The trouble with Scott Hines

Call me by your name. Just don't sign me up for any emails about it.

I’ve got a real problem with Scott Hines.

Not myself, that is.

I mean, yes—to be fair, I have a lot of problems with that Scott Hines—but that’s not who I’m talking about here. I have a problem with someone else. Multiple someones else. Frankly, I’m even not quite sure how many there are. A dozen, maybe more?

I have a Scott Hines problem, but it’s all the other Scotts Hines I have a problem with.

And there’s more of them than I realized.

Hines is, according to a quick search, the 434th-most-common surname in the United States—not incredibly rare, but certainly not on the level of names like Smith, Johnson or Williams, either. The most difficult thing about the name is the spelling, since there’s a half-dozen ways to get there from here—I have learned to reflexively spell it without being asked when giving it over the phone—Hines aytch eye en ee ess.

(No, not like the ketchup. Yes, I have heard that one before.)

Scott, for that matter, peaked in usage in 1971, when it was the 10th-most-common name given to boys in this country; by the time I was born in 1982, it had slipped to 34th. In 2021, it was the 607th-most-common name for boys, a few spots behind Huxley, Sincere, Westin and—most troublingly—Donald.

Point is, the combination of the two is far from impossible, but it’s not hugely common, either. I have never in my life met another Scott Hines, and were it not for the internet, it’s quite likely I might have gone my whole life without ever encountering another Scott Hines.

Then, in 2004, I went and signed up for a new email address.

I was a relatively-early adopter of GMail, back when Google’s then-revolutionary gigabyte of inbox storage was available only if you knew someone with one of the coveted invites. Seeing as how I was just getting out of college and soon to be applying for jobs, I thought it prudent to sign up for an address that was simply my first name and my last name, and not like, JagerBombBearcat69420@hotmail.com.

---

Please share with the class the worst email address or username you once had.

---

For a few years, this worked just fine. It was easy to give my email address out, easy for people to find me. Everything was as it should be.

As email because a necessity in more and more parts of life, though, the unwanted emails started.

Details on the overdue oil change for the SUV did not know I owned.

Communication about the house in Seattle I was apparently planning to sell.

Updates on the high school basketball team in Arkansas I seemingly coached.

I was suddenly and unwillingly exposed to the existence of a whole class of Scotts Hines, many of whom appeared to lack a fundamental understanding of how email works.

(I understand that there are in fact many people who are not as chronically-online as I am, but I still struggle to grasp the concept of “giving out your email address without knowing what it actually is.”)

It was a minor, somewhat amusing nuisance for a while, but it’s gotten worse.

Appointment reminders from a Veterans Affairs medical facility.

My kid’s disciplinary issues in middle school.

Confirmation codes for things I have no desire to confirm—these usually come in threes or more, as I picture a faceless Scott Hines somewhere growing increasingly irate at their keyboard as they repeatedly request a code that never arrives for them.

I can’t decide who’s the worst one: is it the Scott Hines who signed his high-school-aged daughter up for the college-admissions mailing lists of roughly 100 schools, or the Scott Hines who signed up for campaign messages from the Trump family? I choose to believe they’re the same Scott Hines, and that way I can focus my anger on the one bad apple in the bunch. (I bet he’s actually one of those guys who goes by his middle name. J. Scott Hines or something. A real Scott Hines would never.)

Most of the time, I’ll just delete these messages or unsubscribe and report as spam, especially when they’re just stuff from mailing lists. If it’s a person-to-person message, I might send a brief, terse message noting that “this is not the email address for the person you’re trying to reach”.

Sometimes, though, I’m passed a baton I can’t just throw away.

A few days ago, I came back from a meeting to find no fewer than a dozen emails in my inbox, some containing links to mandatory paperwork that Scott Hines had to fill out before starting my—er, his—new job the next day. Every one of the emails came from a no-reply email address. I had plenty of my own correspondence to catch up on, but I couldn’t just let these sit. Scott actually needed these.

I hopped on LinkedIn—something I try to do as little as humanly possible—and was able to track down the profile of a Human Resources manager at the company the emails came from. I sent her a short message explaining the situation, and received a quick reply.

Thank for for tracking me down and notifying me; I will reconnect with the other Scott Hines and get his correct email address. He’s not the most tech-savvy individual, but I'll help him figure it out!

The messages stopped, and presumably Scott Hines started his new job the next day as planned.

I am tired of being the keeper of so many Scotts Hines; it is hard enough managing the one I’m supposed to be. Maybe this is what I get for being slightly ahead of a tech curve, though—if my address had been “shines82” or “SHCincyChiliGuy” or something silly and completely out of the blue like “actioncookbook”, I wouldn’t have this problem.

Maybe I was simply destined to become the ambassador to the tech world from the nation of Scott Hines.

For all the differences we clearly have—I do not plan to ever coach middle school basketball, own a Toyota in Orlando, or vote for Donald Trump—we’ve got at least one thing in common. Maybe I can do them a solid from time to time.

I hope they’d do the same for me.

—Scott Hines (the best one) / @actioncookbook

Image Credit: Getty Images / Westend61

PS: The Getty Images search results for “computer frustrated” are an absolute delight.