Cross/Gruff/Grass/Graph/Cruss

I am a member of a group on Facebook called, “People Who Always Have To Spell Their Names For Other People”. It is a worldwide collection of 381,326 who all join together to rant about the constant mispronunciation of their names – for anyone who has asked me for my name on the phone they will know me as Ruth Gross, G-R-O-double S for sugar...maybe not the correct phonetic letter but 95% of the time prevents mail arriving for Miss Cross/Gruff/Grass/Graph/Cruss

Rather a random topic to blog about it but I have been thinking about it this week following a conversation with somebody on the phone about my surname, who insisted I was wrong. Whilst I appreciate the anglicised pronunciation of my surname is Gross as in 144, the correct (and Polish version) is Gross similar to Cross. Yes it is Polish NOT English so if I correct you please don’t correct me back!

I apologise for the tirade but I know there are 381,325 other who know just what I mean!

Ruth G-R-O-S-S, granddaughter of Aleksander Gross, Zakopane, Poland

P.S. it is meant to be AleKSander, not AleXander