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Metta World Peace, Chad Ochocino, Prince, Diddy, Mos Def...we're used to celebrities changing their names in strange and often annoying ways because it gets plenty of media coverage. But what about the normal everyday people who go through the absurd amount of government paperwork to change their boring birth names to something head turning? Where is their press?
MTV Clutch's editor recently revealed that as a child, he wanted to legally change his name to "Thundercats Hooooo!" Fortunately, his sensible mom stopped him. However, there are a lot of people who have the same idea and no one stops them. To celebrate their commitment (or mental instability), these are the five most awesome name changes by regular folks we could find.
5. Happy Adjustable Spanners
At 27, England's Daniel Westfallen made a drunken bet to let his mates nominate a bunch of new names for him and put them into a hat. The winning name was "Happy Spanners," which Daniel legally adopted. Spanners is British code for "wrench." In America, this guy would be called Happy Wrench. That's completely weird enough. However, his boss requested that he change his middle name to "Adjustable" and Happy happily accommodated him because he truly is adjustable. Good call, boss man.
4. "The" Dan Miller Experience
Once upon a time, there was a performer from Ohio who was named plain ol' Dan Miller. But, in 2007, Dan legally changed his name to "The" Dan Miller Experience. His first name is now "The" Dan (with the quotation marks), while his middle name is Miller and his last name is Experience. His friends can't decide whether to call him Mr. Experience or simply "The" Dan. The quotation marks continue to mystify us, but we have to admit his new name is 100 percent more exciting than his birth name.
3. Optimus Prime
In 2001, on his 30th birthday, Scott Noll, a member of a National Guard Unit in Ohio, legally changed his name to Optimus Prime, aka the leader of the Autobots. Six years later, when a Mr. Jason Burrows became Jason "Megatron" Burrows, Mr. Prime challenged him to a battle. There's no record that this battle ever took place. We do know that Mr. Prime is still alive and married with four children. Here are some other questions that we do not have the answer to: Is his wife known as Mrs. Prime? Do they write "Optimus" on his cup at Starbucks? How often does he talk to/stalk/prank call Shia LaBeouf?
2. McLovin
As often as people yell, "McLovin!" at "Superbad" actor Christopher Mintz-Plasse in public, you'd think he changed his name. After all, who doesn't love McLovin? Actually, we bet Christopher Mintz-Plasse doesn't at this point.
But 30-year-old Gary Fisher takes home the prize for biggest "Superbad" fan: He legally changed his name to McLovin in 2008. He says it reminds him to take life less seriously, but there's no word on whether or not it helped his love life. Informal poll of all the ladies in the world: "Definitely not."
1. Jesus Christ
At 42, in 2006, New Yorker Jose Espinal changed his name to Jesus Christ. Mr. Christ received legal permission and is officially known as Jesus. According to all accounts, so far he has been a disappointing Jesus. He cannot walk on water, has not healed anyone with his hands and nobody follows him...not even on Twitter.
If any of our readers will legally change his name to "MTV Clutch," our editor will pay you $500 and negotiate a number of additional prizes. Seriously. Email him.