Nicknames

Hey all, my friend Becca has an insightful blog and recently wrote about the role of nicknames in her life. I loved her post and it inspired me to think about my own nicknames. Thought I would transfer the conversation to my blog and continue the dialog - I think it's fun to hear about people's nicknames. How about you - do you have any nicknames you'd be willing to share? Here are some of mine:

In my family we used to play around with our names backward, mine was Refinnej Niglub. My brother shortened it and called me Ref for a long time - not so much now, but I still love it when he pulls it out.

In high school my best friend used to run down the hall yelling, "Jeffineffineffineffiner." That got shorted to Jef, with one f, and that still sticks with a small group of friends.

My track friends called me Birdie -long story on that one.

In high school and college as a camp counselor I was "Giraffe" to 100s of kids, who still think of me as that in their head, but rarely say it out loud. Every now and then I mention it to someone and they sheepishly smile and say, "Yeah, that's always the first name I think of for you."

My college friends call me Niffer, and my kids call me Mom, but never, ever, ever, have I been Jenny. Unless you wanted to make me mad. Which a college friend did. And he called me Jenny so often that it stuck, and we laugh - and he's the only one allowed to call me that in the world.