Lately I’ve found myself especially fascinated with interesting words, sentences, and most of all, names. Sentences, most times despite the nature of their content, have been grabbing my attention and inspiring me to do things. Of course, in most instances, that “inspiration” can be directly translated into “forcing me to buy domain names.”

Take for example WanderingStars.org. I bought that one. Can’t remember if I blogged about it. I don’t think I did because I wanted to wait until the design was done and the content was up. Well, forget that – the past few weeks of going to the hospital kind of put a kink in that plan. Never mind that. I bought the name after hearing a song again for the first time in several months – Portishead’s ‘Wandering Stars.’ In that song there’s a line that I loved ever since first hearing the song years ago. “Wandering stars, to whom is reserved the blackness of darkness for ever.”

I had never really paid attention to what those lyrics meant, but I always thought it was a very cleverly structured sentence. It just flowed nicely within the context of the song. But then one night, as I was reading the Book of Jude in the New Testament, I was struck by something else. Suddenly, a verse I had just read seemed very familiar. I tried to place where I had heard it before when that Portishead tune surfaced in my brain. It was exactly the same as that song – “Raging waves of the sea, foaming out their own shame; wandering stars, to whom is reserved the blackness of darkness for ever.”

So now it made more sense, although I was disappointed to find out that my new favorite sentence was referring to those people who have been damned to hell. Whoopsies. 🙂 I still liked it anyway and thought that ‘Wandering Stars’ sounded so romantic. I looked it up on a WHOIS search and saw that WanderingStars.org was still available. I bought it about two weeks ago.

Yesterday, after starting to reread ‘The Little Prince’ while waiting for about five hours for my CT scan at the hospital, I got a specific word stuck in my head. Well, not so much a word as a title. You see, the Little Prince himself came from a little tiny planet, known as Asteroid b612. It might have been the barium I swallowed for the test, it might have been all the radioactive injections I’d had that week, it might have been pure delirium after three straight nights with only two hours of sleep, but for some reason, it was just way too much fun to say “b-six-twelve”. Plus, I really liked the meaning behind it, since ‘The Little Prince’ is by far my favorite children’s book.

Needless to say, I bought b612.org. I’ve decided I like saying b-six-twelve so much, I’ll rename my design company after it. Or something. I don’t know. Either way, I own it now, and I like it. I designed a little place holder page for it until I make up my mind, but I’m still waiting for the registration and web hosting to go through. I love having a ton of web space to play with.

Finally, all this week watching the Olympics, I’ve been bursting into fits of giggles whenever a name appears that tickles my fancy. But, out of all the fabulous names of the 2004 Athens Games, one name in particular stands out. Why? Because it also stood out during the 2000 Sydney Games, back when I was sane. Even then, I loved it. I loved it so much I wrote one of my very first blog entries about the owner of that name, all those many years ago. Sadly, my exposure to that name will diminish until the next Olympics. And yet, I’m worried – what if he doesn’t return? What if I have to live the rest of my life without ever hearing it again? What will I do when my life becomes devoid of Pieter Van Den Hoogenband?

Hehehe. Mind you, I’m not making fun of Pieter Van Den Hoogenband. I never would. That man’s amazing in the pool, and my oh my what perfect teeth he has. But that name, I just love it. During the Sydney games, I was going through a phase when I was rather uncomfortable with my last name. Scratch that – it’s constant; I’m always uncomfortable with my last name. But once we all heard the name of Pieter Van Den Hoogenband, my parents kept laughing, and telling me I should marry Pieter Van Den Hoogenband, because then I’d quit complaining about a name like Lawver. They thought that surely, Van Den Hoogenband would be harder to live with than Lawver.

I’m not sure how I’d feel about that. Sure, it’s better than a really long, consonant-ridden Polish name, or a strange Hawaiian name no white person could pronounce, like Kamakawiwo’ole. But really, I think having a name like Van Den Hoogenband is a name of public service, so I think I’d be okay if I married Pieter Van Den Hoogenband. Letting people say my name could be a tax-deductible charitable donation, because hey, can anyone resist a smile after saying Pieter Van Den Hoogenband? If it were Heather Van Den Hoogenband it might even be more fun, with the double H and all.

I don’t even think I’m alone in my love of Pieter Van Den Hoogenband, or at least his name anyway. You could practically make a drinking game out of it while watching the Olympics, with the number of times those commentators from NBC go out of their way just to say Pieter Van Den Hoogenband. And you just know they’re giggling as much as I am when they digitally project the names of those swimmers onto their appropriate lane right before the race. Everyone else’s name fits perfectly in those little rectangles, but not Pieter Van Den Hoogenband. Suddenly those letters get all tall and skinny, the kerning goes to pieces, and it’s nearly unreadable from being so squished.

I am rather sad now that Olympic swimming is over. No more cheering for somewhat-local-boy Michael Phelps, no more giggling at Gary Hall’s pompadour, no more getting scared by Michael Klim, and most of all, no more Pieter Van Den Hoogenband. *sigh* What am I going to do now when I need a good giggle? Maybe I should send Pieter Van Den Hoogenband a check for providing therapy this week, what with how many times he made me laugh. But most of all, we all know how great it’ll be if I end up as the number one result on Google for Pieter Van Den Hoogenband. 🙂