Misadventures in the Naming of Instruments

[acmespaceship]

During an exceptional 24-hour period which ended yesterday evening: 
1) I received a new and long-awaited banjo ukulele. 
2) I downloaded a library book to my Kindle. 
3) e_m_b found a B&B south of Galena equipped with an 8" telescope, a herd of alpacas and a litter of goldendoodles. 
4) I discovered that our local Costo is now carrying the Ghirardelli chocolate chips they used to have at Sam's. 
Happy dance!  I expect normal reality to resume any minute now.

I thought I would be clever about naming the new uke.  We know what The Universe thinks about people who try to be clever, don't we?

I find it convenient to name instruments, just as I appreciate Ikea's habit of naming furniture.  Before you scoff, consider: when asked where the flashlight is, would you rather say "it's on the counter in the kitchen along the south wall near the back door" or say "it's on Varda"?  Exactly.  So anyway, I have a banjo uke named "Broadway."  Broadway is a cast-aluminum oddity built sometime in the 1960s, with an American eagle decal on the head.  The decal reminded me of George M. Cohan and the name devolved from there.  Broadway is wonderful.  And loud.  And metallic.  Great for some songs, but you wouldn't want me to spend an entire evening playing Broadway in the same room you're in.  So when the Magic Fluke Company introduced their new "Firefly" model, it caught my eye as a more playable everyday type of banjo uke.

The Fireflys have been well-received, which means they've been on back-order for months.  My buddy Pete set himself up as a retailer, so I ordered a Firefly through him (see kindatown ukes).  Got it Tuesday night, and it is just what I wanted it to be.  Great sound and playability.  Played with the pads of the fingers and muffled against the player's body, it blends nicely with other non-banjo ukes.  Played with fingernails and the back unmuted, it's a banjo uke by God!  And yet it does not sound like a machine gun.  Which is good because I already have a banjo uke that sounds like a machine gun.

As for a name, it seemed to me that clearly this uke needed a name related to fireflies.  It even has a cute little drawing of a firefly woodburned on the back.  Since I have recently been listening to a recording of Don Marquis' archy stories, I remembered there's a firefly character.  Aha, so clever, I thought.  Everybody knows Archy the cockroach and Mehitabel the cat, but only the true cogniscenti would recognize the name of the firefly.  But even I, clever person, couldn't quite remember: what was the firefly's name?  A bit of Google-fu just now led me here (and you should read this boss what a fine story).  And I see that we never do learn the firefly's true given name.  But he gets a nickname.

And it's... Broadway.

OK, fine.  So, everyone, meet my new banjo uke, archy.  archy is quiet and circumspect, unlike the flashy and unrefined (and short-lived) Broadway.  Works for me. 

(Incidentally, Zesto as pictured on my desktop is a frozen custard stand we found in Fort Wayne this summer, during a pretty spectacular sunset, part of which is visible below)

Comments

[scarfman]

I remember the moth better than I remember the firefly. The moth didn't have a name either.

[acmespaceship.livejournal.com]

True, the moth made a bigger impression. Until this morning I wasn't 100% sure if there was a firefly or if I was just mis-remembering the moth. I fear that archy was not a good newspaperman; he was often lax about the who-what-where.

Goodness, I'm realizing that archy was one of my role models growing up. Mehitabel goes without saying.