Lately the origins of my e-identity has come up a couple of times. Most recently Metspolice.com awarded me a Mazzilli award for “Most Optimistic” (I think the fix is in there), and Google Images suggested he use a picture of a Cheetah.
Last week’s Mostly Mets Podcast, perhaps the final one of the year, answered one of my Twitter questions involving Kirk Nieuwenhuis’s potential promotion. I asked when he’d be up here to take Andres Torres’ job. Toby Hyde said July first, Ted Berg said sometime in June, and Patrick Flood twisted it a bit and suggested he’d take Jason Bay’s job instead. When Patrick read my question he mispronounced Ceetar as “Key-tar” instead of “Cee-tar”. Ted, the one of the trio I’ve met, corrected him but forgot the origin of the name.
So here it is: I was looking to name a character in an online MUD, which is basically a text-based pre-World of Warcraft style game played over telnet. (This was like 1997) I came up with Ceetar. My character ultimately became a demon-worshipping evil priest type character wielding dark magic and a spear to kill monsters and good guys. It became my online identity and as I began signing up for accounts and emails and websites, I started using it as my user name. So that’s the pretty nerdy origins of the name.
As time as gone on, the idea of creating a more ‘professional’ handle has come up, but I ultimately pass on it. I’m not trying to hide or be anonymous, and I don’t think using Ceetar does that either. Almost everything I’ve done on the Internet about the Mets has been done as Ceetar. To use my real name would actually obscure some of that, and the name is hardly hidden.
Back on the topic of the Mostly Mets Podcast, which deserves it’s own review post one of these days, I think I’m setting a New Years Resolution to meet either Toby or Patrick (but not both) so that I can say I’ve Met Most of the Mostly Mets Members. Try saying that five times fast.
