I was a beta user for Gmail back when it first got up and running, and so I had my pick of user names. I could have picked derekjames@gmail.com or derek.james@gmail.com or any number of user names, but I thought I'd go with short, easy-to-remember, and convenient, so I picked djames.

At one point early on, I had an offer from someone to buy it from me. I ignored him, but I probably should have taken him up on it.

Now, on a daily basis, I get emails directed to Daniel, Danielle, Debra, Deborah, Dan, David, and just about every other D. James you could think of. Many times, these people sign up for email subscriptions and end up using my address (I don't know if this is out of stupidity or to deliberately annoy me). My spam folder currently has 17000 messages in it.

And now, even if I wanted to switch, both derekjames@gmail.com and derek.james@gmail.com are already taken. And of course I'd have to update a jillion references to my new email address anyway.

Blah.