Who's this Norman Cowie and what's he doing with my name?

So who's this Norman Cowie guy?

I mean, seriously, he's pissing me off. Whatever that means. Um. Whoever made up the statement 'pissing me off'? It makes absolutely no sense at all.

Sure, you can, well ... let's be a bit more delicate here ... anyway, you can 'tinkle' ON something, but you can't tinkle OFF something. That just makes no sense. Why do we use phrases that we don't understand? Jeez, ridiculous. It pisses me o...

Oops.

Anyway, back to this Norman Cowie guy. The nerve of him. Whenever I Google myself ...

What? You never Google yourself?

SSuuurrre you don't. Surely you aren't as crass as me. Of course you don't Google yourself. You probably don't look in a mirror either, right?

Anyway, this is about me, not you. Or more precisely, it's about that guy going around using MY NAME. Sure... it's a great name. Goes all the way back to Scotland. But that doesn't mean I'm going to let someone use it.

Well, there's a ...let's say, rumor ... that I occasionally go up to the little magic 'G' in the corner of my brand new laptop, type in the words ...norm cowie... and wait to see what pops up.

Will it be a new review of one of my books, a mention from another writer, my book being passed from one reader to another on a book swap site, or maybe a shout out from someone on Myspace? The point is, there often is something new and exciting.

So imagine my surprise when I enter 'Norm Cowie' and up pops some a page that has to do with someone using my name ... some Norman Cowie. Apparently he's a professor who was rejected for tenure or something and he's soliciting ground swell support for his tenure.

Hah. I know exactly why he didn't get tenure. it's because he's using SOMEONE ELSE'S NAME! Mine, to be precise. Okay, this sounds insensitive. I'm sorry, I'm sure he deserves tenure.

I was kind of thinking of shooting good old Norm an olive-branch email asking him to maybe just confine his Google tags to 'Norman Cowie,' and I'd take 'Norm Cowie.' So I was plotting my approach... assembling my rationale and arguments ... surely he'd get the sageness of my request ... he'd understand ... after all, with such a wonderful name, I'm sure he's great guy ... right?

Anyway, I was composing my email, and out of habit did a quick Google ... and what did I discover? There's another Norman Cowie out there!! What the heck??!

It just ... tinkles ... me off!

Norm

www.normcowie.com (NOT www.normancowie.com!)
The Adventures of Guy ... written by a guy (probably)
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