Spelling names

[Laurence Horn]

At 2:28 PM -0400 9/26/00, Sallie Lemons wrote:
>I am reminded of a joke threaded through an old Cukor film, Holiday,
>which starred Katharine Hepburn and Gary Grant. Grant's pals in the
>film are a married couple name Potter. Everyone calls them Porter.
>The first time it happens, the man responds to his wife, "I thought
>our name was Potter. I must have been mistaken." Another time he
>suggests, "Maybe if we change our name to Porter, people will call
>us Potter." Well...it's funny stuff to me. Given the common usage of
>my last name, it has always seem ludicrous that I should have to
>spell it. But I, like Ron, have adopted something I heard my dad
>say, "Lemons, like the fruit."  :-)))


and, if I can pardoned the rhyme, what I often use is "Horn as in
toot", to forestall the "Horne" spelling that many take to be the
default for some reason I've never understood.

larry

>RonButters at AOL.COM wrote:
>
>>people often think my last name is BUTLER; my great-grandfather began the
>>practice of telling people that he was "Butter with an 's' on the end"; I
>>still use that from time to time.
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