Sure a rose is a rose. But what's the story with some of these names?

Do you ever wonder where people come up with their email addys? I do, every time I update my email list. I understand, of course, that a lot of people simply use their given name or a variation of it and leave it at that.

But others tell you something about themselves, email handles like justboycrazy, alwaysblushing, readingaddict, littleminx, blythspirit, imcheeky, gatorhater, dramamama or sixofnine.

Others give you a hint of the things people either enjoy or perhaps wish for, such as ottergal, shoecrazed (my kinda woman) nomosnow, sliverofmoon, shouldhavebeenacowboy, stargazer, stargal and starfishgal.

In regards to those last three, many of the contest entrants from both here and my webpage, which comprise much of my database, often run in themes. Since we’re romance writers around here, of course we get the entries from likeminded readers/writers such as: romancebooklover, romancechica, romancenewz, romancetreasures, romancewriter and romancereader with various numerals, initials and underscores attached (I’m not including entire addies for obvious reasons). Then there are the pixie people: pixieframe, pixiequeen, pixiedragon, pixiekitty and someone who’s just plain pixilated. On the snow front I’ve got: snostorm, snowangel, snowbear, snowbird, coupla snowflakes, a snowleopard, snowqueen, snowyowl, snowwhiteinfiniti and snowzapped.

Did I mention the ladies? Just a few out of a bunch on my list include ladybug, ladycat, ladychatalot, ladyclearskies, ladyluck, ladymacaw, ladyofmyst, ladyofthelake, ladyontherocks, ladyraidersmom and lady-fill in the name.

Some, like femchauvinist, luckybooboo, and Ladytramp, seem like oxymorons, and others I just like for my own reasons. Boobear, for instance, is one of my nicknames for my cat Boo, motherdriveninsane, because I’ve been there, bookbeyotch cuz it’s got attitude and figgy-fig and tiztazz, simply because they’re catchy and make me smile.

But the ones I really wonder about are those that are different for reasons that aren’t readily obvious to me, such as prettyinpoison, StupidNurse (don’t want that one assigned to my case if I’m ever in his/her hospital) sweetmassacre, aroseoffeathers and, oh so many more.

Have you seen an email addy that tickled your fancy or caught your attention? And, hey, since I took these largely from people who stop by this site, if you're lurking and see your e-addy on my list here, drop in and tell me what inspired your choice.

Because inquirying minds wanna know.