Learning something new at Radio Shack

We haven't been able to use our land line phone* for a few weeks because the battery in the receiver died.  So today I finally found my way to the nearest Radio Shack where the man behind the cash register (whose name tag said "Micheal") obligingly picked out the battery from a huge wall display and then put it in my receiver.  He even took my old battery to recycle it.  (I would unknowingly have tossed it in the trash.)

I asked, "So did your mom misspell Michael or did Radio Shack?"  He said that his name was taken from an old English heirloom Bible (from about 1803, he thought) that has been handed down in his family from generation to generation and which speaks of the "Archangel Micheal;" he didn't know why his mother had decided to name him after the archangel.

Why was I so enchanted?  And why do I think all the family girlies will enjoy knowing that "Micheal" is the spelling in an 1803 English Bible?  Are we all picky, picky, picky?  Or is there some genetic predisposition toward correct spelling, punctuation, and verb agreement that we share?  Anyway, I went off with a little song in my heart from having learned something unexpected in an unexpected place from an unexpected clerk.  And I am just a tad self-satisfied that I know a spelling that the average Joe on the street does not know.

* I read about a girl who, when asked on an employment application to list special talents, wrote in, "I have a land line."  Why do I laugh out loud at that?