Nicknames

Who doesn't have a nickname or family pet name? I'm not going divulge the private embarrassing names that my parents, fellow teammates or mad coaches made up for me during football season. But I bet just the previous sentence made most of you think of those same names you've been stuck with.

While traveling this week to a basketball tournament the girl's decided that everyone needed a nickname. You see, I am the type of person that loves to come up with those sarcastic teasing nicknames just to lighten a persons mood or get a point across. For instance in the middle of a game last weekend I had one of my players coming to the line for a free throw. It was a close game and I could see a bit of tension building. So as she approached the line I yelled knock 'em down Leprechaun. Not all the funny as a nickname by itself, but take into account that she is 5'1", redheaded and full of fire, it made quite the impact on her and the bench. She immediately glared at the bench as all the rest of the girls on the team fell to the floor in gut wrenching laughter.

So, now everyone has to have one. We have Baby Bop or Tiss (short for tissue and always emotional), we have Nessy (he name is Janessa and she disappears for long periods of time), we have Ping (she looks like the girl on Mulan and she hated her original nickname of Flower because of her skunk'esc black and white hair), there is Snuff (I watched a lot of Sesame Street as a kid and she reminds me of Snuffaluffagus), there is Peetry and Ducky (two friends that reminded us all of the land before time characters), ChitChat (shes the girl that naver talks -- we shortened hers to Chit, but it sounds very bad when I yell it from the bench "What were thinking Chit?"), there is Snapper (she always has thing habit of snapping her fingers when she wants the ball), my personal favorite is Dora (she needs a map to find her way around the court), there is JJ (Judge and Jury on the court and her name is COURTney), Sticks is a tall skinny post(her sister used to be known as Twiggy, so this fit), Jayco is a post thatlvoes to "Camp" in the key, there is Willy (my daughter and no one could come up with anything more creative), and then finally Lucky (short for Lucky Charm or Leprechaun).

So next time you think your pet name is horrible imagine that it could be worse. You could have me for a coach and be named after a skunk.