Well, if you're going to spell it *that way, Jackie. But if you want to express hostility towards my beloved ASp, you gone hafta come through me.
All I can say is that my misspelling is an indication of my unfamiliarity with the term. AnnaS., if I have ever used that, I sincerely apologize. I agree very strongly with what the FF and Zed indicated: that whether it is "okay" to use derogatory nicknames depends primarily on the personality of the recipient and the quality of the relationship between the two people, and the circumstances. At the moment, I cannot think of a single circumstance where I would call her ASp and mean it in a non-derogatory way; and even if I could, I couldn't be sure due to the circumstances of communicating electronically that she would know it wasn't derogatory, and so I just don't use it. Whoever came up with that nick may or may not have meant it derogatorily; and whether they did or didn't, AnnaS. may not have been offended; I can't know these things. I'm not saying this or any other nickname should never be used; but *I would worry that it would cause offense if I used it, so I don't.
I have on occasion called my kids something like "dingle-dobber", when they've done something they know was stupid. BUT--they understand, by my expression and my tone, that what I am really telling them is, "Yeah, you make mistakes; you are loved and accepted anyway". If I ever called somebody an ugly name in the heat of the moment, I would regret it for the rest of my life. I just cringe when I hear siblings call each other "Stupid", or "Idiot"--even on a TV show! And it's ten times worse when the parents do it to their kids.
