Let me state here and now, for the record, my name is my name, not a pseudonym. Why anyone might imagine that a person would deliberately take on a handle so unwieldy, if they did not have to . . .  well.  My pops was a Limerick and my brother is currently raising  two more, so the receiving of books filled with cunning limericks or funny limericks or – heaven forefend – rude limericks, is a tradition that is likely to go on for some time in my family.

Not only is my name long (if you include my middle name) but a surname like Limerick seems always to prick folk into beginning nonsense rhymes they cannot finish, when they first meet me. I have had more, “There was a young woman from . . .” said to me than I care to recall, yet not one fellow has thereafter produced anything worth remembering.

It may be worth noting that there is another alison limerick out there – I have met her and her brother Edmund, who is a bona fide Lord. We are not related, she being a pretty, blond, blue-eyed woman (sister to Lord Limerick), me being none of those things but I am pleased to say, like me she is a good egg, nice woman, smiley or was when we met many years ago. Out in Facebook and Twitter land there are other folk using my name, commandeering it for no sensible reason that I have been able to discern. They do not claim to be ‘alison limerick’ but are simply using that unique combination of letters, or so it seems. I have been told by a number of friends who were seeking me on-line, that they found strange, unrelated pages when googling my handle. Oh well such is life. If I was an Ann Smith I would have no time to worry about the footie-mad fellow who has called his page alison limerick or the whoever-it-was who had appropriated the name on Facebook before I signed up, who had built the page (about me!) then walked away from it. I have had to number myself, as though I were a series or a sequel. Poor me you may think, however, if I were Ann Smith, that number might not have been 1 but 199. There are (unfortunately for the Ann Smiths out there) one or two women with legitimate claims to the name.

So in conclusion, I am what I am and what I am needs no excuses or silly rhymes, or questions asked about whether I come from Eire. I do not and although I have enjoyed every trip I have made to Ireland, (north and south) I have never lived there. I hope that clears up any outstanding questions upon the subject of my name. If it does not feel free to ask, however I do not respond well to . . . foolishness.

For those reading this who have no idea why I have been wittering on about limericks, try this: