Chapter 40: What's in a name, anyway?

a co-worker of mine, mike barry, doesn’t know my name. or he thinks it’s “sharice,” which isn’t really close to “sherene.”

i was seriously upset about this for a few days. after all, if people have no idea what my name is, how will i get anywhere in life? i figured i was especially in trouble if co-workers don’t know my name. granted, i should add that the only time he ever addresses me is in the morning to say “good morning, sharice” because we don’t speak to each other otherwise. he does his thing, i do mine. (and don’t worry, i’m using his full name because 1. do you know how many mike barry’s there are in this world? the sheer number would render it impossible for him to find this. 2. he doesn’t know my name and therefore can’t find my blog and 3. it’s just funny to me)

in my quest to remedy this problem, i asked some people for advice and this is what ensued:

you should somehow find a way to let mike see your name written on paper. for example, pretend that you want him to sign a petition about something (for example, an "end the violence in zimbabwe" petition. there are a lot of those floating around nowadays). then, be like "see, i already signed my name RIGHT HERE." show him your name so that he can see how it's spelled. that way, he'll feel like an idiot for calling you the wrong name! if that doesn't work, legally change your name so that future encounters are not awkward.
so here's how you tell mike what your name is: start talking to him about something fun that happened to you (feel free to use a real-life event or use your imagination). then say: "and then he said, 'SHERENE, you're bleeding!'" or something like that. say something that requires you to say your name.

you should have a loud conversation around him and be like "wow, i really hate when people cant pronounce my name right? how hard is it to say SHERENE" (yell this last part). It’ll work like a charm. or wear lots of clothing/name tags that say SHERENE in big letters. its like that commercial where the boss says the wrong name of the guy hes talking to even though hes in this guys cube which has his actual name on like everything.

right. i ended up never trying this techniques because lo and behold, it turns out that everyone in the office hates mike barry. even his own boss. so i really don’t care anymore.