By Robert Kirby 6824

| The Salt Lake Tribune

Authorities in Southern Wisconsin recently arrested a 30-year-old man named Beezow Doo-Doo Zopittybop-Bop-Bop. Doo-Doo for short.

The Associated Press reported Doo-Doo was picked up for drugs and carrying a concealed weapon. Fairly serious offenses to be sure, though probably not as serious as that name.

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Doo-Doo used to be just Jeff Wilshcke. Exactly why he legally changed his name is a mystery, probably even to him. A wild guess would be a cause relative to the primary reason he was arrested.

Still, you have to admit that Doo-Doo is a handy name in today’s ID theft environment. It’s doubtful that somewhere else in the world — certainly not in America — there is another Beezow Doo-Doo Zopittybop-Bop-Bop.

If you went to buy a car, there’s no way the salesperson would say, "Are you the Beezow Doo-Doo Zopittybop-Bop-Bop living in Provo or the one Arizona?"

On the other hand, the name doesn’t fit all that well on a pocket. "Elder Beezow Doo-Doo Zopittybop-Bop-Bop, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day-Saints" would require a name tag the size of a license plate.

Most of us don’t have the luxury of being the sole owner of our name. The average person with the average name probably has some kind of ID twin somewhere in the world.

There are a number of Robert Kirbys out there. In 2006, I was thrown into the Iron County Jail, charged with intoxication, assault, mordification of livestock etc. Bail was set at $10,000.

Apparently I was REALLY drunk because the first I heard about getting arrested was when a friend sent me the news clipping.

Turns out it was "Robert M. Kirby" who got arrested in Iron County. The Robert Kirby that is me hasn’t been arrested in nearly 40 years, though not for lack of cause.

It’s also been a few years since I was mistaken for the gay comic strip artist Robert Kirby in New York.

If there’s any online confusion now, it usually has to do with some lawyer in South Carolina, a candidate for sheriff in New Jersey or a math professor in Texas.

Note: I’ve heard there’s a monkey Robert Kirby, but I’ve never actually verified this.

Don’t start thinking you can clear up any confusion by sending someone a picture of yourself. I Googled "Robert Kirby photos" and got pictures of race cars, birds and people of different ethnicity, gender, species, etc.

There’s a picture of my face Photoshopped onto someone hugging Jennifer Aniston. That was disturbing. It’ll be even more disturbing if my wife sees it.

As the world becomes more populated (and the Internet more demonic) there may come a time when my name, date of birth, Social Security number and photo no longer suffice to identify me as me.

Eventually, we’re all going to need ID numbers behind our names like email addresses. It won’t be enough to just be "that idiot columnist Robert Kirby." I’ll need to be "that idiot columnist Robert Kirby 6824."