Triumph of the Slayer

[kevin_standlee]

I have a post office box in Sunnyvale, California. I hate having to give the address over the phone because people cannot get the name right, even when I spell it out. They insist on spelling it Sunnydale. Even though I said S-U-N-N-Y-V-as-in-Victor-A-L-E. It is at least as bad as the people who spell my name wrong even though I'm very careful to warn them that I'm going to tell them my name and they are going to spell it wrong unless they wait for me to spell it for them. Nobody has ever gotten it right the first time without my spelling it out. I don't expect them to do so. Everyone wants to spell my name like a tool company, and everyone wants to spell my address like a fictional city where Buffy lived.

Comments

[yourbob.livejournal.com]

Mr Stanley
PO Box ####
Sunnydale, Ca

My autocorrect wants to make it Sunnyvale though. Hmm.

[history-monk.livejournal.com]

I have the same problem with my surname. With the more hopeless-sounding telephone people, I don't actually pronounce it at all: I just go straight to NATO phonetics.

[kalimac.livejournal.com]

I find that when I do that, they're not prepared for a spelling, and I have to do it again.

[kalimac.livejournal.com]

Footnote: The VIsitacion Valley district of San Francisco, apparently because that name is now too closely associated with crime reports, is now often actually being called Sunnydale. (See also North Hills, formerly Sepulveda, in LA, and my favorite, Eastpointe, Michigan, formerly East Detroit. There was never anything wrong with the town itself, but even name association with Detroit is now so toxic they prefer to pretend to be part of the Grosse Pointe district instead.)

[wild-patience.livejournal.com]

I once was at some sort of town festival in Sunnyvale and someone connected with some city department had balloons with Sunnydale on them instead of Sunnyvale.

My favorite greeting card reads: "I went to hell and back to get your this card. (There's a card shop next to where I work.)"

[howeird]

The first time I heard it, I thought you were named after Stan Lee. And Sunnyvale, of course, I've lived in or near for 25 years, so that one's easy.

[dsmoen.livejournal.com]

The one advantage of Saoirse is that no one assumes they know either how to spell it or how to pronounce it.

Both are usually correct. (Though I guess people haven't picked up on my "Sounds Like Weird" clue, thinking perhaps it applies only to my first name.)

[garyomaha.livejournal.com]

I've spent my whole life phonetically spelling out my name. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. My current street name can yield hilarious results from spell check because it wants to correct it to "horny." Er, not a match.

[chocolatescifi.livejournal.com]

The next time you're at the post office, you need to ask the staff how often they see items addressed to "Sunnydale."

[delosharriman]

Sunnyvale. It's where the airship station is.



What?