Nicknames stick to people, and the most ridiculous are the most adhesive.
In Japan, they have TV sets in cars right now, where you can punch up traffic routes, weather, everything! You can get Internet access already in cars in Japan, so within the next 2 to 3 years it's gonna be so crazy!
She became so important to them that they wondered how they had ever managed without her in the past. And the longer she stayed with them the more indispensable she became, so indispensable in fact that their one fear was that she might some day move on.