Shawn From Barbados

For whatever reason, no matter how slowly I say my name, it gets butchered. I spell it out and it still gets butchered. I've spelled it out one letter at a time for people, and they read it back and it's still wrong.
My old editor's brother made a running joke of it. Every time the brother called the office to talk to my boss, he'd give some weird permutation of my name to the receptionist. It never failed to ring back to my desk.
The worst, though, was when I called an Arena League coach for a story on one of our local guys. I don't know if I mumbled when I left the message, or spoke too low since I was in the office, but he called back and asked for "Stoker" instead of "Bowker."
Even my wife has had problems with people butchering our name since she changed it.
Eventually, you just hope people are in the ballpark instead of looking like a A-hole by correcting everyone you meet.

 

A few bosses ago, my manager was named Bill Keeler. Our receptionist for a period of time (over a year!) thought his name was Phil Keller. No one ever corrected her. Without ever actually discussing it, all the employees somehow got in on the joke.

Several times over the course of the day, we would hear over the intercom "Phil Keller, you have a phone call on line one" or whatever. This girl would also stick her head in his office on a daily basis and consistently call him "Phil" throughout the conversation. And he would happily respond, usually with a shit-eating grin on his face. Sometimes there was snickering while this was happening, sometimes there was uproarious laughter by the evesdropping employees. It even got to the point where everyone would call him "Phil" in meetings if she happened to be in attendance.

Maybe at a certain point this chick figured it out and didn't say anything. I don't know. Seems impossible it went on for so long. But I am friends with Bill to this day, and I have him listed in my cell phone as "Phil Keller."

 

"It's not Hedy, it's Hedley"

 

I call all coaches coach. Never have to remember the names!

 

Friend of mine owns a restaurant/club where a lot of pro athletes hang out, sometimes they bring their wives, sometimes their girlfriends, etc.

He tells his staff 'Remember the wives names ONLY, pretend you never heard the other names, that way you can't ever make a mistake....better to call the girlfriend by the wrong name than screw up the wife's name.'

 

I've made the mistake a time or two of calling my wife "Lisa" even though her name is "Julie."

She usually ends up singing that damn song.

 

You need in the bag a good one syllable name to use in a pinch - generic but familiar sounding. Bo , Ace , Stud , Coach all work pretty good. The guy feels flattered that you called him some cool sounding name and does not realize that you do not know his name.

 

I used to cross paths with a friend of a friend who always called me "Big Daddy." Eventually I asked my friend "is he making a fat joke?" My friend said, "no, he calls everybody 'Big Daddy.'"