Charise Mericle Harper: Hello, my name is Charise Harper, and this is my cat, Penny. The Harper part of my name is a gift that I got when I got married 10 years ago, and the Charise part of my name is the gift my parents gave me when I was born. Sometimes you like a gift a lot, and sometimes you don't like a gift a lot. When I was a child, I didn't think the Charise part of the name was a very good gift. I wanted a regular name like Sally or Anne or Mary or Jennifer or Susan or something. But you know what? As I've gotten older, and probably right when I was in high school, I decided that I really did like Charise, and I liked that it was different. And even though I have to spell it all the time 'cause everybody spells it wrong, I still really love my name. Once again, my name is Charise Harper, and Penny says hi.