“Veggie-Something?!”

A while ago, our amazing Shaz asked What’s in a name? An identity, a thought, the online world’s first idea of who we are? Well, I remember my first online name.

On the first Xbox (the one the size of Scotland), I set up broadband for the house. All ready to embrace the online revolution that was Xbox Live, I spent an hour or two that afternoon coming up with possible cool-sounding names for my Xbox handle and that night, set out to make one of them my own.

My first choice was taken. “That’s okay,” I thought, “it’s to be expected.”

And my second. And my third, fourth… fifteenth. Not to be discouraged, my Xbox Live service was kindly offering suggestions, such as; “How about adding a random 16-bit alphanumeric after that?”, or “Have you considered adding ‘teh kill3r’ to the end of that?”, and the equally helpful  “How about choosing something that’s nowhere near as cool instead? Norman maybe, or Bert? Only with a random 16-bit alphanumeric after them cos they’re taken, obviously.”

All suggestions delivered with the kind of cheery enthusiasm really only found in machines, cartoon characters based on lines of soft-toys, and occasionally newlyweds. I had worked my way through the entire list, and I was no nearer my goal than when I started. My Halo 2 disc sat there, glinting in a mocking way (this is a fact; I in no way imagined it!). It was at this point, ridiculously keen as I was to get pwned by legions of American 8-year olds, that I made my fateful error.

I pressed the Random button!

“Nope!”, “That’s rubbish!”, “Bleurgh!” I thought, as I dismissed out of hand the first 50 or so useless suggestions. Until, in my desperation, my eye settled on “Vagabond”.

Kinda conjures up images of a traveller, a rogue, a man who lives on his wits, I thought. “Well… I’ll change it later”, I said to myself.

I make no excuses. I wholly admit that the mistake was mine. I accept all guilt and responsibility. Because quite apart from it being a bit rubbish, I had simply given no thought to how it would be received by the legions of oh-so-special Halo 2 players that have helped make the internet the place it is. Simply put… three syllables is too many.

“What’s that? Veggie-something? I think he like vegetables or something man, I don’t know.”

They even thought my green Marathon icon was meant to be brocolli! If they were being ironic, I wouldn’t have minded… but when one kid slowly sounded out the syllables like he was reading in front of the class for the first time, I knew it was time for a change.

“Vadge… A… Bond?!” he proudly pronounced. “What’s Vadge-a-bond? Is that a girl thing? Have we got a chick in the room?!”

Friend Requests rained from the heavens. There were three requests that I send photos of myself. One persistant little bugger wanted to know if I was married! I have never been as popular since. Yet, call me weird… despite this; I still set my heart on changing my name ASAP. To something short, one syllable preferably, so no-one could ever get confused over it… say… Skill.