Jon No More

I have decided to end the use of my name 'Jon'. It was a good name, and served me well. It would have fit nicely as a baseball autograph. And I can sign stuff. Moreover, Jon Matlack represented the name well in the early days, and Jon Stewart seems to have made it acceptable after years of misunderstanding (what no 'h'?). Of course, a shout out to the clever purveyors of'Porta Jons' and 'Don's Jons' is certainly a lovely addition to our family of Jons. Let there be no mistake--I like the name, as it is a combo old school and mid-50s radicalism--or what passed for it during that most comatose of decades--that I can embrace.  It's old school but cool--kind of like Tony Bennett.

Sadly, the end of Jon came this afternoon, after two incidents that made it clear that the name was causing a number of potentially serious problems.  First, I was to be greeted at the Kabul airport by our security team. I have done the drill many times before--I go to a meeting point, and they are there.  After all this time, the system broke, with no security in sight. So I call the number for security:

"Hey this is Jon. Where are you guys?"

"Uh Jon, what....where are you?."

"Waiting at the airport for you."

"Uh, call you right back Mate." (By constitution it appears that all security guys are either South African or Brit--thus you hear the term 'Mate' in a day here more than you would otherwise hear it anywhere this side of a Hugh Hefner party).

I call back.

"So what's up?" I say, calling again.

"Uh, we'll be right there."

So how does such a thing happen. Well, my  security that barely speaks English (a SA and a Brit) walked up to a guy and said "Jon?"

'Yep"

"You work for ARD?"

"You must have shaved?"  (they were told to look for a guy with manly facial hair--think Sean Connery).

"Yep, I did."

"Get in."

Now this would have worked out wonderfully--had I not called 5 minutes later looking for my ride.  It was then that my crack intel group was able to break through this most serious of security breaches.  After a bit of waterboarding and dog barking, they found that the impostor was Sean, working with IRD (nice accent morons) and had indeed just shaved to celebrate spring. Jon, Sean, whatever.

I am a calm person, and was unaffected. But after spending some additional hours at work, I then came over to my hotel to check in. Problem. After 10 minutes of scrambling, it seems that a 'Mister John' from ARD had taken my room. In Afghanistan, a name like mine gets shortened to 'Mister Jon'. Mohammed Karim Abdul Karini is left alone--but we struggle with odd names like 'Jon' so it obviously needs to be shortened.

This has led me to conclude that I must change my name--what the hell, it may be the only change I haven't made in the last couple years, so why not go for it. I thought that the heavens had spoken when mistaken for Sean instead of Jon, so I would just change my name to Puff Daddy. But the Afghan evening clerk said that the name has been taken. Then taking inspiration from my background, and a lame taunt by a certain Mr. J.S. of Cincinnati, I have settled on a name:

Hoosier Daddy. 

That's right, Hoosier Daddy, as is Who's Your Daddy.  I'll get my security peeps to be my posse. Puff Daddy doesn't ride with guys as rough looking as my guys, packing AK-47s around. That's right--I'm bad--though I think that term may be a decade old, so I will try to find a new description. 

Man, this is going to be sweet. 'We need you to pick up Hoosier Daddy...."  "Room for Hoosier Daddy". Osum. No more confusion. I am ready for the Grammys--or at least the People's Choice awards. 

Hoosier Daddy....I should have done this years ago....Damn well would have gone to the head of the table line at the restaurant. Hi ladies--Hoosier Daddy here.  Nice. This is going to be killer good. 

RIP Jon. Long live Hoosier Daddy.