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Complex Numbers #1070539 added May 5, 2024 at 7:04am
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Revisited: "Fail"
We're going back in time, as usual for Sunday mornings. This time, it's just to October of 2020 (specifically, 10/10/20, one of the few dates that work in both American and European style conventions and which can also be turned into a mathematical equation): "Fail" 
I did the entry for that month's round of "Journalistic Intentions" [18+], which is still an active blogging challenge, though not every month. Also, all the links in the entry are still solid, which isn't too surprising for something less than 4 years old.
Anyway, I got curious and looked up the origin of the name Fail.
I didn't go into this at the time, but today, I noticed that the ultimate origin of the Scottish surname Fail (which has many alternative spellings) is the name Paul. Don't ask me what kind of linguistic vowel shifts it takes to get from Paul to Fail; I don't know. But the name Paul, from Paulus, is Latin in origin, though it is probably most associated with the Paul of the New Testament.
So Paul becomes Phaill (or some similar spelling), and, by the convention of some Scottish clan names, generates MacPhaill, later Anglicized as MacFail or just Fail.
At least, that's one possible explanation. I never did trust some of these genealogy websites. But you know the Meat Loaf character in Fight Club? "His name was Robert Paulson." Well, "Paulson" is the English equivalent of MacPaul, which we've already speculated became the name Fail, so I have to wonder if Palahniuk did that shit on purpose. Probably not; his symbolism tends to be more of a, well, a punch in the face.
Anyway, back to my original entry:
I know, I know, it's rude to make fun of peoples' last names. You should be proud of your last name, even if it's Fail.
Or Hogg, as in yesterday's entry (coincidentally, also Scottish). Still, being proud of being a Hogg (or a Fail, for that matter) is no damn excuse to name your kid Ima.
There's the story of a Dr. A. Hedgeh, for example, who apparently had a problem with people adding "og" to his nameplate.
In case you don't want to bother rereading my 2020 entry, I'm including that link here again, because I still laugh every time I see it. Fake or not.
So, yes, it's rude to make fun of peoples' names.
But sometimes, it's so funny you can't help it. |
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