Benedict

A photographer visits to take photos of my flat for a room-letting website.  He is friendly and we talk about the area and the internet over a cup of tea.  'Oh, I've got a really weird one', he tells me when I ask my question.  His answer therefore comes as somewhat of an anticlimax.  He tells me that his Dad wanted to use it as his first name but that his Mum wouldn't allow it.  I ask why his Dad was so keen on the name.  'He's just a bit arty like that', is the reply.

Claire

A French waitress with short hair and an eager demeanour.  She tells me she doesn't have one.  'I think my parents were trying to punish me', she says.  She gives me, instead, her older sister's who works for the French equivalent of the RSPCA.  She has been in London for two years but is fed up and about to go and work on a cruise ship in the Caribbean.  I tell her that sounds nice.

Stala

Teaching a pupil about the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising of 1943, he tells me that his best friend comes from a Jewish family who have sailed through any problems that their religion may have faced for the last 200 years.  This may have had something to do with the fact that his grandfather was in with the Kremlin (apparently, there is a painting of him standing next to Stalin in their hallway).  The family are such fans of the big man that they decided to give his grandson a disguised version of the dictator's surname as a middle.

Bernice

A break-through of sorts.  On the tube, feeling snuffly, it is going to be dark by the time I get home.  It is Sunday, and I don't feel like approaching a stranger.  I consider walking past the pharmacist to ask for some Benylin Cold and Flu and a middle name but I don't want to.  A girl sits next to me even though there are plenty of spare seats.  She has wavy blonde hair, fur-lined boots and a padded coat.  She is reading the Independent.  There are still four stops to the end of the line.  Realising that I have not yet had a tube encounter, I make a rash deal with myself that, if she doesn't get out earlier, I will ask her at my destination.

The tube empties but she remains.  The doors open and we get out.  I steal myself and catch her up.  I worry that I will seem like a lunatic but, after a flicker of panic, she laughs and seems amenable.  'What do you do with them?' she asks.  I explain about the blog.  The name belonged to her grandmother's sister.  She died when she was 26 from throat cancer.  She was very beautiful, an actress and known as 'Bunny' for short.

We ride the escalator and she asks what the most interesting name has been.  I find it a difficult question to answer and tell her that  I quite often need people to spell them.  As we reach the top she wishes me luck and, feeling better, I go home to cook myself something with garlic.

Joy

Enquiring about joining fees at my local swimming pool, the lady behind the counter has a friendly customer service smile.  Her white shirt is neatly buttoned and ironed and she wears smart black trousers.  Her braided hair is tied back from her face and her name badge is correctly pinned.  She is helpful about the various possibilities but is unsure as to whether the nearby lido would be included.  I thank her for her help and explain my resolution.  'Is it really?' she asks, looking pleased to be asked, 'I don't have one but would you like me to tell you my daughter's?'  I say that would be much appreciated.  She tells me and I ask if there was a reason why she chose the name.  'My husband is quite a lot older than me', she explains, 'so my daughter's birth was a very joyful thing'.  Her daughter is now two years-old.

An hour later she calls to tell me that the lido could be included at an extra cost of four pounds a month.  I thank her very much for her diligence and say I will think about it.

Antony (as spelt on birth certificate) and Bashak

A man came to connect my phone line.  He was wearing a florescent yellow gilet and a beanie.  The process took some time and he had to get out his ladders.  As he was going down the stairs I asked my question and then whether it was with or without an 'h'.  'Well, I spell it with an 'h' but on my birth certificate it's without, you know?' he replied.

Later, in a pub full of noisy Welshmen, the topic of names that could have been is raised.  My friend might have been called 'Milo' after his mother's childhood dog.  I was nearly 'Hamish' after a donkey in a children's book.  A friend of a friend said she had once considered changing her name by deed poll to 'Rik Mayall'.  The revelation of her Turkish middle name comes up by happy accident. 

Walid

Listening to my ipod along a busy road, a lady beckoned for my attention.  She was leaning against a railing and wearing a smart-looking grey coat with turquoise-stoned dangling earrings.  A black scarf was wrapped round her head.

Disorientated by the Rolling Stones and the noisy traffic, I found it difficult to understand what she was saying.  Removing my earphones I finally understood that she was asking for money for food.  I gave her a pound.  She asked for two.  I told her that I didn't have anymore but used the opportunity to ask my question.  She said she didn't have one but gave me her first name and told me it was the final word in Muslim prayer.  She asked if I had ever seen a Muslim in prayer.  I replied that I wasn't sure I had.  She demonstrated by chanting and waving her finger.  She repeated her name three times.  I didn't tell her that this was of little use to me.

In a more suburban part of London, I sit in a quiet cafe.  'Internet' is scrawled in chalk on a blackboard outside.  There are four croissants on a plate and a selection of liquors behind the bar.  The proprietor is an elderly gentleman with a bald head, a grey moustache and wire-rimmed spectacles.  Bringing over my coffee, he apologises for his shaking hands.  He comments on the beautiful weather and goes outside with an espresso and a Marlborough Light.  His accent is Lebanese.  As I pay, I ask my question a second time today.  He looks suspicious.  'What do you want to do with it?' he asks.  Before I can explain he has given his answer and spelt it.  I say thank you.  He says it is his pleasure and retreats to a computer at the back of the shop.  I collect my bag and open the door.  He tells me that his house is leaking.  We agree that we hope the Spring weather lasts. 

Vivien Julia

Today I heard of the recent birth of a friend's baby.  A little girl, her middle names are those of her two grandmothers, one of whom once put cucumber slices on my eyes and sprayed my face with Evian water in the South of France.

Child

The middle-aged Indian man who was loitering in the entrance to the underground claimed not to have one.  He was wearing a red dragon costume made of synthetic fur whilst collecting money for the mental health of children.

At the other end of London, in an upmarket supermarket, my eye was drawn to a bottle of ready-made pancake mix.  All that was required was to add water and shake.  I was impressed by the ingenuity of the product and decided not only to buy a bottle but that its creator, American household saviour Betty Crocker, should be today's middle name.

Compared to a properly-followed recipe, Betty's mix was slightly disappointing (her batter was sticky and difficult to flip).  But more disappointing was the discovery that the cultural icon and top brand name is not a real person.  According to Wikipedia, the name was developed by the Washburn Crosby Company in 1921 as a way to give a personalised response to customer product questions.  'Betty' was chosen because it is all-American and cheery, 'Crocker' because William Crocker was a director of the company.  They neglected to think about something to go inbetween.

Instead, today's middle name is that of the real woman behind the facade.  Marjorie Husted, who was born in 1892 and lived to the age of 104, was a home economist and helped to develop the brand.  For twenty years from 1924 she was the voice and wrote the script for the radio show, Betty Crocker Cookery Show of the Air.

I don't know whether she had a hand in Betty's 'Shake-to-Make' pancake batter.

Poppin' D

Collecting a piece of furniture from the depths of the DLR, I am met outside a factory by a short man with cropped hair.  He is wearing a baggy blue sweatshirt and tracksuit bottoms which don't match.  He also has on a pair of padded gloves.  I ask what he does in the factory.  'I work with gangs', he says.  'What do you do with them?'  I ask.  'Bust 'em', he replies.

As he takes me into the large warehouse he tells me about his grassroots work with street kids.  'We teach 'em magic... illusions', he says flourishing his hands.  He also performs street interventions.  He was born in the local flats and has been working in this field for twenty years since he was made redundant from the building trade.  I am interested and he offers me a tour of the upstairs where the community-based project takes place.  'When I started, it wasn't working', he explains, 'they'd come 'ere, make a mosaic, then go rob someone on the high street'.  He shows me photos of the kids.  Some of them have been defaced.  He tells me the difference between transition and change.

I feel chastened but decide to tell him about my own project.  'My family were so poor they couldn't afford to give me a middle name', he says before continuing, 'That's a joke - but I don't have one'.  He is, nonetheless, eager to help.  He offers the middle name that he was given on the streets as a youngster.  'It's 'cos I was the only white kid body popping on the estate', he says.

He takes off his glove to shake my hand.  I wish him luck with all his good work and head back to the DLR carrying a hatstand.

Rani

Waiting for my debit card to be validated in a cafe, I ask the waitress.  She is tall and thin with hair that is halfway between maroon and red.  I don't think the colour is natural.  She says she thinks it means 'princess' in Indian but she is not sure.  'I'll ask my mum', she says, 'it's hers too'.  She tears the receipt from the chip and pin machine, then calls a shorter and plumper woman from behind the counter.  She has dark hair in curls and large glass crystals hanging from her ears.  They don't look related.  'Yes, it means princess in Indian', she confirms.  I ask if it was her mother's before her.  'No, my mum was English', she tells me, 'my dad was Indian'.

Singh

In an arts centre in West London, a boy is sitting with an ex-colleague mopping up the remains of some mashed potato.  He has a diamond stud in his left ear and chains around his wrists.  When he smiles I notice that his front four teeth are replaced with silver.  Interrupting neat stubble is what looks like an old scar on his upper lip.  His hair is clean and his face is young.

He tells me that all male Sikhs are given the same middle name.  For girls it is 'Kaur'.  My ex-colleague expresses surprise at his friend's religious background.  'We've talked about this before', he says, 'I just don't do all the beard and turban stuff'.

Frances

At supper I sat to a friend of a friend who works in the city.  She has such a dislike of her middle name that she deliberately used to spell it with two 's'es and neglected to include it on her graduation certificate.  At the ceremony, as everyone's full names were read out, her mother was disappointed to find that her daughter had erased a carefully chosen centre-piece.

(In the spirit of fairness I should point out that today's name is a fine actress as McDormand, a perennial children's favourite as Hodgson Burnett and was my best friend at Primary School.  Though I probably wouldn't use it for my daughter.)

Zann Noah

In my local cafe I am happily distracted by a one year-old child smiling at me from behind a large wooden toy.  I smile back.  He starts giggling.  His hair is matted and not yet fully grown.  He has two front teeth.  His face is that of a well-disposed elderly gentleman.  He wears a T-shirt with the slogan 'Hey Ho Let's Go'.  I am impressed by the positivity of his attitude.

We make each other laugh.  The mother says, 'You can keep him'.  I decline the offer but ask her my question on his behalf (the inquisitive gurgling noises suggest that he will not be able to provide me an answer himself).  He steals my spoon, falls on the floor and finds it hilarious.  I, in spite of myself, do too.

Sitting with her mother is a girl wearing a pink and grey striped dress.  She has the mournful look of an elder sibling who is coming to terms with the fact that she is no longer the most entertaining person in the room.

Dorothy

An early morning conversation on Skype with a friend on the other side of the world.  I tell him about my blog and he offers his middle name.  I explain that, as I already know him, it is invalid.  I ask whether his flat-mate is in.  She is and, being called, emerges from the doorway onto my computer.  Both she and my friend have heavy glasses.  She also has a fringe.

I have turned off my video because the connection is weak so I feel sinister and disembodied as I ask my question.  She says she doesn't have one.  There is an unfortunate confusion over the internet waves between the word blank and bland.  She suggests the reason for her lack might be her mother's dislike of her own.  I have my answer.  I ask what her mother is like.  She is short and blonde and a horticulturalist.  Her first name is Wendy and she is married to a man called Peter.  My faceless voice says goodbye and lets the flat-mate return to the darkness at the back of the screen.

(P.S.  I want to retaliate against the aspersion cast on today's name.  She was, after all, a literary giant in the shape of Parker and L. Sayers.  She has entertained generations with her adventures with a lion, scarecrow and tin man as Gale.  As Dandridge, she was the first African-American to be nominated for an academy award and, as Cotton, she is a well-loved chain-smoking resident of Albert Square.  That is not even to mention the fact that you cannot beat the value of her clothes on the high street as Perkins and that she is a good friend of the entire gay community.

Unfortunately, the world is on my friend's flat-mate's mother's side.  From it's heyday in the 1920s as the second most popular name in the USA, it now only just scrapes into the top 1000.)

Rodrigues

In a supermarket buying a chocolate pudding and some daffodils, the girl at the check-out asks me how I am.  She has glitter around her eyes.  I say that I am okay and ask the same in return.  She says I am lucky to be going home.  She is working until eleven.  I comment how miserable that must be, especially on Valentine's day.  She says, 'Don't say that.  You'll make me cry'.  For fear of causing more distress, I change the subject.  I am worried that I am holding up the queue as I have difficulty understanding the answer.  She writes it for me on a till receipt.  We wish each other good evenings.  She has been in London for three years.

Frank, Marcella, Catherine Wagner and Grey

The waitress in a mustard patterned pinafore over a colourful jumper was sorry not to be able to help.  They don't have middle names in Thailand.  She suggested that I try someone from the Philippines.

With no Filipinos immediately to hand, I instead turned to the table behind me.  They were two boys and two girls.  On their table was a box of twelve cans of Fosters.  They were happy to be asked and provided their answers in the order above. 

George Leo

A pianist at the Royal Academy of Music.  Short back-and-sides with a moppy quiff of curly hair on top.  He was wearing a stripey knitted jumper, skinny black jeans and large boots with zips undone at the sides.

I didn't ask whether the second part was related to his star sign.

St Albans Robert

Late at night in a quiet shopping mall in west London, I approach a shop assistant to ask about a heavily discounted item that I am considering purchasing.  He had a large diamante earring in his left ear and a heart-shaped face.  Wispy stubble grew from his chin.  He was folding a towel with energy.  Once he had reassured me that the item was not faulty (although it had been on the shelf since he had started working there the Christmas before last), I asked my question.  He smiled broadly.  His teeth were very white.

I asked whether, like Brooklyn Beckham, the name had anything to do with his place of conception.  His body bent back in laughter.  Considering that he was stuck folding towels in a department store in a shopping mall on a Saturday night, he seemed surprisingly chirpy.  He said he didn't think so but that it had something to do with his grandfather.  I thanked him and we shook hands.

I took the item to the check-out and rid the shop of something that had over-stayed its welcome.

Elizabeth

Back in the supermarket, buying a walnut-layer cake, I am served by the lady with braided hair from 1st February.  I ask if she remembers me.  She is coy but acknowledges our previous encounter.  I ask if, today, she will give me the answer I am looking for.  Again she passes the buck.  "She's got one", she says pointing to a colleague who also has braided hair but hers is tied higher and tighter.  She is perhaps a bit older.  "It's Elizabeth".  The colleague smiles and acknowledges this to be the case.  They have worked together for ten years.

My check-out assistant asks for my middle name.  I tell her but she still refuses to give hers in return.  I leave more determined than ever to discover it before the year is through.

John (II)

In a pub, I am served by a girl with dark hair, a severe fringe and pale skin.  Her English is functional until I ask her the question.  She doesn't understand.  I repeat myself.  The two people next to me at the bar listen in, as does the man loading bottles into the fridge.  She thinks I want to know about the company.  The man next to me, in a padded jacket with unkempt facial hair, tries to clarify, 'He wants to know your middle name'.  The woman next to him, whose face looks lived-in, repeats, 'Your middle name'.  The girl is none the wiser.

Her colleague, still loading bottles, takes charge of the situation.  'What's your first name?' he asks.  She tells him.  'And your last name?'  She understands and answers.  'And the one in the middle?'  It clicks.  'Oh.  I don't have one.'  The four of them look at me.  I turn to the man in the padded jacket.  He shakes his head.  'Don't have one, mate', he says.  I move to the woman.  She looks down to the bar, 'Don't have one'.  I feel as though the fates are stacked against me.  I look to the man loading bottles.  His brown shirt has floral cuffs and he has product in his hair.  He looks efficient and proves to be so with a clear, one-syllable answer.  Relief.

As I pay for my drinks, I ask the man in the padded jacket why he doesn't have a middle name.  'Never had one since I was born', he tells me.  I ask him why he thinks that is.  'I'm from Luton', he replies.

Benedict Graziano

Three boys and a girl sit opposite me at a table next to the fire in my local cafe.  One of the boys has glasses and a moustache (it's ends are waxed into curls) and they are largely dressed in knitwear.  I overhear the girl suggesting a trip to the Saatchi Gallery.  "Near that posh station", she says.  One of the boys suggests Embankment.  "Sloane Square", I pipe up from behind my laptop.  They collectively thank me for my help.

Later, as I pack my bag, I decide to make my request.  They seem happy to be asked and discuss amongst themselves who has the best.  The girl leans back and says hers is boring  Two of the boys don't have one.  The final boy with a v-neck sweater but no moustache says his is good.  It is not an idle boast.  He is Italian.

They ask me what I am doing with the names and I explain about the blog.  I give them the address which makes me nervous.

Valerie (II)

In a busy supermarket the self-service machines are unwilling to take my card.  A human being takes me to real-life check-out assistant.  I decide to make use of the unexpected personal interaction.  I explain my resolution.  He shakes his head.  He tells me his name is composed only of a first and a last.  It is cold outside and I look desperate.  I catch the eye of the assistant next to him in a well-filled orange fleece.  She has clearly overheard our conversation.  "Do you?" I ask.  My assistant clarifies, "Do you have a middle name?"  She replies, "Yes. I have a middle name".  I ask her what it is.  Her pronunciation puts the stress on the second syllable and I have to check that I haven't misheard.  "Yes", she confirms.  But there are customers to be served and no time for dallying.

Marie-Pierre Dominique

A meeting of the residents of my flats and I walk home with the lady who lives below me.  She is French and wears glasses with opaque plastic rims.  She also works from home.  She asks if I want one or all three of her middle names.  I tell her to hit me with the hat-trick.  "I'm catholic", she tells me to explain the use of her godfather's name in the middle, "or I used to be".   

Ramesh

In a deserted South Indian restaurant we are looked after by two waiters with distinctive facial hair.  One came to collect the bill and I made my request.  We had difficulties understanding one another.  I tried to explain about resolutions and middle names.  "I don't know about that", he said.  I tried once more.  A baffled smile crossed his face.  He told me it was his father's name.  In India it is customary for a son to be given his father's first name as a middle.

A minute later he returned.  He wanted to know mine.  I told him and he asked how it worked in England.  "I don't know", he said.  I said I thought it was rather hotchpotch and that I didn't either.

O'Brien

Waiting at a cash machine, I am approached by a black man in a beanie who asks if I have any spare change.  It is snowing so I look in my pocket and find a two-pound coin.  I decide that it might be worth something in exchange.  "Is that your new year's resolution, is it?"  He smiles a crooked smile.  He is holding the stub of a cigarette.  "It's a good one".  I express surprise at his answer and ask whether he has Irish roots.  "Nah", he says, "the people who looked after me when I was a kid were Irish so my Mum decided to give me that name".  I raise my eyebrows and nod.  "I know.  Ridiculous isn' it?"  He laughs.  We wish each other a good evening.

Thomasina

"We need to talk!" says a girl wearing a knitted hood and a green cagoule.  Her arms are spread wide.  In her left hand is a clip board.  I doubt the absolute veracity of her statement.  "Sorry.  I'm in a rush.  I'm late", I explain hesitating for a moment too long.  "Give me thirty seconds", she demands.  Having hovered, I succomb.

She speaks fast.  I learn about the plight of the Siberian tiger, the speed with which we are using up the world's resources and that her favourite animal is the snow leopard (a well-worn fluffy one hands around her neck).  As she pauses for breath I interrupt.  I tell her that I like her charity and that I used to do sponsored walks around Wimbledon Common in it's support as a pre-pubescent.  I also tell her that I have too many direct debits coming out of my account to add another.  She tells me I can always cancel it.

More than thirty seconds have passed but I decide to capitalise on the encounter.  She seems pleased to be asked.  I say I have never met anyone with that name before.  She says she hasn't either.  There were a lot of Thomases in her father's family but her parents didn't have a son to whom they could pass it down.  Instead of ploughing on regardless, they went for the next best thing.

I run to my destination.  I am late.

Augusta and Joseph

Home late without a middle name and reluctant to brave the cold in search of a stranger, I resort to the internet.  I decide to google famous people born on this day.  I have a choice between the pop star Shakira and James Joyce.  I settle on James Joyce (and by accident his wife Nora).

Had he not suffered from a perforated ulcer, James Joyce would have been 130 today (he was fond of his birthday and published both A Portrait of the Artist as Young Man and Ulysses on the 2nd February).  His middle names are generally recorded as Augustine Aloysius but should you go back to his birth certificate you will find it registered in the female form.  Why this should be is unclear.  Possibly a misspelling.  In Ulysses, Joyce makes use of this peculiarity by referring to "the birth certificate of Leopold Paula Bloom".

Stranger still appears to be the choice of Nora's parents.  Did her registrar suffer a slip-of-the-pen too?  However, research shows that it was not uncommon in Catholic countries for people to be given a saint's name of the opposite sex and the husband of the Virgin Mary and earthly father of Jesus Christ is as good as any.  Sadly, they clearly both felt funny about their gender-bending middle names and got rid of them on any official documents when they moved to Switzerland.

Perhaps they should have just swapped.

(Shakira's middle name, and indeed her last, remain a mystery.)

Clare

Buying a baguette and some salami in the supermarket, I am served by a lady with braided hair tied back in a loose bun.  It is cold outside.  For no apparent reason she pulls up her fleece to reveal the hot water bottle she has strapped round her waist.  'They say they're trying to preserve energy', she tells me when I ask whether someone could put the heating up, 'They don't care about us'.  I decide to take the opportunity.  She looks around as if for help.  'I don't have one', she replies unconvincingly.  'Really?',  I ask.  She points at the heavily pregnant woman behind me in the queue, 'She does!'

I apologise and ask if this is true.  The buttons of the woman's black coat are done up tightly over her belly.  I wonder if she has a hot water bottle under there too.  'I don't like it', she says, 'it was too popular.  There were seven of them in my class'.  Then she qualifies, 'Not that I ever use it'.  I have paid and her items are now being scanned by the shop assistant who had facilitated the encounter.  She tells me that her daughter's middle name is going to be Constance, after her grandmother.

The shop assistant pipes up, 'You wouldn't remember mine anyway'.  I remind her that she had told me she didn't have one.  'It's African, you wouldn't be able to spell it'.  'I'm sure it's much more interesting than mine', says the pregnant woman.  'I'll tell you next time.  I promise'.  I tell her I'll bring a pen and paper.