Nomenclature

[naamah_darling]

I was going to do a 12 Days of Fishmas, and post a fun picture of one of the cats or my friends or me every day until Christmas, but like the giant tosky floop I am, I forgot about it yesterday in the midst of assorted other chaos. So I offer you the first picture today

Comments

[gothicbeauty21]

I understand your issues with addressing cards; like so many of my friends, I shacked up with a guy I was dating, and we still live together almost 5 years later, although the romance broke up 2 years ago. I know of about 4 couple-friends that are unmarried and living together; I just think in my head how I refer to them. "Jimmy and Ginger, okay I'm putting Jimmy first", "Jessica and Dave, okay Dave goes first", etc. It may not be proper ettiquitte, but hey, anyone that knows me knows I'm no lady.

To me, Christmas cards are about fun and sharing warm feelings, therefore I try to make it as relaxed and groovy a process as possible. I too am constantly coming across names of people who are no longer in my life, for a number of reasons, and yet I can't quite bring myself to remove them from my address book. And I refuse to buy a new address book, simply because I'm totally in love with my current one and won't replace it unless I can find another one just like it.

[naamah_darling]

That's more or less what I do. Whatever comes out first is what comes out first. I try to stay relaxed about it, but I'm perpetually aware of it in the background as this weird little thing I have to think about.

Imagine if you were dealing with multiple same-sex couples. You couldn't use the formal "Mr. and Mrs. Soandso" address or the friendly "the Soandso family." It would force you to either use both names in their entirety, which seems stilted, or use first names only. Funny!

That's one thing I haven't seen discussion about: I wonder what the rates of name change will be like once gay marriage is legal. What that will do to our formal styles of address? We'll HAVE to adapt, because what we have isn't going to work.

What a wonderful way to rub stubborn people's faces in equality! XD

[aiglet]

I'd honestly use "The Misters Hyphenated-LastNames," just to make them laugh, but that's just me.

I do use "Dr. & Dr. Musumeci" for the boy's parents, though. She gets snitty if referred to as Mrs. and it seems rude to give her the Dr. and not him.

[gothicbeauty21]

I don't even bother with the Mr. or Mrs. Like for "Jessica and Dave", I do both full names.

The whole gay marriage thing baffles me. I'm all for it -- anyone that wants to get married should be allowed. But yes, I can just imagine how funny it will be asking couples, "Who's the man?" I guess people would just drop the prefixes all together and just do "Jane and Janet Smith".

What! I get to be first!

[equani_tsula]

Golly! Fortunatly, I don't do the gift thing any more - because white kitty Pearl has a serious paper fetish and I hate to thing what the packages would come out looking like. Many the white hair would be part of the gift I'm afraid.

I hear ya on the name thing - we've had James referred to as Mr. Foovay if I gave my name first on something becuase OF COURSE our last name is the same - we get quite a laugh out of it. And in my case, I'd love to be offending his family - but they aren't smart enough to be offended. And really, they don't consider me a family member so much as a potential servant girl or, hopefully, just a phase he is going through. *cackle*

I know the holidays may well be a bit difficult for you this year and heres a whole pile of hugs in advance OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Blessedbe

Re: What! I get to be first!

[naamah_darling]

*grin*

Thanks.

We get cat hair in all our presents. Kind of a given. :/ But nobody seems to mind so much.

Sargon has yet to get "Mr. Gannon." Though on one really entertaining occasion someone called for "Mr. B," and when I offered to take a message, they asked after "Mrs. B."

"Nobody here by that name. I'm sorry."

"Then may I ask who I'm speaking to?"

"Mr. B's wife."

". . ." (Loooong silence.)

"I didn't change my name."

"OH!"

We had a good laugh, but I did make my point. I'm not the little Mrs. Not to anyone.

*grin*

[equani_tsula]

You go. I am "Mrs.Moore" to utility companies - otherwise they act totally stupid over giving me any information - or they won't even LET me PAY the stupid freaking bill. More things I don't miss about Tulsa - all the bills were in James' name and I pay all the bills...but I'm a nobody, just some broad with a different name who wants to pay the bill. He often had to call and explain to the utility who I was and have my name specifically added. Totally mucks up their system for the wife to not be Mrs. - so I gave up and when they say "well who are you?" I just say "his wife" and they go "Oh, well Mrs. -" *sigh* whatever

Re: *grin*

[naamah_darling]

Man, that shit would just STEAM me. Thankfully, nobody's yet given me any grief RE: the utilities.

What the hell is wrong with these people!?

[harmonybunny114]

When in doubt, write them alphabetically! Nice, safe, inoffensive, stolid alphabetized lists :)

[naamah_darling]

That had occurred to me. It'd also always put me first. Which feels a bit unfair, but hey, who's the one hand-addressing the frigging envelopes?

[tlatoani]

My wife shekkara and I both kept our last names too. I do get calls for "Mr. [Herlastname]", but she gets more stuff for "Mrs. [Mylastname]". I'm pretty polite about it. She's less so, because early on after we got married, she ran into some people who told her that they didn't know women were allowed to do that, and some people who just can't seem to get the message that she didn't take my last name. (I guess it would be more accurate to say that she's as polite as I am, but a hell of a lot more aggressive about getting it corrected because she sees the gendered assumption as offensive.) I've been known to answer calls for "Mr. [Herlastname]" with "I'm afraid he's dead; who are you trying to reach" because we live in what used to be her father's house and the calls have occasionally been for him (despite the fact that he's been gone for more than 20 years now

[blackfelicula]

It is relieving how many times I've gotten out of survey calls or political calls by refusing to answer to "Mrs. Davidson." It can be a pain in the butt when officials from my son's school call though.

At least with return addresses and cards from the both of us, hyphenation works. Sometimes people get thrown by it when I use our separate names in the context of each as an individual. The smart ones catch on pretty quickly.