I'm sick. It's probably from the recycled air in the plane from when I time traveled, but nonetheless, it sucks. My throat is sore, my ears are clogged, and I've been choking on a Niagara Falls worth of ick since Monday. Gross, I know.
Needless to say, my tolerance for other people is lower than usual. And since my usual low is below low, well, you get the picture.
With that being said, I need to set the record straight, once and for all:
My last name is spelled B-Y-R-N-E. It's pronounced like "burn", but there is no "U". See "Byrne" equals no "U", yet every freakin person I spelled my last name to this week has added a "U". And notice I said "spelled" because I don't even bother saying it anymore. It's more like:
Person: What's your last name?
Me: B-Y-R-N-E
But their ears must be clogged because they spell back to me as: B-U-Y-R-N-E
To which I reply: There's no "U". It's B-Y-R-N-E
And then they say: B-U-Y-R-N-E
And then I angrily say: No "U". Just B-Y-R
And that could go on a while before they say: Oh
And I think: You fucking idiot.
I blame my husband.
The odd thing is, that this doesn't happen with my first name, at all. People just assume they know how to spell "Alaina" which usually ends up looking like Elaine or Elayna or whatever other letters they try to throw in there. But at least they don't bug me about it...
And I don't feel compelled to strangle them.
I have the same thing with (both!) of my last names. No one could believe that the name Guy could possibly be so simple. I was in the habit of introducing myself as "Emily Guy G-U-Y.". Naively, I thought that Birken would be an improvement, particularly since it's spelled just like Birkenstocks. But no, I always get Berkin or Birkin or Berken or (my personal favorite) Bricken. I know I care more about how other people spell their names than they care about how I spell mine. At least it gives me something to feel superior about.
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