Ten Characters I’d Name A Pet After

October 18, 2016 Top Ten Tuesday 26

10-characters-id-name-a-pet-for

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly feature/meme hosted by The Broke and the Bookish. This week’s topic is Ten Characters I’d Name A Child/Dog/Cat/Car/Etc. After.

 

I’ve always loved the idea of naming pets (or cars, or computers) after book characters, whether human or animal. In fact, all our computers are currently named after fictional characters, as are two of our four Kindles. Oddly, we didn’t name our current cats after anything at all; they just have normal people-type names.

Cats

  • Frodo, Sam, Merry and Pippin, from The Lord of the Rings. (Probably in pairs, as I’ve never had more than two cats at a time.)
  • Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes, from Laurie King’s Russell & Holmes mystery series. (Again, for two cats.)
  • Dimity, from Nancy Atherton’s Aunt Dimity mystery series.
  • Dumbledore, from the Harry Potter series. (For a large grey cat.)
  • Minerva or Professor McGonagall, from the Harry Potter series. (For a tabby cat.)
  • Fireheart, from the Warriors books by Erin Hunter.  (For an orange cat. Robin named a feral kitten Fireheart; he was a sweet kitty and we liked him, but he disappeared.)
  • Altra, after the intelligent Firecat in Mercedes Lackey’s Mage Storms trilogy. (Probably for a Siamese or maybe a Maine Coone.)
mcgonagall-cat

 

Dogs

  • Gandalf (for a large grey wolfhound or something like that)
  • Sirius (for a big or medium black dog)
  • Tudor (for a corgi — not after a character but after the illustrator Tasha Tudor, who drew a lot of corgis)
  • MacDuff, after the West Highland terrier in the eponymous picture book series. (For a Westie, obviously!)
wells_macduffmovesin

 

ETA: I forgot to mention that we’ve learned the hard way not to name computers after characters who die or have horrible things happen to them. Maybe names really do have power!

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26 Responses to “Ten Characters I’d Name A Pet After”

    • Lark_Bookwyrm

      I’m sure it would get shortened to McGonagall pretty quickly. 🙂 Or even McGon (or McGone, if she were as shy as one of kitties when we first got her.)

  2. Berls

    Great names. I like how you said exactly the type of animal you would name after. I was just thinking that even though I didn’t put this in my post, but I like ironic pet names. Like if I were going to name an animal Spike after Spike from Buffy, I wouldn’t name a dog. Too obvious. Maybe a bird or a fish. Lol!
    Berls recently posted…Top Ten characters I’d name a child/dog/cat/ car after #TTTMy Profile

    • Lark_Bookwyrm

      They would indeed! Authors are great name sources. I had a cat named Chaucer, years ago. Well, I suppose technically he was my mom’s cat, as they got him while I was in college. But I came home to live for a bit after I graduated, and I fell in love with him. He was the sweetest, most loving kitty I’ve ever known.

    • Lark_Bookwyrm

      When I was growing up, one of our neighbors had a white dog (I think an Akita) named Gandalf. It’s a good name for either a dog or a cat, I think.

  8. Lindsay

    Great picks! I wanted to include Minerva on my list, but I already had two other Harry Potter names!

    I like the Lord of the Rings names — that’d be so cute. Although I would probably go with the full Samwise; I’ve always loved that name!
    Lindsay recently posted…16 Pet Names Inspired By NovelsMy Profile

    • Lark_Bookwyrm

      Glad you enjoyed it! Of course, I doubt I’ll ever have a wolfhound; they’re too big for me. I’m more of a cat person; if I get a dog, it will need to be small. But never say never!

    • Lark_Bookwyrm

      Sorry about Moaning Myrtle; I’m sure it wasn’t funny at the time… but yes, I think that’s a name I’d avoid! We’ve had several devices and computers die or go a bit wacky. I doubt I’ll be naming any of them “Loki” or “Anakin,” either.

    • Lark_Bookwyrm

      Yes, exactly. Some names just require a certain personality or animal. Though subverting that can be fun, too — naming a cat Fido, or a three-headed dog Fluffy. 😉

  13. Roberta

    Russell and Holmes are wonderful ideas. I will definitely remember those.

    We once named a cat Miss Rumphius from a favorite children’s book. That is, until a week later we found out the cat was a boy. Then his name became Jeff.