I hear you on the lettuce association. :-) I think that would dissuade me from using it in real life. I don't mind it all that much myself, but I love other names equally (if not more) that don't also belong to a vegetable!
"Do you know how a man makes his way here? By brilliance of genius or the cunning use of corruption.
You must cut a path through this mess of men like a cannon-ball, or creep among them like a pestilence."
Balzac