Monday, November 05, 2007

even steven

We have a new pet at the Craver household. My daughter Mary has asked us to provide foster care for her dog until they move next spring. I have agreed to it, but sometimes things don't turn out exactly like you expected, you know? We thought the dog's name was "Bunny." They were talking about renaming it. (Cue the music from Jaws.) .

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Our lives have been touched by dogs with names like Coco, Ben, and Muffin. This dog was being called "Bunny," but they were talking about renaming her. (Increase volume and tempo for scary music.)
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They took care of her shots and tags and whatnot. It's a sweet dog, really. This dog doesn't make a lot of noise. She's so timid, she respects the cat and dog we already own. On the first day, she bonded well with D2 and seems to be feeling comfortable and happy in our home. (Music crescendos for the attack...) .

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They named her "Jiko." (Scream!) .

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It's pronounced GEE-koh. She was named after an African restaurant in Disneyworld. So this means every time we call her, someone will say, "You named her Chico?" We will have to explain the whole thing over and over again. .

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Coincidentally, I told a coworker last week that it didn't matter what anyone thought, they could name their new cat whatever they liked. But having to keep a dog until next spring, and constantly hear her name... this changes things. .

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Okay Mrrr. Whatever mean things I ever did you (even though they were very funny or well-deserved) we should probably call a truce before this thing gets ugly. We're EVEN, okay? And if you get a sudden inspiration to change the dog's name to something more, well... you know. Well, that would be just fine. .
?
. . Folks, would you help us? Please tell us some of the names you have given your pets.

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Sticks & Stones disclaimer: Mary previewed the playful jabbing and allowed it to go public.
Image by Mary

25 comments:

Mary said...

Would you be more content with the name if I told you we strongly considered "Oogie Boogie"? It's a name from The Nightmare Before Christmas and being that we got her on Halloween, we almost went with it. But we thought keeping up with a food theme with our pets would be good, so we then narrowed it to Boma or Jiko, both are African restaurants at Disney World. Yesterday after church, we got back to Wes' parents house and he just looked at her and said "Jiko."

Craver Vii said...

More content?? Like if somebody dropped an anvil on my foot and said they were originally planning to drop it on my head? Then yes, it's an improvement; we're moving in the right direction.

Now I'm curious. Let's add a line at the end of the post to see what kinds of names people have given their pets.

I'll start. We used to have a dog named, "Duffy." Some of my hamsters' names were "Bertha, Zorro, Spedley," plus some other politically incorrect designations which were conjured up by a warped mind.

Mary said...

Oh this will be fun!
Our hamster: Squirrely
Our guinea pigs: Smirnoff, Ulysses (these have both passed away), Eggnog, Mocha, and Coconut

And now Jiko. Come on, you know you love it. :)

Craver Vii said...

Forgive me if I am too analytical, but you seem to have a theme with those names... Restaurants, flavors, foods and beverages...

How does "Squirrely" fit in unless... Yikes!

Llama Momma said...

Can you change the name of a dog without causing some kind of identity confusion?

As a kid, I had a little dog named "Pebbles." But we actually called her Pooh Pooh. (A foreshadowing of my life, perhaps?)

Maybe Jiko's not so bad...

Mary said...

llama momma, while Jiko's name had originally been Bunny, she really didn't respond to anything...it's like she didn't even have an identity. So a name change isn't a big deal in this situation.

Dad, in our defense, we didn't name Smirnoff, Eggnog, or Ulysses...they were already named that and we liked the names so much that we kept them. :)

Anonymous said...

As a child we had a puppy we named Spotty Mustard (I wanted Mustard, my brother wanted Spot; we compromised), a cat named Lemon, a chihuahua named Moses (we found him in the bushes by our house), a hamster named LDJ after the initials of the people in the family who gave her to us, a dog named Rommelhood (another compromise--Rommel and Robin Hood but we really only called him Rommel), another cat named Miss Kitty, and most recently a dog named Teddy, a kitten named Talbot, a bird named Jingo, and a hamster named Critter.

Tell the Mrs. Craver I said, "Howdy!!" :o)

Craver Vii said...

To Llama Momma's point, I don't want to be obstinate and call the dog by another name, so that when Mary gets brings her home next spring, she only comes when you call for "Morticia."

Mrrr, I was thinking something like "Onyx" might be nice, even though that gem is not exclusively black. How 'bout "Velvet?" It's not only distinct in it's sound from any dog commands that I can think of, it's also kinda sophisticated for a girl dog.

Pebbles and Ulysses... Great pet names!

d2saint? Is that who I think it is? Friend, yours have been the best backyard barbecues ever! We miss you guys. Give yourselves a family group hug for me will ya?

Anonymous said...

Dog - Ruckus

Anonymous said...

OOPS!!!! I broke the rules again!You do know who has a dog named Ruckus don't you?

Your friend!
(:-)

Anonymous said...

Oh, annnnnd we have a snail named "Dinner" and a second snail named "Mr. Poops".

Still your rule breaking friend!
(:-)

Anonymous said...

Okay, growing up I had a cat named Puka (pooh-kah) because we got her in Hawaii and named her after puka shells. A dog named Sox, who was all black with white feet. Our dog now is Irie (eye-ree), named after the Jamaican word for "it's all good, it's all okay . . . it's irie, mon!" We heard it on our honeymoon and decided it was a great name for a dog. We subsequently have the next three names for our dogs picked out in advance - Marley (after Bob), Kingston (after the capital) and Ziggy (after the other Marley). Although now my husband wants to name our next pet Zagawa (after the lost idol in Curious George, the movie).

All of which explains why I was confused as to why you had an issue with Jiko when I first read your post. I sort of like it.

Craver Vii said...

A dog named Ruckus. Rule breaking friend. Hmmm... East Coast? Is that you?

I like creative pet names, but I-rie? How Ee-rie. The thought I keep going to is, what if the animal gets out and we have to go looking for it?

Here is another factor. You can call most animals anything you want. But a dog will be trained to respond to its name. Cats don't even do that. Not because cats can't understand, but they just don't care. They think we're lucky that they condescend to give any kind of acknowledgement at all.

david mcmahon said...

I know someone who called their dog Deefer ...

as in D for Dog

!!!!!!!

Anonymous said...

Hey now, are you saying my dog's name is eerie? *howling in the background*

L.L. Barkat said...

I once named a dog Michelangelo. He was white, long-haired. And I was a child. I'm not sure what got into me.

Thanks to Mary for agreeing to this post. It made me smile.

(Oh, I have an idea. My word verification is the phonetic spelling of the word "legitimate". You could name the dog using the next word verification. Well, as long as it wasn't the phonetic spelling of "illegitimate" or "Dad is a [what you said on the Big Boy sign]".)

lorenzothellama said...

I once had a dog called Fagin. The present dog is Badger. The cat is Scaredy. I've also had cats called Eeka, Splat, Mushroom, Spider and Phil Collins. And of course, I am a llama called Lorenzo.
Ltl

Craver Vii said...

Michelangelo and Phil Collins? As if cats don't already have a big enough ego! lol!

Hey 'Renzo, I'd like to hear why the one cat was named Phil Collins. And since today we're all about nomenclatures, epitaphs and such, is there a story behind how you picked your pseudonym?

Unknown said...

I named a cat we had Mecurious (soft e).

I think you should name the dog bunnucula.... :)

Inihtar said...

I've lived with boy cats named Derreck, Felix and Wednesday (none of them mine and none named by me). But still, with names like these floating around in my head, I'm sure you don't want suggestions from me! :)

Anonymous said...

It's us. We're southerners now. :o( :o) When you bringing the Craver clan and coming to see us??? You can get our phone (for directions) and address (for mapquest) from Christine. :o) Tell everyone we said, "Hey".

Mary said...

Bunnucula....hahaha that's awesome!!

I love out-of-the-ordinary names. Wes & I are so not for typical names. It surprised us both when we named our one guinea pig "Mocha" since it's a fairly common pet name.

Anonymous said...

Hi D2saint

Lifelong Learner said...

OK. You asked. We give really creative names to our pets. Our cat was name Big Kitty (she was 23 when she finally died last Spring!), and we had a squirrel named Short Ears. Our dog is a pekingese we picked up in a market in the Himalayas. He was next to the vegetables. We decided to name him the local word for "snow." BUT, we misinterpreted the word, and actually named him a verb. Vuji means "snowing." It fits, though, so we kept it. ha!

Anonymous said...

So I had a cat named Basil (from Faulty Towers) and now have a wee girl cat named Uriela...
K
;-)