name change?

so here's the thing: i've had some questions about the name of my blog recently. people are wondering, "what does agentorange records mean? why use the name of a herbicide? or a record company? weird...."

well, i hear you, so here's a little bit of history to explain (kind of) the name.

first, the orange part. when i was in high school, i had an orange hat that was extremely orange and that i wore all the time. it was a florida gators hat. i still have it, though its more brown than orange now. anyway, i began to become known and recognisable by this hat. orange began to become a bit of a trademark for me. and, quite simply, i fell in love. at first it was just infatuation: i thought orange was beautiful. but soon it grew into something more. i began to see orange as the color of the underappreciated, the unlikely, and the underdog. i mean, in general, orange was an underrated color. everyone's favorite color was red or pink or green or blue, or even yellow or purple once in a while, but almost never orange. it was underappreciated. unsung. and this worked for me.

when i was a child, being the right-handed youngster that i was, i did most things with my right hand: eat, play, color, etc. but once, when i was quite young, it occurred to me that there was a real injustice going on in the use of my hands. quite simply, the right hand had the enormous priviledge to do everything while the left hand often just lied there and got to do nothing. when i realized this, i was deeply saddened for my left hand. so i began to purposely do things with my left hand, just so it felt appreciated and included, and for the sake of fairness. i didn't know it then, but i was displaying what would be a part of my character for the rest of my life: a concern for justice, and a certain affinity for the underappreciated.

so orange began to embody this for me. in college my love for orange was so loud and visible, i was known around campus as the guy who loves orange. soon people were referring to me as agent orange, just as a nickname. i liked it.

the "records" part of the name of my blog is only there because i have always had this deep passion for music and in college began making mix tapes, then mix cd's, as often as i could. i loved juxtaposing songs into collections. i made all of these mix tapes and cd's under the moniker agentorange records, with the tag line: ...die trying. it just became my signature.

when i started this blog, i thought the agentorange records thing was a way to be me without plastering my name all over everything. maybe i even wanted some anonymity.

i'm aware of some of the history of the whole agent orange chemical thing, and in case i wasn't, a chemist in my congregation recently gave me an article that reminded me. agent orange is an herbicide that was used in the vietnam war as a way to deprive the enemy of shelter by defoliating the forests. it was called agent orange becuase the drums holding the mixture were painted with an orange band. following the war, the hype surrounding this chemcial, also called dioxin, had grown enormously and some where calling it the most potent carcinogen known to man. others defended it and have claimed that studies and reports have shown little or no health problems to associate with most dioxin exposure. the debate continues today.

so i thought about changing the name of my blog. then someone said to me that most of my readers probably aren't thinking about agentorange in that way. and i agreed with this until this morning when i google-imaged "agent orange" and saw pictures like this. now i'm not so sure that i'm comfortable with the title. so i'm thinking i should change it.

or maybe i should keep my title but be very specific in my tag line.

help! what do you think? i'm looking for some ideas here. if i changed the name of my blog, what should i change it to? i've thought of things like underdog in orange, the orange agent, under the unlikely orange, the unlikely orange and other underdogs, the orange dog and other unlikeliness, and so on. any other ideas?

further, i hesitate to change the name of my blog because i really don't want to change my URL right now.

blogs are probably best when they are pretty specifically focused, and i know mine is not focused at all, and therefore mostly interests people who already know me, which is fine by me. i'm not looking to attract a global readership. i simply want to write about what i think and feel and what is going on with me. and i want a title that somehow captures me and this purpose.

so, i'm thinking... if you've got any ideas, let me know.

greg.