What happened next between your mother and myself would have been far more enjoyable if you hadn't walked into the room

The rest of the story involves least one of each of the following: startled leaps from beds, violent impacts on your mother's beloved erotic pumice stone, triumphant emergences from comas and crying, confused five-year-olds soon to spend much of their adult lives recounting this traumatic incident to mortified psychiatrists. I'll spare you another telling because I'm sure you are vivdly aware of the details. But you probably still don't even know who I am and that I can help you with.

My name is Eleanor. Some people ask me where someone who is, seemingly, male gets the name Eleanor. Despite the obvious possibility that this subject holds for comedy, I consider it a very grim, serious matter. You see, Eleanor was the name of the brave little cocker spaniel that swam out into the middle of a lake to save my mother from drowning after her boat capsized. But the effort was too much and it died of exhaustion as soon as they reached the shore. She and my father vowed, through tears, to name their firstborn after that noble animal, regardless of gender.

The above story is not true.

I could tell you the one that is, but it's mundane and you'd probably think less of me. Here are some stories in a similar vein that aren't so boring: Sid Vicious was named after a hamster. John Wayne was so called because his real name was Marion Morrison. He squandered a wonderful name in doing so. I would kill to be known as Marion Morrison. In fact, is it too late to start referring to myself under that name?

Probably. But it's never too late for an outrageous handlebar moustache:

-Eleanor