Kate without an eight
The two questions I'm most often asked about my name is whether Kate is short for anything and whether I'm named after anybody. No and no. Pretty boring, huh? I'll tolerate Katy as a nickname only by dear friends who are willing to sing me "K-K-K-Katy": "K-K-K-Katy, beautiful Katy/You're the only g-g-g-girl that I adore ..."
It's been years since anyone sang that to me, and I'm pretty sure my face might freeze into a permanent smile if someone did.
Anyway, the only other question I'm asked about my name on a regular basis is how to spell it. I don't think it's that hard, but Cate Blanchett has thrown off the curve for the rest of us. Still, I haven't heard of much variation beyond Kate-With-a-K and Cate-With-a-C ...
... Until three of the other women in niche popped by my cube today. One of them has a preschool-age son with a classmate named K8. Yes, that's K8-With-an-Eight. It's on her birth certificate and that's how her family and teachers spell it. Problem is that K8's parents are facing a bit of a dilemma because they're trying to get her a passport but numerals are not allowed on a passport.
"You've probably never done that even on personal stuff to be cute," one said about abbreviating Kate as K8. (I have. I didn't volunteer that information after hearing it put in those terms.)
Anyway, they told me that since I started working there, I've been dubbed Kate-Without-an-Eight. I guess there are worse things to be called by one's coworkers, no?
Kate-With-a-K-But-Without-an-Eight, signing off.
posted by Kate at 9:41 PM
Copyright 2001-2009, L.K.C.S. It's MINE, all MINE. If you wanna use it, gimme credit and a link, okies? And don't run with scissors, because you're just going to poke somebody's eye out with that thing. No, really. 
5 Comments:
nice post, yah
a slow, slow weekend this..
I read the title, and I thought you were about to enter into a verbal battle against Jon and Kate Plus Eight, which is a god-awful show.
Seriously, K8? That makes for a cute way to spell somebody's name in an IM conversation, but not for an actual spelling. Text messaging and IM conversations are completely destroying the English language.
Maybe not destroying, more like evolving. As communications become mere snippets via SMS/IM, and considering the limitations of things like twitter, you are likely to see this more and more. Where you have abbreviations showing up in modern language.
After all, the letters only represent sounds that come out of your mouth. A = aahhhh, P = pee, U = ewe, etc. So, if you replace the sound of -ate with a letter, and if that letter comes at the end of a word, thus making it "8," is that not simply an evolution of our written language?
Mental gymnastics aside, i still think it is dumb as hell.
That is about as good as the name "Le-a". And no, that is not pronounced like the Star Wars princess played by Carrie Fisher. That is Lu-DASH-uh.
Why do I have the sneaky suspicion that these parents also have college degrees?
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