What's In a Name?

Had to do the Shakespearean reference in the title. After all it is DC's citywide Shakespeare Festival this year and I've already attended several different productions around town. I'm especially looking forward to seeing Jeffrey Carlson in Hamlet. Don't know who he is? Mark my words - you will soon. If you watched him as Zarf/Zoe on All My Children, I'm sure you are as big a fan as I am.

Back to the subject, I've been frustrated for some time by the fact that many, many folks can't seem to spell "gardener." Is it really that hard? I mean, it is one of the few English words that is spelled like it sounds -- "garden" then add "er." One after another I hear from people saying their email to me bounced or the web site is not working, when I dig further I find they are trying to access: http://www.washingtongardner.com/, which clearly does not exist. *Sigh* A typo I'd totally understand, but that deliberately missing "e" is going to be the death of me.

On principle as a writer and editor, I just cannot fork over the dough to pay to register that domain name misspelling and have it directed to our correct site. I mean why should people be coddled? They'll never learn if we do that. So here I am venting and I guess I'll just have to learn how to deal with it as it seems to be getting worse every passing week judging by my phone calls and in-person encounters. At least the magazine still comes out on top of the Google search even for the misspelled version of its name. For the record it is Washington Gardener Magazine at http://www.washingtongardener.com/!

BTW, the real Washington Gardner (pictured above) was some kind of Civil War hero and a Congressman from Michigan for several terms. Read more about him here.