'More on My Name'

    Today, I happened on Bébé Mélange's (née Great American Satan) 'Life's a Gas' 2026-06-15 Freethought Blog entry coincidentally entitled "Your True Name".

Bébé Mélange's (née Great American Satan)

     (Here is my reply further detailing some of the troubles I have had with respect to my namesake.)  

 

   My name, which was handed down to me after the death of my brother, who died before I was born, has caused me no end of bureaucratic grief. This was even before I added an extra middle name in 1997.

 

    Early in life, the school records had my name in the wrong order (thinking my middle name was my first). Later on, when I joined the work force, the IRS and SSA got me and someone else with my same namesake, employer, and birthday (not year) entangled. 

 

    That only took forty seven years of back ‘n’ forth to undo. 

 

    I was even denied benefits on account of my currently being in a federal penitentiary. 

 

    I was never incarcerated.
 

    Then the military came after me for evading registration although I had been registered and classified 1-O with them for decades. All of it because they too, had my name incorrect. 

 

    More back ‘n’ forth.
 

    So I changed my full title to a play on words. What the heck.
 

    😉

 

  -FIN-

 

MARS

From my 2026-06-07 I Facebook post and subsequent reply to John Heiden’s comment:

I was curious to see what ChatGPT would make of my name "Manuel Antares Richard Sanchez" which is a play-on-words I officially chose for myself in 1997. Antares is a star name which roughly translates "the rival of Ares" the Greek of war, known to the Romans as Mars - my very initials.

A collaboration between myself and ChatGPT

ChatGPT came up with the image and slogan you see, but I had to later darken the initials ChatGPT was instructed to do, but failed to execute.

Be assure however, I am most definitely anti-Ares!

And now that I've made an "arse" of my myself, my "ears" are burning!

;-)

Later that day, here is the question John Heiden (my friend and very first roommate) quite understandably put to me:

    “I’m sorry I haven’t asked sooner but which name do you prefer to go by now?”

And my reply:

The name by which you’ve always known me: “Richard”.

  I was handed three names at birth, which until I reached 18, were in the wrong order, then in 1993 I found they weren’t even my own, “Manuel Richard Sanchez” was the name of my late brother, who died before my twin sister and I were born. (I learned the truth stumbling upon his death certificate.)

 Instantly, I had no name of my own.

So I decided to add a fourth name to the three as to have one that was mine and no one else’s. My initials already spelled MRS, so why not make it MARS, as I love astronomy and 50’s sci-fi anyway.

Then I realized “Antares” and the word play would be perfect.

 In 1997 I made it official before a judge, amending all my government documents right down to my birth records.

“Richard” however remains my mom’s favorite spelling of the name I’m called.

I realize this is more than you ask, John, but “in for a penny…”

    ;-)

    In a related bit, my full name before the change has caused me nothing but bureaucratic nightmares. For forty seven years the IRS and SSA had me and another Richard Sanchez (same birth day but not year) entangled. The military was also on the lookout for me even though I was registered 1-O with them for decades. So on and so forth.

 [UPDATE: 2026-06-09

I think I could add to the slogan making it read thusly: One name. One star. One planet. One person. Maybe it's overdoing it with one phrase too many, instead of remaining succinct, tight, pithy with brevity the aesthetic goal. Then again, Mars is the fourth planet, and my name has four initials, and more importantly, there are four primary picture elements: the slogan, the star, my name, and the planet surface below! So the aesthetic concept of the number four most definitely comes into play. Maybe I can try to see if I can recreate the graphic on my own, with the necessary changes being made to it. We shall see.  

2026-06-11 12:08:00 AM PDT:

Voila! Dood! Here it is! Actually, it’s not that bad. All I had to do was have Google’s search A.I. roughly identify the font, Goudy Old Style, then cut the original slogan and replace it with the updated text.

The finalized image.

 

  -FIN-

 

What's in a...

 ...HEY!

    While working on the previous post, I noticed something that had slipped my prior attention - mainly because I was not thinking that very hard about it. 

    In addition to my middle name Antares (the rival of Ares, id est, Mars) spelling "ant arse" with the switching of two letters, something I long knew. It can also spell "ant ears". And if I kept going, then I'd could also get phrases like "tan ears" and "tan arse", "ran east", "sane rat", "sane art", "sane tar", "sea rant",  "sat near", "are ants", "Rats Ena", "Ena star", "Ena arts", "Ena tars", "seat ran", "eats ran", "teas ran", "tears an", "stare an", "rates an", "snare at", "rate san", so on and so forth.

Ant, Ares, arse, ears, tan...

    Now that I've taken the time to notice, here are even other words embedded within like "eat", "era", "Etna", "Nate', "neat","net", "nets", "rate", "rates", rent', "rents", "rest", "Santa", "Sara", "sent", "sear', "seat", "snare", "Stan", "star", "stare", "stern", "tares",  "tase", "taser", "tea", "tears", "ten", "tern", "terns",  but which can make little or no use of the remaining letters to form a meaningful or coherent phrase.

     Okay... 

    So now that I have duly noted the presence of the word plays and smaller words possible, I can move on.  (I'm sure my obsessive-compulsive disorder hasn't exhausted them all - Stop that, OCD!)*

 

;-) 

 

-FIN- 

*I’m kidding about the OCD. I only have a touch of compulsive behavior; just a smidgen. Nothing full blown.