[asinclair]

I used to work at a division of a very large multinational company. One of things that the employees took pride in was knowing the preferences of every single colleague. The way we did it was to give nicknames to people based on their preferences.

Bitter black -- that was me, wanting my coffee straight

Sweet blonde -- one of the guys who took cream and sugar

We also had monikers for people who preferred tea, or soda, or fruit juice. I don't remember those after more than five decades.

Didn't matter what race, sex, or ethnic background. No one took exception to this way of keeping track. No one.

We cared. That's what was important.

[ProtectOurFreedom]

In the mid 70s, I worked in Red China for about seven months. At the main job site, there were so many guys named “Wang” that we had to give them nicknames to keep them straight. There was “Tall Wang” (the tall guy, of course), “Whiskers Wang” (the guy with the straggly chin whiskers) and a few others. Good old “Whiskers” cracked me up.