo of Tofu/Bean. I demand to see this dog. (I have said elsewhere -- possibly even here -- that dogs should be named after classic country or pop stars or foods and cats should be named after rock stars or figures from literature so yes, Tofu is a perfect dog name.)
posted by edencosmic at 5:38 PM on February 24 [3 favorites]

All cars mine spouse and I have owned together have had names. Currently we have a used white Prius we bought with 200k miles on it, and it is formally titled The Space Shuttle Sally Ride, or informally Sally. It looks shuttley, it has travelled far, and we are fans of naming things after queer heroes!

When it comes to instruments, thought. . . my spouse is a musician. (I'm not going to call her MsMew, sorry; I don't get to name her, that's her prerogative, heh. As a MeFite she went by Transitional Procedures.) She's a multitalented multinstrumentalist, and also DJ, recording wiz and producer, so she's got a lot going on--but she is deeply attached to the electric bass she's had for thirty years. Long ago she named it Leo. And she wrote a love song to this bass, titled Leo's Daughter. So I guess you can call her that! Anyway, if you'd like to have a listen--all instruments, vox, and production hers--you'll find Leo's Daughter here.
posted by DrMew at 5:50 PM on February 24 [2 favorites]

We have a Buick named Opal because it's an Opel made in Germany and an older Bmw named Otto.
posted by djseafood at 6:26 PM on February 24 [5 favorites]

My land vehicles seem to tell me their names within minutes of their aquisition or not at all. So the bike I received on my 7th birthday was Cactus, but no bikes since have revealed their secret identities to me. About half of the cars have had names, including Harold Hill ('68 Fury), Sparky ('74 Toyota Corolla), 209 ('74 Mustang with a bad cylinder), Harvey ('79 Rabbit), Clarence ('06 Mini Cooper), Greta ('19 Honda Ridgeline), and Large Marge, a 14-passenger van I drove all over Europe during a vacation with extended family.

For some reason, my boats (like those belonging to Mr. Carmicha, who does not name his cars) have been named with more thoughtful consideration, like pets. I've had two boats: Moxie and my most recent acquisition, Mrs. Beasley. One of the first people I took out on the new boat was a childhood friend. Early in the outing, I reminisced about how her grandmother, not wanting to imply that the kids were spoiled, described them as "under-deprived." My family thought that was hilarious, and "under-deprived" became a family joke. To my surprise, my friend had never heard the story. Hours later, when she asked whether I had a name in mind for my boat, her grandmother's name, "Mrs. Beasley," came into my mind unbidden. My friend thought I was teasing her, but I knew it would stick, and it did.
posted by carmicha at 6:36 PM on February 24 [2 favorites]

I don’t play my guitar much, but I named it Carlos Ghosn after they smuggled him out of Japan in an instrument case
posted by alphanerd at 6:39 PM on February 24 [2 favorites]

I'm not sure when I started naming my cars. However, over the years I've driven around in Betsy Buick, Freddy Ford, Tilly Toyota, Jasmine Jetta and, currently, Henry Honda. But rest assured, my children's names are not alliterative.
posted by Scout405 at 6:40 PM on February 24 [4 favorites]

But rest assured, my children's names are not alliterative.

Do you want supervillains? Because that's how you get supervillains.
posted by notoriety public at 6:41 PM on February 24 [8 favorites]

We never named our cars until we got one of the newer ones that beeps at you all the time to warn you not to do stuff. We call her Pixie (derived from the letters that came on the license plate) and we treat her like a nervous backseat driver. We need to tell her it’s okay, we really weren’t going to back straight into traffic, promise. It’s very therapeutic.
posted by Knowyournuts at 6:55 PM on February 24 [2 favorites]

There was a staff meeting this morning. Our house is getting an animatronic cat. We have a budget of 80 dollars a month for cleaning supplies that never comes close to meeting the demand caused by the sheer volume of incontinence and we are getting a robot cat. It's supposed to act like a support animal without the eating and shitting. I suppose it will need a name.
posted by Mr. Yuck at 6:57 PM on February 24 [3 favorites]

“And, how many of you actually name your cats? Or do you just cycle thru a set of nicknames?”

Both. All of our cats have proper names and then we have lots of nicknames for them.

For example, our orange cat with CHP is Sir Wobbles. But we call him Sir, Sir Fluffs, Mr. Biscuits, Sugarfoot, and a few I’m forgetting right now. His sister, Cupcake, is Cuppy, Kitty Softpaws, Pink nose, and “tuptake” based on how our two-year-old niece pronounces Cupcake. My late, legendary, tuxedo cat Lilah Zuul McScratcherson was known primarily as Fancy Cat (by me) and as Murder Cat by the rest of the family. You get the picture, I’m sure.

Cat tax. Murder Cat tax.
posted by jzb at 7:01 PM on February 24 [8 favorites]

Have never named cars, nor my guitars.

signal, you are correct. That guitar is metal as foretold.

We have two Teslas, (we didn't know how it was going to turn out, sorry), and you pretty much have to name them for the app, which is required to get any service or do anything, what shit. Ms Windo's is "Blue Whale Friend" and mine is "Abdul Alhazred", and mine seems to have been a good choice in retrospect...

But have really never named objects. Which is interesting to think about the why nots? I love my guitar, but can't imagine naming it. Fun thread.
posted by Windopaene at 7:06 PM on February 24 [4 favorites]

Our neighbors have an outdoor cat that we refer to as "Murder Cat". Ms. Windo was walking the dogs one afternoon, and saw it shoot out of hiding and kill a bunny...
posted by Windopaene at 7:08 PM on February 24 [5 favorites]

Only one of the cats here got the many nicknames treatment. Spicy gets called Mr. Spice, Spicearoo, Spiceman, even Shagadelic Spicealicious.

The actual story behind his name: We weren't even here in the house a month before there was a mama cat who moved her 6-week-old kittens into our yard. We caught mama, and then in the process of scooping up all the kittens, one of them hissed at me. So ferocious! I said to him, "You are spicy!" as I popped him in the carrier. At the time, i didn't realize that I was both naming him, and falling in love.
posted by notoriety public at 7:17 PM on February 24 [8 favorites]

I would be tempted to name a trans am, Titus.
posted by clavdivs at 7:19 PM on February 24 [4 favorites]

edencosmic: tim_in_oz, you say this and neglect to share a photo of Tofu/Bean. I demand to see this dog.

Who am I to defy the will of the people? Here's Tofu enjoying an espresso with me. And, as luck would have it, Tofu in Jaffa.
posted by tim_in_oz at 7:42 PM on February 24 [5 favorites]

mr supermedusa has firmly refused to consider naming the car (he's no fun!) 2007 Fit
I stood up and said if I had a Fit, it would be called Tantrum. (Couldn't help it, it just came outta my mouth.)

Mygothlaundry, I think every big ol' truck of a certain color is called Moby. Moby Richard was the name of my first one. Didn't stick, though, with my second one. This one is just White. It's big, but not so much whalish. It was more of a Great White, but my friend had already co-opted that name.

...my wifi network is the Chipmunk People's Republic.
Moonbird, that is perfect!

My husband has tamed these blasted feral cats that are supposed to be staying outdoors catching vermin. I guess they were so food hungry before he found them that they continually bolt their feed and overeat. With predictable results. He calls them by various nicknames, and I can't remember who is who. Right now the only way he knows who I'm referring to is that I call the first one, 'That Damn Puking Cat' the second one, 'NO, The Other Damn Puking Cat' and the third one, 'That Damn Cat Just Brought Another In Here!' We're going to have to agree on monikers for the buggers before these swears stick hard and fast, although I will continue to address all three collectively as 'GERONOUTTAHEREANDGOTOWORK!' while holding the door.

drewbage1847, I'm sorry to hear about Osiris. When you have a special buddy, it's hard. Hope there are plenty of headbutts and scritches in the time left.
posted by BlueHorse at 7:44 PM on February 24 [8 favorites]

My spouse and I named ChatGPT -- "Eleanor". This came about after Spouse referred to it as "he", and I thought we shouldn't default to the masculine.
posted by NotLost at 7:48 PM on February 24 [2 favorites]

Does Murderbot have a gender in your head?
posted by Windopaene at 7:58 PM on February 24 [4 favorites]

I have owned at least 50 cars and 10 motorcycles over the years and have never actively named any of them, really.

That said, my early 1960s MG is "Reg", the name the previous owner referred to the car by, without fail, and it seemed churlish to not continue the tradition. Reg is a good car and I cannot think of a time in the 25 years I've been caretaker it has "failed to proceed".

I guess my mid-50s Morgan project has a nickname, "Fairchild"...I suspect you can see how that was arrived at. That same nickname leads to it also being called "My Wife", not from any attraction, obligation or reference to an actual human but from Jon Lovitz's Pathological Liar character referencing Morgan Fairchild as same. (God am I old.)

The everyday car is a 23-year-old Land Rover which just gets called the "silly car" as it makes no sense as something to rely upon (or buy fuel for, the gas mileage is close to single digit). It is also the "puppy's car" since the back has plenty of room and a "dog guard" to keep Mr. Dog confined to the back (he's a loony sometimes in the car, going bonkers if there is one of his hated bicyclists in sight).

The giant old 250,000-mile Ford landscaping truck probably deserves a moniker, but it's just "truck". The 50+ year-old Jag sedan also has no name, nor do any of the current crop of four motorcycles. (My newest vehicle of any description is a 2006 Triumph motorcycle which I still think of as "new", even though I bought it well used when it was close to ten years old.)

All that said, I never refer to the cars above which have names by those names to other people.
posted by maxwelton at 8:05 PM on February 24 [4 favorites]

I'm reading this thread on the third floor of a 3 storey building on a phone not connected to a charger, and all kinds of words were selecting themselves and then Google was searching them without consent from me and I couldn't make it stop.

Then there was a big crash of thunder not really all that close and everything went back to normal.
posted by jamjam at 8:13 PM on February 24 [6 favorites]

go on
posted by ginger.beef at 8:22 PM on February 24 [3 favorites]

Maybe he can't...
posted by Mr. Yuck at 8:26 PM on February 24 [4 favorites]

Epiphone Hummingbird is Cersei (she can be capricious). The HSS Strat is Eowyn, ready to bring down the Witch King. And the Les Paul Studio is Galadriel. When those humbuckers sense any bit of grit in the gain it's "beautiful and terrible as the Dawn! Treacherous as the Seas! Stronger than the foundations of the Earth!"
posted by Ber at 8:29 PM on February 24 [3 favorites]

Does Murderbot have a gender in your head?

I've read the series twice and still don't have a strong feeling about that. Love the stories though (well, the seventh one felt a bit rushed compared to the first six).
posted by Greg_Ace at 8:53 PM on February 24 [2 favorites]

I just think it's surprising that the electric field generated by a fairly mild lightning storm in a room on the top floor of a 3 storey building turned out to be strong enough to activate the touchscreen of a cell phone — a phone which is in an electrically insulating case which prevents my skin from coming in contact with the body of the phone, by the way.
posted by jamjam at 9:32 PM on February 24 [3 favorites]

My dark grey/black car is Raven.

My current older cats are tuxedo sisters, named Janelle Monae and Josephine Baker, for women who looked good in tuxedos. My new 8 mo old kitten is Woody Guthrie (and yes he kills fascists). I've previously named cats after philosophers (Soren Kierkegaard) and baseball players (Yorvit).
posted by gingerbeer at 9:36 PM on February 24 [8 favorites]

My robot vacuums are named Issac and Jarvis.
The cancerous tumor in my colon I had removed last month was named Mitch. Fuck Mitch.
posted by msali at 9:45 PM on February 24 [10 favorites]

I guess I'll start calling my car Target, because things have banged into it few times the last 6 months, costing light assemblies. I swear that telephone pole slid right in to me in the blinding snow. and the mailbox def. gave the car a come-hither glance.

The dog is Muffin, because she is as smart and cute as a muffin. Sometimes she's my lovemuffin, sometimes she's the beast of annoyance. and I like muffins.

I have had an exercise hangover since Saturday because I danced Friday evening. But I did rouse myself to make a big pot of bean and vegetable curry. It's not inspired, but tastes fine and is nutritious and used ingredient I already had. also, I cleaned a lot of snow off the wood pile yesterday and can have fires in the wood stove, so maybe it's a new exercise hangover. In any case, my ability to accomplish much of anything has sucked.

I am having a birthday ending in 0 soon. I plan to bring cake to the dance group, and will ask the Activistas (Excellent women I worked on a campaign with and we keep meeting to do political work in our town) to have a special coffee meeting at the bakery we like. And probably have a nice dinner with the son. This plan sparks joy.
posted by theora55 at 9:59 PM on February 24 [7 favorites]

I am a notorious unintentional killer of plants. But I got a beautiful Prayer Plant (Maranta leuconeura) last year, and still going strong, 3 months on!

I named him Charlie Brown, because when it gets a little chilly, he droops real hard.

When I first got him, I tried to cheer him on, like "aw c'mon, Charlie Brown! Stick around!" and sometimes just "Char-ley!" with a British accent. Now I just think it, it's understood.
posted by ishmael at 10:03 PM on February 24 [3 favorites]

My partner and I have owned ten or so cars. I don't (as a rule) name them (though my wife has occasionally named her cars).

I was an early adopter of the Mazda Miata. Some family members disapproved of it on safety grounds - so the Miata is occasionally referred to as (....if not quite formally named...) "The Red Menace".
posted by AsYouKnow Bob at 12:16 AM on February 25 [3 favorites]

After a few "False Spring" days, it finally feels that Winter has been pushed away and we are into some form of Spring. Which is good, as the relentlessly cold days and nights, and sometimes week after week of a solid grey sky, were not great for anyone.

Hence, photo opportunities have been low over the last few months, but looking at the forecast - the uninhibited sun symbol is predominates - that may now change. I know I should moan about the cold too much, as if/when we get hit by another record summer heatwave, those will be the days we'll pine for. But, still.

I'm starting a course on biodiversity loss in exactly 8 weeks time; later in the year, depending on what combination of courses I choose, there will be one or perhaps two more in the wider and overlapping fields of biodiversity, climate change and sustainable development. This has surprised a few former colleagues in the fields of academic game studies, and information science, but a change has been working its way through my mind for a few years now.

That course also looks pretty intense, with a lot of preparation (first, read two books in entirety) before lecture #1, so that's me cutting down on the online distractions a lot. Wishing everyone brighter days, both metaphorically and literally.
posted by Wordshore at 1:56 AM on February 25 [5 favorites]

I don't name things. I would totally name a car if I ever owned one. Have never for example named my guitars although I have had many and still have a couple. Still think guitars with names are pretty cool.

Up here in 65˚N Finland the days have gotten longer again. We've not had very much snow the whole winter, recently a cool/thaw-cycle that leaves everything looking sad and dirty and very icy everywhere that's not the most used roads & walkways. That's just recently though, in general it has been very pretty sunny with nice clouds with very mild around -10˚c sub-zero temperatures, which is the good way to have it around here. When it gets very icy I tend not to walk as much, which leads to aching.

That might change because I got a call and a text to call back from a client, this vinyl print shop about an hour walk/transit/walk away, with whom I've worked with regularly over the past I think four years now, helping when they are busy or short-staffed due to vacation time or whatever. Good news is I decided to update my hourly billing rate just before this, and while they tried to offer me less, I didn't budge and now will be billing a couple of euros more per hour. The job is graphic design and working the printers/materials before the printed materials go to the people who process it and onwards to the people who install it (like car vinyl wrap or display window or an office).

So a good day so far: I've given myself a raise and made plans with the client to go there tomorrow, sent them the contract for rest of this week and my friend is coming over with weed and groceries so I don't have to go outside today (re: icy).
posted by fridgebuzz at 2:34 AM on February 25 [8 favorites]

While in college I acquired a 1967 Cadillac Eldorado. It was a beast, with a huge 8-cylinder engine sitting on top of its front-wheel drive. I called it Chariot because driving it, one felt like Ben Hur being hauled along by horses.

The car was cheap due to missing teeth on the flywheel. Before starting it I would request a prayer from all passengers, and if the prayers failed the starter drive would have nothing to grab. I would then have to get under the enormous hood with a very large and heavy wrench to manually turn the engine over. It took some finesse. More than once I’d have to do this while a date stood by watching.

After a few bad starts, my friends renamed the car Roulette which was a better fit.
posted by kinnakeet at 4:30 AM on February 25 [6 favorites]

I have a Golf. Her name is Brunhilda. My previous car, also German, was named Dieter. Cars with a stick shift are male; automatics are female.
posted by arancidamoeba at 4:36 AM on February 25 [2 favorites]

The only car I have ever named was the '72 Eldorado convertible I got custom license plates for. "Eldosaur" got about 6 miles per gallon and I was glad to be rid of it.

More recently, I talked to my last vehicle for a week before taking it to the wrecking yard. It was very good to me, and it's identical replacement now "wears it's brothers winter boots".
posted by CynicalKnight at 4:50 AM on February 25 [3 favorites]

We do randomly name some things, and there's no rhyme or reason for what gets named and what doesn't. We have two dutch ovens, both blue, one dark, one light, one Staub and one Le Creuset, named Big Coquette and Little Coquette, but the big enameled cast iron pan we use almost every dang day (also blue!) goes unnamed, poor thing. We have a mortar and pestle we call Marble For The Home, because it's marble and came in a box that said "Marble For The Home." We've never called it anything else. My husband has fixed Marble For The Home's grindy bit three times now, when it's fallen on the floor and broken in half. MFTH still does the job, though! There are other things, but I'd have to wander about and cast my eyes upon things and remember that we call it something goofy. I feel like we named a cutting board once.
posted by taz at 5:34 AM on February 25 [4 favorites]

A cautionary note for the security conscious that this topic is ripe for password gleaning . . .
posted by aspersioncast at 5:50 AM on February 25 [5 favorites]

We’ve been gradually replacing appliances, and settled on the LG brand for many of them. The accompanying app lets you rename the machines. So for a while, we had Mr. Dishwasher, Mr. Dryer, etc.

My wife one day renamed all of them. Dishwasher (they/them), because as she said, how do we know what the dishwasher identifies as? I mean, I was going for Spaceballs “Mr. Radar” but she vetoed that.

We later added a stove and a refrigerator. Stove is just “stove” … but she did realize a few weeks ago that the fridge was named “William ‘Refrigerator’ Perry”. She did not rename The Fridge, because her mother has been a long time Bears fan so she is OK with the joke.
posted by caution live frogs at 6:10 AM on February 25 [4 favorites]

The number of German cars with German names and English-speaking owners makes me wonder if Germans name their Fords and Chryslers things like "Chris" or "Mark" or "Larry".
posted by AzraelBrown at 6:20 AM on February 25 [2 favorites]

Always named my cars according to their plates - either as a homonym or abbrev.

Current one has JTG as letters, which in Swedish turned into JätteGulliT. (Large cute)
posted by monocultured at 6:26 AM on February 25 [3 favorites]

I have an old Plymouth Duster named Wendy after Springsteen's Born to Run.

My sailboats are Pretty Lady, named by the Boy Scout camp I bought it from which is a fine name and I'm keeping it, and Lady Slipper after the Minnesota state flower and because she slips through the water.

I worked at a very large corporate campus years ago and when we moved to a new building instead of the old boring numbers they named the many conference rooms after lakes in Minnesota. That's great except they weren't arranged alphabetically, geographically, by size, or any other way people could ever figure out. Nobody ever knew where a room was unless it was one of the big ones right by the entrance. Numbers would have been better than constantly hearing "Do you know where Lake Waconia conference room is?"
posted by Clinging to the Wreckage at 6:30 AM on February 25 [4 favorites]

I didn't grow up with named cars, and didn't encounter one until a college girlfriend introduced me to Donovan.
posted by emelenjr at 7:47 AM on February 25 [2 favorites]

This game by MeFi's Own malevolent is named Styscraper, but I call it fun!
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 8:36 AM on February 25 [3 favorites]

Also, my car is named Viola, because of its color and after actor Viola Davis, who is always fantastic!
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 8:37 AM on February 25 [5 favorites]

I've always named my cars and I usually name my guitars. The cars have been Skorcho (1997 Altima), Sterling (2001 Camry), and Prometheus (2012 RAV4). My wife's 2005 Corolla is Serendipity.

The guitars are Opaline, Punkinstein, and... shoot, I forgot the name of my Tele.
posted by grubi at 8:51 AM on February 25 [2 favorites]

Learning the letter E in kindergarten, our class listed the name Emma, and I told my teacher that was the name of our car. She laughed and I realized that not everyone does name their cars. I've never named my cars as an adult but one of my friends called my Stratus the Dodge Fucker for some reason. Now I drive my car past the dealership where we got her, so I pat her steering wheel and say, "That's where we got you!"

All cats are named and then called 57 different nicknames. I started naming my ipod/iphone/ipads so I knew which one they were in itunes and icloud. Usually just SoeloiPhone13 or something like that. Same with Windows machines, just HP10 or Dell11 for easy id on a network.
posted by soelo at 9:18 AM on February 25 [3 favorites]

"Do you know where Lake Waconia conference room is?"
We've got state park names on our rooms, so one of them is Mystery Cave. It is one of the brightest rooms due to the south facing windows. Meanwhile we have several others without windows at all.
posted by soelo at 9:20 AM on February 25 [5 favorites]

We don't "name" much, though some adjectives or epithets might get regularly attached. Of our 3 consecutive cats, we named two. The first, a big red and white tom, we named Eric, after Eric the Red, and also a Monty Python reference. The second, a pretty little calico, we named Penelope (Penny), because the shelter had reported her name as "Tegra", and no cat should be required to answer to that. Our current cat, a feisty tabby, was called Bonny by the shelter. We've kept that name, though we did change the spelling to Bonnie, and there was no pushback.

We have a little sailboat (19 ft) that I named "Lake-Effect"... though if I had a do-over, I would name her "Bobbin", cos that's what we do most outings, when there's little or no breeze.

Not much of note to celebrate right now. I'm finally over 3 weeks of a cold or whatever, I'm pretty sick of plowing snow at our boat club (though playing with the tractor is still a little bit fun). Family still a slow-rolling crisis. North America is a faster-rolling crisis.

I'm almost having to force myself to consider doing fun stuff, and not succeeding much, to Mrs C's disappointment. She so deserves a vacation. Spring is always good for a lift, and I can get the bikes out again. I'll look forward to that.
posted by Artful Codger at 9:38 AM on February 25 [3 favorites]

One office I worked in here in Portland had conference rooms named after the bridges spanning the river that runs through the city. As with the lake-named rooms mentioned above, it was mostly just confusing.
posted by Greg_Ace at 9:41 AM on February 25 [1 favorite]

Does Murderbot have a gender in your head?

Nope.
posted by cooker girl at 9:47 AM on February 25 [3 favorites]

Murderbot does not have a gender in my head, but also, absolutely does not present as Alexander Skarsgård. FFS. I'll watch it anyway but this choice makes me mad.
posted by seanmpuckett at 10:38 AM on February 25 [10 favorites]

I have never named things; my partner names cars, but then doesn't really use the names. It's never "I'm taking Big Red to the game tonight" just "I'm taking the car." When I had a car I sort of idly tried to name it but nothing ever made sense.

Also in my time on this earth I have had so many good names for pets but have been fully 95% outvoted on them. One day we will have two pitties named Beavis and Butthead, I swear to fucking god
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 10:54 AM on February 25 [3 favorites]

I am now fondly remembering my brother's college-era cars, though: Tom Celica and Vanny DeVito.
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 11:13 AM on February 25 [6 favorites]

During the Covid "Safer at Home" lockdown, my partner, kid, and I had another mom and kid stay with us for companionship/moral support. Both kids were in kindergarten. After yet another day of coming up with things to entertain the two, we had them go around and name all our plants. The two girls made individual name signs out of small cardstock scraps, toothpicks, and tape. They divided up the work and each plant got its own sign with charming kindergarten-level handwriting. We had about 20 plants then. The plant names included Mr. Ficus, Big Poke (a cactus), Tiny Poke (an aloe), T. Rex, Water Leaf, Rock Around, & Foxy. We still have most of the original 20 plants and 5 still have the signs (the other signs deteriorated due to watering or were lost when the cats dug in the plants).
posted by catdapperling at 11:17 AM on February 25 [6 favorites]

The name of the current iteration of my beloved bicycle is Serenity.

Which is a name I have wanted to use for a bike before, but I didn't want to have to explain that, no, it has nothing to do with Whedon's Firefly but enough time has passed now that it's less likely that people immediately think the name is about Firefly.

Which I get why people would think that, because my bike is kind of a do-it-all workhorse of a craft, but no.

My last bike was named Joy, and I'm glad I reserved the name Serenity for my current bike because it's a much nicer steel bike that's more chill and plush to ride. Joy was aluminum and a lot of fun to ride, but also not as chill in the quality of the ride.
posted by loquacious at 11:30 AM on February 25 [3 favorites]

I was just sharing with a co-worker a great cat name idea I've had but not used: Gateau.

and you could call them Babycakes as a nickname. (feel free to run with this future cat parents!)
posted by supermedusa at 1:19 PM on February 25 [4 favorites]

I would go with Cateau, but, a bit literal.
posted by Windopaene at 1:38 PM on February 25 [3 favorites]

Gateau == Gato the Spanish word for cat
posted by supermedusa at 2:03 PM on February 25 [4 favorites]

Sure, sure, fine. I know the word, even though I speak a bit of French, not Spanish.

It is clever as foretold.
posted by Windopaene at 2:39 PM on February 25 [4 favorites]

But mostly cute!!!
posted by supermedusa at 2:55 PM on February 25 [3 favorites]

Aw man, we're safe from the asteroid now.
posted by jenfullmoon at 3:05 PM on February 25 [4 favorites]

And I named a robot vacuum cleaner Broom Hilda.
posted by carmicha at 3:28 PM on February 25 [5 favorites]

We only named one car when I was a kid - a Volare we had when I was about ten. Volares were not good cars and usually had lots of problems; ours started making a rattling noise whenever it turned a corner. And thus my father called it "The Flying Typewriter".

Then came the day when Mom was driving me and my brother home in The Flying Typewriter and it started spontaneously making its own left turns into the next lane. Mom managed to get us home safe and told my father that cute name or no, we had to get rid of it.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 3:58 PM on February 25 [2 favorites]

"There's mean hands all over the world. I don't want mine to be mean." Overheard phone conversation.
posted by Mr. Yuck at 4:44 PM on February 25 [3 favorites]

never thought I was gonna aggressively gender a baby but taquito child has a rotating set of nicknames all ending in -man pronounced with a falling intonation like in Peterman, for some reason

Smallman, Littleman, Tinyman, Littleman Smallman, Tiny Q Babyman, Tiny Q Smallman Attorney at Law, Smally McBabus, Maximum Baby Littleguy

taquito husband called him Manman the other day which strikes me as peak whatever this is

used to think Charles Dickens was an asshole for winding up with kids nicknamed Plorn & Chickenstalker & honestly I still do but now I kinda get how it happened
posted by taquito sunrise at 4:57 PM on February 25 [7 favorites]

Foster cat Burt has an applicant already! I will be bringing him to the shelter for a meet and greet with them Sunday morning. If it's a match, he could go home with his new family that day!
posted by notoriety public at 5:08 PM on February 25 [9 favorites]

Back in the 80s, one of our good friends ended up moving into the triplex next to ours; he had an old beat-up diesel VW Golf, which he had nicknamed "Ferrous", as in Ferrous Oxide, due to all the rust (it was magically held together with gun tape and bailing wire). He had even made a small custom sticker/nametag for it, that was the chemical composition of rust.

My most recent vehicle was named "Valkyrie, the Volvo" - a silver V70 wagon.
posted by Jade Dragon at 5:33 PM on February 25 [2 favorites]

I think pics of Burt are called for
posted by supermedusa at 7:46 PM on February 25 [3 favorites]

I think pics of Burt are called for

Pics are available on his adoption link, as well as a short video clip of him playing. He was rescued off the streets just a couple of weeks ago, back when it was super cold in Chicago. In addition to being handsome and charming, he's pretty lucky too!
posted by notoriety public at 8:12 PM on February 25 [6 favorites]

❤️❤️❤️
posted by supermedusa at 8:37 PM on February 25

Burtman is a handsome cat!

Hope he finds his new home.
posted by Windopaene at 8:54 PM on February 25

I name lots of stuff. This year's cat is Sir Impey Biggs. He is a hyperintelligent hatcher of schemes to annoy me. He also bites, and is frequently addressed as You Little Shit. After decades of laid back sweet elderly cats, I'm stuck with this rambunctious predator.

My car is a white Honda Fit which I didn't wash for many years. While it was dirty, I called it Festooned With Wisteria. I washed it a couple months ago and now it's name is Inverted Skunk. It's very white except for a dirty black stripe in the middle of the roof where I couldn't reach to scrub.

My house is named Invasive Acres in honour of the wisteria, bamboo, morning glories, trumpet vines, etc which infest my grassless yard. I also call this kind of yard Zeroscape due to its wild, unlandcaped nature. It takes a lot of work to keep it looking so rough. Bees and birds and squirrels and bunnies love it though.

My black acoustic guitar is named THE BLOODLETTER. After a 40 year hiatus, I took up trying to play and much blood has been shed. The same fingertips that hold down the strings are also pincushioned with tracks from daily diabetes sticks. Playing with bloody fingers makes me feel METAL!
posted by a humble nudibranch at 9:35 PM on February 25 [5 favorites]

I've never named our piece of junk Honda Odyssey, but since it's fairly common, I do point out the exact copies to my kids 'sister car!' and if they are a older model, they are 'cousin cars'. I started doing it when my kids were small - they are teens now but still do it. My wife has actually gotten into other people's cars twice since we had it, usually because she is phoning and not paying any attention.

Other than that, i don't name things.
posted by The_Vegetables at 9:55 AM on February 26 [1 favorite]

RIP, Michelle Trachtenberg of Buffy, The Adventures of Pete & Pete, Harriet the Spy, Gossip Girl. Possibly due to complications from a liver transplant.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 10:01 AM on February 26

I had a boyfriend who named some of his tools. His Makita sander was called Stan, after Stan Makita, the old school Canadian hockey player. His Rockwell saw, was called Norman, of course. There were others, but they don’t spring to mind.
My first car was a POS Plymouth Valiant. - I named it Prince (after an old comic strip, Prince Valiant)
Our cats have “official names” and what the get called most of the time. Juan is Big Baby, because he’s huge (17 lbs and at least 18” long), Winston is Little Man, because he’s so much smaller than his brother Juan (he’s just a normal sized 10-11 lbs kitty); sometimes he’s also called R2, because he looks and occasionally acts like a previous cat we had - Rodeo.
I am also fond of using acronyms for things that wouldn’t normally get one. Example is the 3,000 gallon above ground cistern, which I call the BGT (Big Green Tank/Thing). A former red truck was the BRT (Big Red Truck).
posted by dbmcd at 10:13 AM on February 26 [1 favorite]

. 39 is far, far too young.

And I’m very disappointed in that asteroid.
posted by theBigRedKittyPurrs at 10:45 AM on February 26 [3 favorites]

. so sad
posted by mumimor at 10:49 AM on February 26

I used to have a car named Otto….get it?

We call a fire in the fireplace a Mitchell because of an outdoor survivor type reality show we watched years ago where a woman was yelling at her partner Mitchell to make a fire. So, we say “Make a Mitchell!” in a loud demanding voice.

This is what we say around the house:
I have to pound in a nail, where’s the MC Hammer?
Someone close the Jane Curtains, it’s dark outside.
Don’t run with the Edward Scissorhands.
Do we have any Detlef Schrempf for the seafood gumbo?
Today I’m going to water the Robert Plants.

There are many more, but it’s hard to remember them. They just pop up as needed.
posted by veneer at 6:00 PM on February 26 [3 favorites]

AP News: Amazon’s new AI-powered Alexa promises to be your ‘best friend in a digital world’

That's uncomfortably close to "Your Plastic Pal Who's Fun To Be With"...
posted by Greg_Ace at 9:45 AM on February 27 [2 favorites]

My devices tend to pick up the names of Steven Universe characters. My main laptop is PEARL, my phone is AMETHYST and tablet is PERIDOT.
posted by JHarris at 3:21 PM on February 27

I said I didn't name anything but I just remembered my lawnmower does have a name because I had to use it chomp up leaves in the freakin' winter. That's supposed to be one of the advantages of winter - no lawn mowing.

It's name is Yo Diggity - from the Blackstreet song "No Diggity", because it has a bagging attachment so it "bags it up". The video has marionette puppets. It's weirder than I remember.
posted by The_Vegetables at 3:24 PM on February 27

Under the category “fucking infuriating” spouse received a mailing from Sirius XM congratulating him on his recent vehicle purchase (including the make and model), reminding him that he had a free subscription until Y date and the cost to continue the subscription.

I purchased the car. His credit was never used. His name is not on the loan or the title. He did not make the initial deposit (card is in my name only) and he certainly did not write and sign the huge ass check for the down payment.

This is not the first time that I have been primary signatory on something only to somehow find myself relegated to secondary, but this one has gotten under my skin.

The irony is that I was toying with trying out the subscription. Never happening now.
posted by theBigRedKittyPurrs at 4:53 AM on February 28 [2 favorites]

Okay: who do I have to blow to get a job?
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 5:50 AM on February 28 [2 favorites]

I'm sorry it's taking so long Empress.

I one-starred my Uber driver this morning and wrote a complaint because he passed a stopped school bus. He came to the church where I stay just a few minutes ago and yelled at me. He lost his job. He was screaming and he shoved me hard twice so I kicked him. Out cold. The guys here were flabbergasted. He landed head first on the cement so I called 911. The cops got here first. I'm not in any trouble. I hope the guy is ok.
posted by Mr. Yuck at 10:00 AM on February 28 [2 favorites]

Never. When I did own a car (I quit driving 14 years ago), I saw it as a strictly utilitarian object and never thought of it as having a personaility. I never name objects. They're just things. They have no personality.
posted by mike3k at 5:26 PM on March 3

Goodness Mr. Yuck, I guess the lesson is 'don't mess with the guy who has a yard bear'.

I mean, Conor MacGregor tried it and look what Nurmagomedov did to him; now it's the Uber driver and you.
posted by jamjam at 9:06 PM on March 3 [1 favorite]

(Still) in Worcestershire. I have purchased a loaf of bread.
posted by Wordshore at 3:41 AM on March 7 [1 favorite]