Getting to know each other's Avatar/Name

[Ginseng]

My avatar is the painting "The Girl with a Pearl Earring" by Johannes Vermeer. This is one of the most mesmerizing portraits I've ever come across. Here is a site with probably more than you ever wanted to know about Vermeer's masterwork.

My handle goes back to 1992 as my first screen name on AOL.

Wilkey

[aes8]

My avatar is the painting "The Girl with a Pearl Earring" by Johannes Vermeer. This is one of the most mesmerizing portraits I've ever come across. Here is a site with probably more than you ever wanted to know about Vermeer's masterwork.

My handle goes back to 1992 as my first screen name on AOL.

Wilkey

I think this was also made into a movie, I got "forced" to go by my ex-gf but I remember actually enjoying it.

aes8 was my freenet login id when I attended CWRU. I just fatfingered the 9 instead of 8 and never corrected it

[BigGuns]

my screen name is a nickname that originated as a play off of a nickname that was derived from my last name while in college. Follow that?

the avatar is clear enough - the bad ass, bad boy, original "nation" team - my OAKLAND RAIDERS. It has lasted a little longer this year than it has in the past few, for obvious reasons. Soon enough, it will change to the logo of my other team - the LA LAKERS.

I usually drizzle in some Dodgers in the early summer and some USC Trojans in the late summer.

All the haters can save it. And suck it!!!!

Much love.

[Stalebread]

My avatar is the painting "The Girl with a Pearl Earring" by Johannes Vermeer. This is one of the most mesmerizing portraits I've ever come across. Here is a site with probably more than you ever wanted to know about Vermeer's masterwork.

My handle goes back to 1992 as my first screen name on AOL.

Wilkey

It has nothing to do with "eye tracking"?

[MoneyPit]

My doberman was trying to get my attention while I was signing up and I thought it would be a clever name... Looking back, I'd probably just use my usual nickname if I could change it. No big deal.

The avatar photo is for my alma mater. It's been a rough year on ol' Rocky Top, but they're going to turn it around soon enough. GO VOLS!!!

[kycolonel]

Been a proud Kentucky Colonel for over 20 years. The avatar displays some of my interests, a good cigar, fine Swiss timepieces, and a cold beer [Presidente shirt].

[baragh]

I've always been a huge fan of Calvin and Hobbes, and read it constantly growing up.

Always identified with Calvin as this kid who is a strange mix of really mature and really immature. Love it.

[SandmanTR]

Ok. So I'll take a stab at this.

My screen name goes back a long time. About 16 years. It's a combination of where I live and my affinity for Star Wars. I live in the Southern California desert where temps reach a lovely 115 - 118 degrees Fahrenheit in the summer months. At which time I refer to where I live as Hells Furnace . Hence the 'Sandman' portion of my screen name since all we have out here is sand, sand and more sand.

The 'TR' portion is an abbreviation of the sand people from Star Wars, the 'Tusken Raider'.

My avatar changes over time but during football season it's usually a Pittsburgh Steelers championship ring (I was born and raised in Pennsylvania). In this case, it's their latest one. The one they received after they won their sixth Super Bowl.

[Montaigut]

The small French village I live in is called Montaigut.

My avatar changes all the time depending on mood, occasions, holidays, or whatever else catches my fancy. Why be normal?

And sometimes 2+2=5 for sufficiently large quantities of 2's....

[PigFish]

I am often roasted, and people seek me out for my good taste. I swim in the world's oceans and streams gaining wisdom and the masses gather to devour me and aquire it. I am food for the brain and the soul alike. I bring something to every table.

And if you believe any of that bullshit, you are a lot dumber than I thought!!!

My name is a long story. A story of family and friends, a river that flows as freely as a keg of cheap beer. It signifies that I don't take myself too seriously. It is to inspire humor, especially at me. My story is posted around here somewhere.

My avatar is often changed and typically has something to do with my namesake. A pig with his head out of the window holding pinwheels depicts me pretty well.

Great thread mate. -Piggy

[ChanceSchmerr]

Boy....Guess I should jump in here too, as my name and avatar are somewhat unique......

First, the name - "ChanceSchmerr". Well, i'm a fanatic Baseball fan, with a taste for baseball fantasy leagues. My leagues of choice aren't using current baseball, but use historical statistics - you create a ballclub using players from 1885 to present, and use particular seasons to create a roster that could include 1927 Babe Ruth, 1960 Mickey Mantle and 1885 John Clarkson, for example. A sophisticated engine then pits your team and it's stats against other teams with their stats and generates a game boxscore to approximate what might have happened had such teams and players faced each other. Whatifsports.com is the host - designed basically to determine "what if so-and-so played against whatshisname?" ANYWAY - I'm in a few progressive leagues (we play season to season, keeping the rights to players as you progress through the seasons to approximate a real ball league), and everytime you create a team, you also get a roster of "Minor League" players - randomly generated rookies that you can use to fill holes on your roster. Each is not given stats, but rather ability indicators like Speed, Power, Contact skills, etc. Each of the minor league players has a randomly computer-Generated name, and there have been some really stellar names over the years, as you can well imagine. But the finest, most hilarious name I ever saw was a Catcher by the name of "Chance Schmerr". Great bat, lousy defence, but a winning name, and I took it as my Alias the moment I saw it. After all, who the hell would ever damn their child with a name like Chance Schmerr?

The Avatar is a little easier to explain. If you can't tell, that's Sideshow Bob from the Simpsons, during his Mayoral "Victory Speech", where he just laughs diabolically and maniacally for a few minutes, followed by the comment "Just look how happy he is!" from the TV announcer Kent Brockman. I picked it because I think Sideshow Bob is one of the best charactors on the show, and I thought this picture could relay the impression that I'm a crazy, nutty bastard.......and I think it does so quite well!

It matches well with my sigtag picture of Homer with his "Knoxville World's Fair" Cigar, about to call out Sideshow Bob for smoking what appears to be a PC/Perla in a theater while watching "Ernest Goes Somewhere Cheap" (Probably not Ernest's best film)....I'm still trying to figure out how to make the picture smaller in my Sigtag......

Anyway...that's who I am, a crazy baseball and Simpsons-loving nut!

[BlueClaw]

Been an Raider fan since 1977 when Stabler the "snake" was at the helm with Madden. back then they were a mean kick ass team in every sense.. still liked them when Plunkett took over.. still a fan but the thrill died down until they make a comeback.. some day.. .

my screen name is a nickname that originated as a play off of a nickname that was derived from my last name while in college. Follow that?

the avatar is clear enough - the bad ass, bad boy, original "nation" team - my OAKLAND RAIDERS. It has lasted a little longer this year than it has in the past few, for obvious reasons. Soon enough, it will change to the logo of my other team - the LA LAKERS.

I usually drizzle in some Dodgers in the early summer and some USC Trojans in the late summer.

All the haters can save it. And suck it!!!!

Much love.

[BlueClaw]

Avatar is something smiliar to the Dark Side of the Moon album cover by Pink Floyd.. i didn't want to use the same as what they use.. I'll never forget Pink Floyd's Dark Side concert i went to at in NYC back in the mid 70's.. awesome !! the light show was just out of this world.. and so was I i slowed down abit since then..

for the past 7 yrs from June to October I take 250 mile trips from NY to MD with my buddies to catch BlueClaw Maryland crab... i'm not talking small size crab here.. the jumbo and mumbo sizes... haul em back to NY and feast on crabs with family and friends... i use to go almost every week but last couple years i've only been able to go 5-7 times during the season..

[sharks]

My Avatar is the Great White. Always had a facination with sharks mainly the white pointer.

One day would love to swim with one ( yes in a cage lol, heard their not very good pets )

Sharks

[mkz]

mkz = My initials.

Avatar: Me.

[dizedean]

Avatar is from "Mad Magazine" (obviously Fidel smoking an exploding cigar) a comic book from my youth that I read religiously.

Helped make me the man I am today.

Name is my first AOL screen name from back in the day, have used it ever since.

My real name is Dean

[Ginseng]

It has nothing to do with "eye tracking"?

Funny you should mention eye tracking...

Here is a cropped version from the Vermeer site that I used as the test stimulus.

Here is the Gaze Plot, a record of where and when people looked and for how long. The numbers inside the circles are the order of looking. The size is proportional to the time spent looking at that point in the image. This is one viewer's record of looking. As expected, eyes, mouth, earring, and areas of high contrast (the front of her tunic against the dark background) catch the eye.

And finally, the ever popular Heat Map which shows the overall distribution of the number of times people looked at various regions. Blue or no color overlay means relatively few looks. Red means lots of looks. Again, not too surprising, lots of looks at the eyes, mouth, and earring.

Wilkey

[cubanmule7]

Sorry, don't have an avatar yet. Eight years ago I was channel surfing and came across Le Tour De France on versus. I became mezmerized with the jersey colors. strategy, spectacular crashes and unbelievable stamina required of these atheletes.

The next day I went out and purchesed a road bike and began my odyssey.

On one particular day I was on my way home from a 40 mile ride when I heard a yell from a car "NICE BUTT", When I turned around to see who shouted out this compliment...It was my wife's girlfriend with three other girls giggling in the car. Hence the name Cyclebutt.

[micahzeff]

I stumbled onto FOH while doing a google search to find photo's of Cuban cigars after doubting whether the first box of cigars I had ever purchased were legit. I signed up for what I thought was a throw away account, and used the generic name that's usually on credit cards in advertisements. Much later I stumbled back across the forum and began obsessively reading the posts on FOH and have learned so much, and now check the forum many many times per day.

My avatar is a photo of my daughter dressed as a monkey for Halloween.

[SmokinPorn]

First of all...great topic. For my name, it symbolizes two things. First, I couldn't select Porn or Pornel which is a nickname I've had since junior high. Second, when I first started smoking cigars, it was like heaven. So what's the next best thing to heaven in my weird and demented head....Porn. LOL. So I came up with SmokinPorn.

As for the avatar, I had the mask and though it was so cool that it had a fat stogie that I felt was so appropriate to use as my avatar here on the fabulous FOH.

Lastly to Leaflover....hopefully the Celtics can beat the Lakers this year but I wouldn't bet on it. LOL. Cheers!

[cubanmule7]

OK. just got the avatar and it's the Chicago Bears logo. I'm from Chicago and this is my football team.

I will probably switch up the Bear avatar with the Blackhawk logo and there's nothing you Red Wing fans can do about it!!

[mazolaman]

The avatar is me.

The name is due to the fact that I run vehicles on vegetable oil.

Currently running a Mitsi Delica on vegetable oil,although not much at the mo,as it's too bloody cold!

[Ginseng]

The avatar is me.

The name is due to the fact that I run vehicles on vegetable oil.

Currently running a Mitsi Delica on vegetable oil,although not much at the mo,as it's too bloody cold!

Biodiesel. Very cool. Hats off to you, mate. So, um, does your tailpipe emission smell like chips?

Wilkey

[LeafLover]

First of all...great topic. For my name, it symbolizes two things. First, I couldn't select Porn or Pornel which is a nickname I've had since junior high. Second, when I first started smoking cigars, it was like heaven. So what's the next best thing to heaven in my weird and demented head....Porn. LOL. So I came up with SmokinPorn.

As for the avatar, I had the mask and though it was so cool that it had a fat stogie that I felt was so appropriate to use as my avatar here on the fabulous FOH.

Lastly to Leaflover....hopefully the Celtics can beat the Lakers this year but I wouldn't bet on it. LOL. Cheers!

Cigarporn, I think you're right. Seeing how the season is shaping up for both teams. I don't think Celtics will beat the Lakers this year.

BECAUSE LAKERS WON'T MAKE IT TO THE FINALS!!!!!!

[mazolaman]

Biodiesel. Very cool. Hats off to you, mate. So, um, does your tailpipe emission smell like chips?

Wilkey

Yes,when I first start up in the morning,there's a definite smell of fried stuff!