Journey vs. Destination

I want to name my are-you-ok gadget. I mean give it a proper name, something catchy and jingly. Something that takes the awkward description I give and then the example and turns it into a blindingly obvious system.

Unfortunately, I am not good at this. If it was up to me, all our pets would likely be called Bob. (It would make things easier, don’t you think?) Also, when working on a tshirt to improve posture, my favorite name (and the working name of the project before my husband explained the negative connotations): StraightT!

I thought to ask Elizabeth but she was the one who wanted to have it post to Facebook with a status of “Maybe not dead”. I find that hilarious but I’m not sure everyone would.

In the code, I call the thing ayok (for “are you ok?”). It is unwieldy to pronounce, I don’t say it very often. Even in my internal monologue.

A day or two ago, I had a brainstorm and decided that the name should be Mandy-the-manatee since the plush is (currently) a manatee. And Mandy is sort of a portmanteau of Maybe Not Dead (ok so Mande might be “better”).

I emailed Elizabeth to tell her the good news. I hadn’t considered it before but Elizabeth had this rant about how pre-named plushies are wrong. Wrong, I tell you. Owners should get to name their own animals.

Which, of course, means I immediately want to name mine Bob.

But back to a system name. How about POM for piece of mind? I bet the pomegranate people not appreciate it. Though their little heart logo would be nice too. As long as I’m going to infringe, might as well go all the way.

POL or Polly for proof-of-life? That’s another name for the animal, not for the system. Though Pet Polly isn’t bad and tells you what to do with the device.

What about GlaDos due to the “Still Alive” (also due to innate creepiness of having a stuffed animal spy on you)? I suppose that has a copyright or something.

Anyone want to suggest a name? The bar here is quite low.