Amy Dickinson is a name you might not know but she replaced the late Ann Landers as the advice columnist of the Chicago Tribune a few years ago. Like her predecessor, her column is also syndicated to newspapers all over the country. I frequently read her work in the Seattle Times and chuckled when I saw this exchange in yesterday's paper:
DEAR AMY:
I have been following the letters in your column about dogs that are named after people. There are two dogs in my neighborhood, one with my granddaughter's name and one with my nephew's name.
Dogs are not the same as people. I can't bear to hear them called by names of my family members.
------- UPSET
DEAR UPSET:
Yes, dogs are not the same as people, and that is why you shouldn't take this personally.
------------AMY
Oooooh, I wished she'd asked me instead. I would have explained to her that nobody gets to own names. Whatever her precious granddaughter and nephew are called they are not the first and they won't be the last. And she doesn't get to be the decider of who or what gets to be Chip or Muffy or whatever.
I can't tell you how many Sophies and Daisys I've met over the years and it is no insult when I share that I have pigs with those same names. It doesn't reflect one whit on the humans with the same names except I am inclined to like them more upon first meeting.
I wish Amy had added a sentence to her reply and it had appeared this way:
DEAR UPSET:
Yes, dogs are not the same as people, and that is why you shouldn't take it personally. But if you meet a dog in the neighborhood named Uptight Bitch be sure to ask if she was named after you.
----------------AMY
Wow- you've gotten me to respond two days in a row...(you fill in the blank!)
But seriously, as the owner of three dogs: Roy, Reggie, and Ted; and two cats: Pete, and Annie;
I whole-heartedly agree with your version of the reply...!
Posted by: Phil | August 03, 2008 at 05:27 AM
Bean, You should take over Amy's advice column!
Posted by: LiLa | August 03, 2008 at 06:59 AM
HA! And with that, you have officially become my favorite show prep page.
Posted by: kimmy | August 03, 2008 at 07:23 AM
Bean-me and my puppy, Olivia, agree with you wholeheartedly. And so do my kittens, Chloe and Zoey.
Posted by: HeatherMichelle | August 03, 2008 at 07:41 AM
No, dogs are not the same as people ... oftentimes they are WAY better!!
Posted by: Marge | August 03, 2008 at 08:19 AM
I'm not a fan of pets being given "people" names. Pets aren't children. However, given the outlandish names of children these days -- Pilot Inspektor, Valetine, Levi, Bean -- and the growing pet industry's focus on pets as part of the family (guilty as charged!) it's becoming more and more difficult to distinguish between appropraite pet names and appropriate children's names. I named my dog based on a joke I heard as a kid, and though I find it funny, not too many people do. But you know what? He's MY dog, and if I wanted to name him "Ura Idiot" I would. (Maybe I should at that to my list for future dogs' names.)
I do like your response to "Upset" though. That's a stupid thing to write about. It's not as though there aren't other people with her loved one's names. Does she take offense to them, too?
Posted by: stk | August 03, 2008 at 08:22 AM
My 8 year old cat, Shakira, Thanks You Bean!!! Not to mention, my kitten, Hermione!!!
Posted by: Ana | August 03, 2008 at 08:41 AM
It's the dogs who should be insulted after finding out they share their names with some bratty neighborhood kids.
Posted by: John E | August 03, 2008 at 10:01 AM
Seriously, do people have nothing better to do with their time then to become offended at nothing? I am offended at this womans offense and I reject her completely.
Posted by: Jennifer | August 03, 2008 at 10:44 AM
It is not my dog's fault that his name is Charlie Moto Cheero. It is not my Siamese cat's fault that his name is Tobias. But it is my HUSBAND'S fault that my orange tabby is named Nuisance. (His true name is Jeffrey ... I know this because I LISTENED to him, unlike my husband, who simply decided to let a 6 week old kitten loose on the car ride home.) :l
Posted by: Kate | August 03, 2008 at 12:16 PM
Someone at the LA Times is just as much of a numbers geek as I am. They've put together a database of registered dogs in LA County, focusing on location, breed and name: http://projects.latimes.com/dogs/
Conclusions: Way too many Chihuahuas out there, and people really like the names "Lucky" and "Max". Assuming the letter writer lives in a place similar to LA County, I will hypothesize that the letter writer's nephew is named Max, and that it's not the rest of the world's fault that the writer's stupid kid named her daughter Lucky.
Posted by: Rose | August 03, 2008 at 01:52 PM
Congratulations, now this has devolved into a "Share-with-Bean-my-stupid-pet-name"-a-thon.
Fing pet parents....
Posted by: Jerkface | August 03, 2008 at 02:10 PM
I don't think my cats, Alice (Ali) and Samantha (Sammy)would think to highly of Uptight Bitch (Upset)
Posted by: Lynne_T | August 03, 2008 at 07:11 PM
Dear Bean,
Why do people get upset over retarded things?
Yours Truly,
Constipated in my pants
Posted by: Edmund F | August 04, 2008 at 05:24 AM
I like your response, Bean. I second the notion that you should take over the advice column.
I think pet names give you a lot more leeway to be creative. I would certainly never name my child Bandit, but for a dog - okay!
Posted by: Chris Kiefer | August 04, 2008 at 09:21 AM
That was a GREAT comeback Bean!! I agree wholeheartedly. My names are definitely not the normal pet name because I think they are boring. So my dogs are given names that I like; Riley, Quintin, Savannah and Kaylie and people laugh when I tell them their names but no one has ever said you can't name them those names because they belong to a HUMAN!! Ridiculous!
Posted by: Lisa | August 04, 2008 at 09:58 AM
We named our new, rescued pug after you, Bean.
Posted by: Sunny Days | August 04, 2008 at 02:53 PM
That probably WAS her response.
Damned editors.
Posted by: Rochelle | August 06, 2008 at 10:01 AM
My brother Fido disagrees.
Posted by: Bananafish | August 06, 2008 at 12:15 PM
My cat's name is Bob, after Bob Hope, because Bob Hope lived a very long, entertaining life, and my last pet did not - just hoping to transfer some good karma to the cat. (Last cat was named after Rudolf Valentino, who died at the age of 31.)
And for the record, Bob wants to scratch out the eyes of Uptight Bitch. If she's so bugged by this that she needs to write to an advise columnist, then she needs to be blinded so that she can have something that's real to worry about.
Posted by: stacey | August 09, 2008 at 02:22 PM