Living a lie

**Update**

Once upon a time, about four years ago, I went to my favorite fruit stand and saw a crate of kittens, all snuggled in a big heap. The one in the middle had whiskers that were just out of control and and its little body was a thick soft mound of fur. That's the one I took home, and I named her Eleanor because she just was. Then Eric was all, what if Eleanor is actually a boy? And I was all, well, then you can name him, terribly cocky because, as I just mentioned, this cat was an Eleanor if ever there was one.

Um, anyway, so that's the story of How Skilly Got His Name.

We get asked a lot where we got the name Skilly, so for about four years, I've been patiently explaining that when Eric was in high school, he saw the town of Skilling on a map of Ireland and thought that would make a great boy's name, so he could go around saying, yo, Skills! whenever he wanted to get the kid's attention.

This is why 1) I am in charge of the naming of children around here and 2) I'm not sorry we ended up with two girls.

Let's take a look at a map of Ireland just for kicks, shall we?

See Skilling?

Yeah, me neither.

Eric was doing a search the other night, and he was all, remember Skilling, Ireland? Turns out it's really Skellig. And we're all, what!?, except Abby, who put her head in her hands and declared that she just didn't know what to believe anymore.

So it turns out Skellig, Ireland, is an island. And from the pictures, it looks pretty boss. Also, it's Skellig Michael, so wow, we could not have gotten Skilly's name any more wrong.

Figure 1

Figure 2

So now we're all like, Skilly! Oops, I mean Skellig!, but Skilly doesn't seem to care one way or the other, probably because we've never really called him Skilling to begin with, exept possibly his first week with us, and then it was shortened to Skilly pretty quickly because it's just easier to say. I just asked him for confirmation on his thoughts, but he's too busy cleaning himself to give me an answer.

NOT an island

Well, the end, I guess. Oh, except Skilly crawled up on my chest this morning and gave me a good licking on the nose, which was gross and also very tickle-y. He likes me best, you know, unless Abby or Eric or Johanna is in the room. That's gratitude for you.

**Update**
So apparently Eric did not find Skilling on a map, but rather heard someone talking about it--and, what with the Irish accent, "Skellig" sounded like "Skilling" to his young ears. And P.S. I'm relieved to hear it was an audio mistake because I've been wondering just how bad Eric's decoding skills were in high school.

Also: Skilly is still Skilly. I guess the moral of this story is that when enlightenment comes late... um, it's too late. Or something.