Name meme!

[lady_sarai]

Completely stolen from author_by_night, even though I wasn't tagged. Cause I'm a total meme thief that way. ;)

Explain your username, and then tag five others to do the same.

Okay, so this meme's been going around forever, but I'm stealing it and doing it now.

Contrary to what I have discovered in reading Trickster's Choice the past few days, I did NOT steal my name from Tamora Pierce's newest books, even if Sarai seems... interesting, thus far. (If you've read, please don't spoil me!)

I could explain this shortly and sweetly, but brevity is not a friend of mine. ;)

So, we'll start with "Sarai," which is a variation of "Sara," which is the thinly veiled secret of my Real Name. (Long ago, I was so paranoid about people online learning my Real Name that I chose names as far from that as possible... I went by "Princess Emma" on ff.net AGES ago--we're talking junior high school--for that very reason. Although, even that was a nod to my real name, as "Sara" is hebrew for "princess." I've lightened up since then... there are far too many "Sara"s around for me to worry over this discovery, even if I have eliminated all those spelt with the "h.")

So, I have this ginormous book of baby names from around the world (yes, I am a geek, but this helps when creating names for characters!) and I looked up "Sara" and found the variation "Sarai," which I liked a lot. So that's THAT.

As for "Lady"... heh. When I chose my AIM screenname, I thought I'd be clever and use the meanings of my first and last name, but my last name's *supposed* meaning (this has never been confirmed; a cousin told me the meaning after doing the genealogy) is long. 9 letters. So Princess didn't fit with it, and I didn't want to drop any letters. So I went with "Lady_________."

And when I made this lovely LJ, I just... transferred the "Lady" to "Sarai" and voila.

Entirely too long an explanation and too much information for you all. ;)

As for tagging... aradiachiba,zoe_chan and arnica, even if I already know how those came about. (High school DOES come in handy on occasion!) And alphabet26 and scribophile, because alphabet26 knew me as Princess Emma, and scribophile loves coconuts in boats. ;) (If you've already done this, and I didn't notice, I am sorry and beg forgiveness!)

Comments

[minisinoo.livejournal.com]

(chuckle)

I automatically assumed Sarai was a variation on Sarah/Sara. It's the original Hebrew of Sarah, wife of Abr(ah)am. I wasn't sure if your name might be Sara/h or if you were referencing the Matriarch. :-)

(And yes, that's what you get for having an Early Church historian on your list. LOL!)

[lady-sarai.livejournal.com]

Yes, it's a *very* thinly veiled secret, my first name. ;) When it's difficult to make your way through the local grocery store without hearing your name at LEAST 5 times... I figured I was safe enough on the internet. ;)

And I do have a soft spot for Ye Olde Biblical stories. The trend to write historical fiction about them is pleasing me, although I have yet to make it to those books in my Mile-High List of books-to-read-for-pleasure. ;)

I always liked Sarah, and when I was little, it was because "look! My name's in the bible! Except God spelt it wrong." ;) (I apparently told my Sunday School teacher this once.)

[alphabet26.livejournal.com]

Mine is "alphabet26" because when I was online chatting in ye olden times when chatting was still the thing, I found someone with the username ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ and I thought that was pretty cool. But if they had that name, I could not. So I went with "alphabet." And I put 26 on there when "alphabet" because of the letters in the English alphabet.

Note: I am very grateful now that I could not be ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ, because now that would be very frustrating. So yay for hindsight and all.

[lady-sarai.livejournal.com]

::laughs:: Hindsight is a marvelous thing.

Good lord, ye olden times. I remember the message boards on AOL. Wow. Junior high flashback.

[alphabet26.livejournal.com]

And, uh, we'll just ignore all those missing words in there...like "when 'alphabet' is taken" and pretend I made sense.

[lady-sarai.livejournal.com]

And we'll just ignore the fact that I didn't even NOTICE. =P

[thistlerose.livejournal.com]

I haven't read Tamora Pierce, so I wondered if it was a reference to Sarah. I like the name Sarai. I always wondered why she changed it. I don't think they ever told us in Hebrew school.

[lady-sarai.livejournal.com]

As far as biblical women went, I always liked her; I suspect this was a "my name is in the bible!" thing at first. ;) I only recently (within the last year) discovered that her name was originally Sarai, and it pleased me. :)

(I didn't know about the Tamora Pierce thing, either, until someone in a community asked me if I'd taken the names from these books. =P Great big no, there.)