So when people ask me for my username for something, I tell them. I usually have to spell it for them. It usually gets accompanied by the question – five minutes later, sometimes – "Why did you choose that as your username?" and my answers vary. Sometimes I go into a deep, mystical reason as to why it is what it is, sometimes I just say I don’t know, but sometimes I actually tell them where it came from (which is generally less exciting than the other two options).

Rewind back a few years to around 2003-time. I was, what, 12 years-old? It was on the edge of the Internet boom and me being a near teenager was getting into the whole thing. Hotmail was where it’s at and it’s come to the point where its a good idea to get yourself an email address. Hey, it was free, so I wasn’t complaining.

I’d had hotmail accounts before, but they weren’t really any good. I’d forget the password, or get bored of the username I’d used on it. It became too long and annoying to type in. So I thought I needed a short, snappy username to become cool and edgy. Obviously, all the cool and edgy words were taken (or you could have coolio234687 if you really wanted to…) so I decided to invent my own word. What’s cooler than inventing your own word?

Looking around for inspiration, I had three items in my site which made up the final word ‘Stupler’. To this day I can only remember one was a box of beer and the other two were nothing to do with a stapler…

Success. Hotmail liked my new username. Fantastic. I now have an online handle which was to become mine from that day on. When you search Stupler on Google it comes up with countless sites that I’ve signed up for. You can find out a lot about me from Google, it seems. It’s a blessing and a curse.

But before this post turns any more into an IMP seminar, let’s go in to what else Google throws up when you type my username.

Perhaps the most famous Stupler is Eva Kolosvary-Stupler, an artist from Budapest, who now resides in America making a living out of awesome looking art. She makes wall and free-standing art out of things people throw away, like Self – the statue-type thing on the right – amongst other more mainstream art types like drawings. From drawings of vegetables to the downright awesome looking patterns called Emanations, Eva Kolosvary-Stupler is someone I suggest you study for an art course, if not for your own amusement. See her website here.

There’s a slightly more boring guy called Reynold P. Stupler who provides financial advice to the Americans who need it. He’s had 25 years experience and can give public speeches about the accounting and financial sectors of industry. Yeah, but I bet he can’t make awesome people out of a chest of drawers. Anyway, if you must, you can contact him online and get all his oh-so-exciting services, but I don’t think you came across my blog to seek financial advice, did you…

There’s even an art history teacher called Harvey Stupler, but there’s not a lot of information online about him. But you know which Stupler there’s a lot online information about? Yeah, me. So when you ask what a Stupler is, you know it’s better than an Art History teacher, an accountant and even an artist. Happy days.

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