Throughout my life, I have had a surprising amount of people comment on my name. Apparently, it is a very interesting name. Now, let me tell you, I actually have been pretty fond of my first name. And my last name… well I think you can imagine the kinds of names kids made up with my last name. That being said, I’ve been told that my name, Samantha Spurlock, sounds like a mystery novelist, a sports caster, a lawyer, a blogger. I have also often gotten, “are you related to XXX Spurlock?” “Do you have any relations with Morgan Spurlock?” “I knew a Spurlock back in high school.” ETC. While these have all been good experiences, I think I have officially encountered the most unique mentioning of my name.

For some reason, many Irish have been kind of fascinated by my last name, but last week topped all my other name experiences. I went into the bank for the 145th time since arriving in Dublin, and the teller said, “ay Samantha Spurlock, do you play the sport?”

I was completely thrown off by this statement, and thought that maybe I misunderstood him with his thick accent. I think he understood that I was confused by my dumbfounded look and my awkward giggle without a response since I had no idea what he was saying.

He asked, “Have you played the sport spurlocken?” Genuinely shocked, I asked him what was spurlocken. His response, “a cave divin’ sport my lass, you know, where you go ‘plorin’ caves on de coast of England” (in my best Irish accent impression of course!).

This intrigued me so I came home and did some research: I did not find anything on Spurlocken and probably spelled it 15 different ways…but I did find what he was talking about. There is a sport called Spelunking that I guess with an irish accent sounds a lot like Spurlocken.

What is spelunking? Well according to wikipedia: Caving — also traditionally known as spelunking in the United States and Canada and potholing in the United Kingdom and Ireland — is the recreational pastime of exploring wild (generally non-commercial) cave systems. In contrast, speleology is the scientific study of caves and the cave environment.

I guess you learn something new every day! I can truly say however, this was definitely a new name experience and probably the coolest one I will ever get!

Some more homework for you, youtube spelunking and let me know what you think. I can’t actually watch it because it makes me too claustrophobic, but enjoy!