How did u decided your screen name

Several years ago I had been out celebrating Saint Patrick's Day and when I got home I decided to join an online forum.

Naturally I asked for help from my two oldest sons, who were youngish teens at the time.

The hardest part was choosing a screen name which involved a lengthy consult with Stong Bad and Homestarr Runner as well as excursions through and to various other websites for inspiration.

In the end I was christened "Sealion" I think after a British submarine.

I don't have much in common with British subs or sealions except that I think they're cute -the sealions.

I did used to practice many water sports and hobbies as well.

Being a Mom with a masculine screen name can be tricky. I have found out the hard way that if I don't identify myself as a Mom in some way my comments at times may seem effeminate. Not wisely recommended for participation in military discussion forums.

I have since wised up and adopted other screen names that I personally chose and like much better. But I am still sentimentally attached to "Sealion" because my kids selected it and it so representative of that particular era of their lives.
 
My screen name is obvious as well. My DD, Buckaroo, received her name at an aviation camp. As she put it, "It's better than Tex.":wink:
 
Mine was picked to miff my son & it work & is still working. :thumb:
 
Ok Jamz, that was no fair you left us with more questions than answers..I am now going to call you Shahrazad...you now have 999 more nights to keep us engrossed with how you got the name...this will be fun:shake:
 
Apparently, I can't spell. I meant to say "worked" instead of work. Any English teacher reading.... please don't give me a red X.

Pima, no mystery here. It is my main goal in life to embarrass my children. I seek more & more unusual ways to accomplish this feat. To this day, they tell me it doesn't work so I keep trying all methods available & will do so until I find one that does. My most recent idea is to wear the brightest orange CG shirt I can find to a KP function for kicks. Seems the Mids like to print out what I say to terrorize the Jamz with. That hasn't even worked. Yet. :biggrin:

happily signed,
James Mom :smile:
 
is it just me, or does it seem that this is the main goal of all mothers?:rolleyes:
 
Okay I most admit I wanted to have a bedtime story for the next 3 years on how the name came about:frown:

As far as embarrassing your s, I do it all of the time...OMG Bullet and I actually still hold hands in public:eek: We are like you...tease the heck out of him...I gained the weight, went through labor, sleepless nights at least I should be able to embarrass him after all the times I had to say "we need to leave the store now since everyone knows your name"...remember saying DS/DD stop don't touch that, DS/DD no you can't have it,DS/DD leave that alone, DS/DD stop touching your sis/bro, DS/DD put that down...now they can say mom/dad please don't go there, don't touch that, don't say that, don't talk about this:shake:

Isn't life funny
 
I always feel sort of nerdy... Altaica is the Latin species for Siberain tigers which is my favorite animal. 103 comes from PAN-AM flight 103 that crashed in Lockerbee, Scottland and my family is Scott/Irish desended....
 
My DH and I had a blessing done for PAN AM 103 at our wedding, it happened only a few days before. The pilot was a friend of my Dad's
 
You too!

I'm glad to know that embarrassing your children is universal! After having "morning" sickness for 9 months morning AND noon and night, I strongly believe that it is not just my right but my duty to harass and embarrass my twins whenever possible. Kissing my DH and such is one of my favorite ways. Doesn't always work but we continue to kiss anyway. It will be a bit harder to embarrass Buckaroo once she is at USAFA but I will find a way...
Her sister will be much closer and may have to suffer a little more because her sibling is far away. Oh well, such is life.
 
Lots of twins out there :) - I have twin boys, 4 years younger than my DD who is trying for USNA but I couldn't in all fairness use that in my screen name so I opted for something really simple. The initials of all three of my kids ... plus mom :biggrin: Even I can remember that one.
 
erm. . .

Bumblebee.

just a screen name I use everywhere.
I'm always busy and I love flowers?
Not to mention I annoy everyone, so my friends call me the bumblebee. .
always hovering around. . buzzing and flitting about. .
 
Many moons ago ( before the internet and cell phones..84), I was 33 weeks along preggers with my D, my spouse was a FNG in a fighter SQ at Torrejon AB, Spain. He was sent off to Incirlik AB Turkey, the Sq deployed there for 3 months and he needed to do his flights to be certified as a wingman and to do nuke missions.

The AF sends a letter to our PO box saying that we had been over paid 9 months ago when he was at fighter lead-in and they were taking our entire next paycheck. A whole $1100. I was in tears, only had been in Spain 6 weeks didn't know what to do, called my Sq CC wife...who called the wing king's wife....who called her husband....who called his Exec to pick me and take me to the MPF. He did and the airman behind the desk at the MPF said "you are just a wife" I can't talk to you about HIS pay.

I have had that said to me many more times in the past 26 years. But when he made O6 they just said it in a more polite way.

I am married to Harvard...cause he went there. I am sure that PIMA knows people only by their call signs. The spouse refers to that person a rino or K9, had you never hear their given name. Even more fun at their pin on for BG.
 
Very true in our household about Pima only knowing a person by thier callsign. Something like this happens weekly:

Pima: "Bullet, some Capt XXXXX on the phone for you about tomorrow's flight"

10 minutes later, after I get off the phone:

Pima: "Who was that?" (with a puzzled look on her face)
Me: " Oh, that was Riddler (or Stryker, or Popeye, or whichever flight lead was calling to let this old WSO know what time to meet in the morning)"
Pima: (light bulb going off above her head) "OOOOOh! I didn't know XXXXX was his actual name!"

Perhaps the funniest day we have in the squadron is "First name Friday". Standard Bet: All day, you can only call a guy by their first name. (of course, for the O-6s like justawife's H, that first name is SIR) No call signs, no ranks, no last names. Break the rule, you're fined a buck to the snacko's fund. On Friday's, we wear our callsigns on our name patches, so no cheating there. Can't tell you the number of times I'm fined for not knowing the first name of a guy I've flown with and socialized with for the past 2 1/2 years!

Let's face it. The pilots and WSOs (like me) in most squadrons are just little kids at heart, getting to play everyday with the toys we've dreamed about as we were "growing up". We even play little kids games.

And I wouldn't trade it for the world!:smile:
 
JustAWife...
We had the exact same incident happen to us, except we were living on base in Idaho, and they called him up and said oops you live on base and we gave you BAH, you will now be pd $50 for the next 2 weeks.
I also had the same issue when he was at Incirlik with our finance office, I had a power of attorney, but finance will only except if he is mentally incapacitated...HUH? If he is mentally incapacitated he couldn't be in the military, yes mam, but that's the rules.

You are lucky, you can scream Harvard across a store or in an airport...I screamed it in the airport one time and to this day I am lucky I wasn't arrested for terrorist act. I am glad his callsign isn't Fire. (second nature to call him Bullet instead of his name...for some reason he'll answer to his call sign on 1st try, his reg name and I have to repeat it 5, 6, 7 times)
 
Pima is not alone on that anymore.... If I do happen to remember someone's name it is their nickname. I've gone 4 years in high school never knowing multiple peoples' names cept by nickname. (with over 1200 guys in our school, good luck!) In fact, many people don't know my first name, but just call me Cuga.

As for parents and their sons/daughters.... I found offering hugs to my mom has been quite effective. She now knows when she is going over when I offer her a hug. (she dosn't like them public or private, I give one too many)
 
the triple nickel

I chose my screenname in honor of a close friend of mine Brig. Gen Steve Ritchie (Ret.)... who as the USAFA cadets know was the only USAF pilot ace in the Vietnam War. I have known Gen. Ritchie most of life and he has been a great help and inspiration.

... "when Ritchie volunteered for a second combat tour in 1972 and was assigned to the 432nd Tactical Reconnaissance Wing at Udon RTAFB, Thailand. Flying F-4 Phantom IIs with the famed 555th ("Triple Nickel") Tactical Fighter Squadron he shot down his first MiG-21 on 10 May 1972, scored a second victory on May 31, a third and fourth on July 8, and a fifth on August 28. All of the aircraft he shot down were Mig-21s, and all were shot down by the much-maligned AIM-7 Sparrow radar-guided air-to-air missile. Ritchie became the United States Air Force's first and only pilot ace of the Vietnam War."...

so that where my screenname came from... the addition of the zzz was just spontaneous. :thumb:
 
Interesting note: For 4 of Capt Ritchie's MIG kills, his WSO was Capt Chuck DeBellevue. Flying F-4D's and E's equipped with the APX-80 "Combat Tree" IFF identifiers, an electronic system operated by DeBelluvue, they had a distinct advantage in Beyond-Visual-Range engagements over the North Vietnamese. Using this system allowed them to either shoot first, or gain a tactical edge as they closed to close quarter dog-fights.

DeBellevue later went on to earn 2 more MIG kills in F-4s flying with Capt John Madden (no, not the football guy, but I did hear that when he debriefed his MIG kills, he circled the MIG in the video of his HUD picture and said "Boom" :thumb: ).

DeBellevue is credited as the leading American Ace of the Vietnam conflict. Nice summary of his career and Vietnam achievements here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_B._DeBellevue

I know, it's a wiki reference! But it's pretty accurate....

Chalk one up for one of my fellow WSOs!
 
BTW, to go back to the purpose of this original post. (And PIMA did promise this in the very first post of this thread...)

Why Bullet? Well, it's been my "callsign" since my first operational flying tour 19 years ago (Ouch, I'm old!!!!). Just seemed logical to use it here.

Now, I know some of you young-uns might be asking "how do you get your call-sign?" Well, you get it from your squadron mates. Every other Friday, we hold a social gathering in our squadron lounge (Yes, every squadron has a lounge, filled with squadron memorablia and such. Think Applebee's meets Top Gun. We used to call it the squadron bar, but that has too many negative connotations nowadays), called a "role-call" (comes from the radio call made just before a large-force strike package is about to push into enemy territory. The mission commander (the guy in charge of the entire strike package, reponsible for ensuring everyone gets to their target safely, hits their objectives, and gets back home in one piece) will initiate the call to see who is there on time and ready to execute). Miss the role-call, be fined a buck! During role-calls, we gather to tell humorous stories about each other, usually on how someone messed up in the air during a sortie. Involves a lot of story-telling (with "mostly true" accounts of what happened), toasts to those who went before us and those with us now, and singing fighter songs. Great Times! :biggrin:

When we have a bunch of new flyers who have completed their mission check (now qualified to go to war with us), and have been in the squadron a while, we'll have a "naming ceremony" as part of the role-call. Each guy goes in front of the squadron, one at a time, and everyone gets a chance to tell a story about the person. Callsigns either come from a play on the persons name (good example, I flew with a WSO who's name is B. Swayne. He obviously got the callsign "Batman"), or is a play on one of the funny stories about how a young guy screwed up.

Great fighter squadron tradition, and every squadron I've been in or visited has a similar one.

As to "Bullet"? All I can say is, do something stupid as a Lt, and you'll have a tag that everyone, including your family, will know you as for your entire career. Besides, I love my callsign, it reminds me of Steve McQueen (you young-uns ask your folks who that guy is. One of the original "tough man" action hereos, and what a cool car he drove in that movie!) :thumb:

See what you guys have to look forward to? A great profession (don't get my humorous posts wrong, fighter guys are well known as some of the most professional persons you'll ever meet when it comes to the military. Its when we're in our element in the lounge that we live up to our reputations as "boys with cool toys"), working with some of the best people in the world, in a tight-nit Fraternity of brothers and sisters!

Commence re-assessment of that dream to drive a tank now!:wink: (hopefully no offense taken by those who want to go that route. Running over cars in 70 tons of fun has it's advantages as well! :thumb: )
 
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