Maniacal Rage

nekcihc-deactivated20110116-dea asked:

So that picture you posted of the phone being gutted came up on my dash and at first glance I read your url as 'media carnage.'

Well, “media carnage” is better than some of the other pronunciations I’ve heard in the past 10 years. Because my primary email address is my name @ this domain, I often have to give out said address in stores or over the phone. I always preface the info by saying, “This is a long one, but here goes,” and then I rattle off letter after letter. Most of the time, when I’m done, the sales rep or whoever tries to pronounce it. The most common mispronunciation is “mania calrage”. What the hell is “calrage”? Also common: “manny-ackarage”. Again, those aren’t even words.

The funny thing about all these issues is that I chose the name Maniacal Rage in 1999 after seeing a guest appearance by Joe Pesci on Saturday Night Live in which he completely mispronounces the word “maniacal” when telling Jim Brewer (who is playing a poor version of Joe Pesci) that he’s actually a calm person who doesn’t “burst into lunatic, maniacal rage”. Except he says “may-knee-ackal” instead of “man-eye-icle”. (Watch the sketch—Pesci’s appearance starts around 6:40.) I thought it sounded funny, bought the domains, and here we are more than 10 years later.

Of course, at the time, I never considered that I’d be in my thirties spelling out maniacal rage to a mortgage broker.