Pet naming

[Louie and me]

Our first dog came from a breeder who had called him Jesse. That didn't seem to fit but we wanted something that sounded similar so we called him Joshua.
The next two were rescues and we figured they had already had to learn one new name so we kept them the same.
Rocky was given up by his owners.
Louie was a stray given that name by the sanctuary.

I miss them all.

[Trinityagain]

For the current herd:

Zingo Furrburner--named after a dungeons and dragons character
Oatmeal--that is the color of his furr
Scooter--when he was still outside he would block the door. So we started saying "come on, scoot!"
Turbo--my husband had to pull her off of the turbo charger of his truck where she ran and hid. she was less than 1 pound and severly ill. He swears there is still kitten poop on the turbo charger
Splotch--she looks like somebody took handfulls of paint and threw them at her, causing different splotches of color on her coat
GT--stands for Garage Talker. I had gone out one morning to feed the backyard cat and came in to tell my husband "the garage is talking to me"..took us 3 days to finally catch sight of her.
Momma--just fits, rescued with her kitten
Doodle--the kitten. she was born around the 4th of July. So...yankee doodle dandy came to mind....she gets called Bug a lot for some reason. and Buggly....
Itchy--all white cat with an apparent allergy to the sun. when she was still outside she would be crossing the street and suddenly have to sit IN THE MIDDLE and scratch....

[pomtzu]

I name mostly by personality, or country of breed-origin names. Myndi was an exception since when I got her at 10 months old, she already had the name of Mindy, so I just changed the spelling and added "Jo Kong" (from her mother and father's names) when I sent in her AKC papers.

Sparky - definitely a personality name. He was such a bright little flash of light in my life.
Sherbie - he was orange and white - orange sherbet
O.C. - "other cat", since Sherb was already here

RB Lhasas:
Tai Ling Soo - breed origin. Called her just Tai for short
Wei Wooli Bear - "Wei" was part of his grandmother's name, and "Wooli Bear" because he was big like a bear and fuzzy like the caterpillar. We always called him just Bear or Boo-Boo Bear
Scooter - he was a rescue and already named

RB Meezers:
Ming Blu - I thought it was pretty darn original at the time, but it's pretty common for Meezers as I have learned
Sam - he was already named when I adopted him, but a very fitting name for a Meezer
Suki - just Oriental sounding

Cockatiel:
Rocky - because he thought he (which turned out to be a she) was tough like Rocky Balboa

Mortimer was a BIG tuxie I adopted at about 6 years old and already named. It did suit him tho.

And some others way, way back:
Inky - black rabbit
Smokey - gray rabbit
B.R. (dwarf bunny rabbit)
Cinnamon - terrier mix named for her fur color
Dusty - gray cat
Spook - dark gray cat
Peanut - very tiny cat
Snuffy - my first ever cat which I acquired after I married. Hubby was in the Marine Corps at the time, and a "snuffy" in the Corps is an enlisted man of very low rank, so the name was quite appropriate!

I've forgotten a few - but you get the idea..............

[Litterati]

Plus there is the "official" name, the shortened nickname that I customarily use, and with my current trickster, on occasion, when he is being particularly fractious - or catlike - some words that are not his name and cross the line into the "expletive deleted" zone

So here goes:

My first kitty (now at the RB) was officially named Dominick because with his tuxedo he called to mind a Dominican monk, and someone commented that he looked like a sleek dominatrix (gender notwithstanding.) But I called him Nicky or Nickythecat.

My current kitty is a silver gray tabby - ergo Dorian Gray - although I call him Dorry, Dorry-boy, whatever.

Both kitties were privileged to attain COTD status

[Randi]

Fister got his name when we visited him in the yard. John simply started calling him Fister, and it stuck. We didn't know that he was coming up to live with us and hadn't searched for names. Fister is what you call someone who you don't know the name of - I think like Buster in the US. I didn't like the name to begin with, but it grew on me.

[wolf_Q]

I have to add, after being a pet groomer for years I don't want to use common names even more because I get sick of hearing them so often. Half of the shih tzus are Oreo (if they are black/gray and white) or Gizmo. There's a lot of them named Bear too. Bella is a super common female dog name, any breed of dog. I can probably think of at least 10 black labs named Sadie (anyone know why that is? Seriously almost every dog named Sadie is black and usually a lab). Lots of dogs named Buddy, mostly small dogs. Lots of huskies named Koda, Dakota, etc. Oddly enough the past year or so we're getting a lot of girl dogs named Max, not sure what that's all about. Then of course we have the beagle named Beagle, yorkie named Yorky, why would you do that I guess I just don't get it. I'm not saying I hate any of these names just saying I don't want to name mine anything common. It's funny when somebody calls and says "Is Max done?" and we have to ask them their last name or type of dog because we have like 3 named that in one day.