Why you should...

... spell my name the correct way.

For those of you who know me, you are well aware of the fact that my pet peeve (if it can be called that) is having my name spelled incorrectly. From when I was young, I have had people kill my name by pronouncing it in ridiculous ways. Whilst this is annoying, I often find myself understanding the difficulties associated with speaking foreign words. My sympathy, however, does not extend itself from phonetics to spelling.

It seems to me that people enjoy spelling my name wrong. And I can tell you here and now that that is the pinnacle of rubbish-like things to do. Why?

Well, let me tell you something. When I read my name spelt Shruti or Sruti or any thing that is not Shruthi- you have already dropped about 50 levels down into my moron - alert box. But being the nice person I am, I communicate and let you know that my name is spelt SHRUTHI. At this point I feel that anyone with half a brain will understand that I expect to be addressed correctly. Sadly, sense is really very uncommon, and many a times, I will have people communicate back and still use the incorrect spelling of my name.

Whoa! So, now you are not only at the bottom of my moron list, you have now told me you are a brainless git. Those who write to me in the professional sphere, and continually misspell my name - you have got to be kidding me! It tells me that you are a moron, with no brains, and no interest in actually paying attention to what you are doing, and what you are telling me. If I respond to you - it is simply me being professional. Kindly note that anything I do for you hence-forth is done because it has to be, and under duress... and as you continue misspelling my name, the number of curses you are accumulating grows at an alarming rate.

Then, there are the personal messages - from friends, uncles, aunts, cousins, acquaintances etcetera etcetera. So, I get all sorts of excuses - typos, default spell checker options, memory lapse, aggravation (aggravating me on purpose, that is) and bull shit and bull shit and more bull shit. So, there you have it. That is exactly what I am thinking. My reaction to you may vary - I may laugh it off, I may get mad, I may ignore it.... but remember the moron level always keeps note!

So let's do us all a favour and spell my name correctly - SHRUTHI!