People who change your name when they address you ...

[Night Train]

I didn't get nicknames, I just got annoyed!

However, I still got called 'Boffin' a lot mainly, I think, because I was studying cosmology when I was 9 years old having done geology and weather in the previous two years.

 

[Norm]

David is quite an unusual name for a Mrs, though.

Good point, I really should check what I've already written when I edit stuff.

Just remembered I've also picked up "Natural Gas" amongst my current colleagues and have previously been M. Badoit (their strap line is "naturellement gazeuse").

 

[Chilternrides]

Almost everyone except my family call me by a long standing nickname, and most of the family reduce my real name (Lawrence) to Lol.
Nobody else uses that though.

Neither the nickname or the Lol bother me at all, but almost everytime I have contact with Americans, it usually gets reduced to Larry, which for some inexplicable reason drives me bonkers!

I frequently work quite closely with a lady named Laurence in Quebec, and she is not at all impressed it I pronounce it the same as my own name; It has to be Loroooonce. Oddly enough, the Canadians don't tend to go down the Larry route though.

 

[KEEF]

Never a Nigel

 

[Stephenite]

I've always felt a bit uncomfortable when people call me 'Steve'. Not irritated or irked though. I just don't see myself as a 'Steve'. When people call me 'Steve' I feel as if I should be exciting or do something amazing like Steve Austin, or Steve McQueen, or Steve Irwin, or any number of Steves. I just don't seem to match up to the expectations. I realise that this may only be in my head, but there you go. I suppose i've never grown out of being called Ste. But no-one calls me this any more except old-old friends from back in the day, and i rarely see them these days. I prefer Stephen to 'Steve' even though this can seem formal (at least in the UK). Most of my friends call me this in Norway. It's fine, as it is common to call people by their full name here. Even using a persons two first names is common. But if you bend the pronunciation slightly you get "stiv'n" which means hard-on.

 

[ColinJ]

... But if you bend the pronunciation slightly you get "stiv'n" which means hard-on.

It does in English too!

 

[Stephenite]

:!

 

[deptfordmarmoset]

I often introduce myself as Chris and then some people decide it's fine to call me Christopher. But I'm not Christopher, I'm Christian. I'll correct them then, because they've just changed my name from what I told them into something it never was nor ever will be. It's not worth getting narked over, though - there's nothing malevolent about it - it's when they call me a twät that I start to get annoyed.