Well, my first name is Claire. My father called me Claire Bear when I was small. And to clinch the deal, I was working for the Great Dickens Christmas Fair and Pickwick Comic Annual in the late '70s and thought there was something missing from the recreated 19th-c. London streets, so based on the painting on the cover on the 1975 Penguin Book of English Folk Songs (way-too-small picture here), I built myself a bear suit and became the Great Dickens Christmas Bear and Pickwick Comic Animal. (Ask Dave Swan if you don't believe me!) My partner rented me out for waltzes at 25 cents a dance, or 50 cents with the muzzle in place. He had me on a long chain, and whenever anyone wanted to whirl me around in a glorious Vienneze waltz -- and there were a few takers -- he'd have to run in circles around the happy couple in order to keep from entangling us with the chain. It was hilarious.

So there you go.

Topsie -- I was wondering if that was it. I am a lifelong Morris fan and undertook a pilgrimage to put a wreath of wildflowers on his grave a few years ago. That visit to Kelmscot is a jewel-like memory I will treasure until I die.

Claire