Naming of Vert

“Bob the Spine” was the first choice — just because I thought a spine named Bob would be funny.  The idea was scrapped, however, because others may not have shared in my often nonsensical humor.  My second idea came from an undergraduate class I had entitled Functional Vertebrate Anatomy — everyone called it “Vert” for short.  This sounded like a good name for a character.  It retained its monosyllabic quality, pertained to the subject matter, and was kind of catchy.  Not to mention, it would lend itself to many cartoon ideas.  Mr. Vert teBrae would be his name; his last name making its way into the panel some 35 cartoons later [panel35].