Some areas of New York City have colorful names, or names with surprising etymologies. Spuytyn Duyvil, at the turbulent confluence of the Harlem and Hudson Rivers, takes its name from the Dutch, "spitting devil," and puts us near not only the Netherlands, but also near the netherworld. The latter is seconded by the less beautifully dubbed, but still more dangerous Hell Gate, which leads From the East River to The Long Island Sound--and from there to Jerusalem, in whose Hinim Valley the Talmud puts the gates of Hell. In the same vein, chique Soho was called "Hells Hundred Acres" by the denizens of its factory lofts (and one of its hook and ladders is still called that). Pearl Street, The Bowery, Wall Street are less imaginative. Spring Street, on the other hand, comes from a fiction of another sort. There never was a spring there at all, but a dry hole and a boondoggle, a scam water project. The pit was used to a hide a murder victim's body, though. Of the "surprising," I know just one. The Rockaways aren't some distant sea-plunked boulder, "Rockaway" was the name of the Native American tribe who lived there, among other places around town.

What about where you live?