No, that was a predicate adjective, not a predicate nominative. If you apply it like a predicate nominative, you eliminate the import of its serving as a predicate adjective. So you can just get that idea out of your head right now.
Let me restate myself: In the nominosphere, my name, among all the other names, is simply tops. It’s eminent, elegant, and sturdy. It’s one of the things putting me squarely and unabatingly in my parents’ debt. It’s marvelous. It’s great. I like it.
Just feel that cadence! Two trochees with a stressed foot closing them off!
Just hear that movement! It begins on the highest vowel sound, ‘ee,’ and ends on the lowest, ‘oa!’ An ‘ai’ serves as a perfect mediating third! The unstressed feet preserve their simplicity with the more neutral “er” and “i!”
Not a single consonant interferes with another; consecutive articulation is kept in radically different locations!
How expansive! How orderly! How comfortable!
If it were accompanied, its accompaniment would be by Copeland or Holst.
If it were painted, its colors would be rich without ostentatious or assertive brightness.
If it were personified, it would be someone grander and more interesting than I. Someone regal.
Like Peter the Great, for example. Especially since we share the name. Sort of. Gross means Great in German. Or Big. Like in Great Britain. Which, in German, is Grossbritannien. Which proves my claim to Britain. And Russia.
Plus, if you think about it, since “Peter” means rock and “Gross” means big, I also get all mountains everywhere. Debatably, I get the whole earth. And the moon. Don’t leave out the moon. And etc.
We haven’t even gotten to the Bible yet. Peter: the head of the apostles. David: the definitive ancestor of Christ and the King of Israel. My name, in other words, lays claim to the headship of the human expressions of both Judaism and Christianity. Plus, you know, it’s great to be named after great men.
But none of that was why my parents named me what they named me. No. It gets better. My middle name? It’s my papa’s first. I don’t just have my family’s name, I have my father’s name, too. My father’s name. So I started using it regularly on work of which I was proud. If my teacher received a paper by “Peter Gross” they could have known to expect something sub-par. But a Peter David Gross paper.. Well.
But wait. There’s more. My erudite mama gave me my first name in honor of a fictional character of impeccable taste, talent, and rectitude. Yes. It’s true: she named me after Lord Peter Death Bredon Wimsey. Himself. I think she had a crush on him at the time.
Not only did she give me a name shared by a fictional character of impeccable taste, talent, and rectitude, she gave me a name that almost means as much (or some portion thereof) literarily. Peter Stanhope. Peter the Magnificent. Peter Pan. Even Peter Rabbit is the best dressed animal in the book. (Incidentally, the second of that list also annexes Narnia to me.)
I think I’ll (humbly) show some reservation at this point: that’s all for now.
But just to make it clear..
Summary of the above and Moral of the story: My name, to put it frankly, no offense intended, if you will, is tops. Thank you.