Here's a little sentence that requires no real explanation: "At the age of eight months, Presley's parents started calling her Summer." Speaks volumes, doesn't it? "It took six visits to civil court but now the government calls her that too," explains the Times, in this little bit on regretting the wacko name you gave your baby. What did you ever expect? But this at least is an interesting age, in which nearly all always-popular names are less popular than ever, due to diversity in naming choice-due to our love of fun! And our worship of individuality, etc. This points us, of course, to the extreme rise and serious downfall of "Paris." Just like "Ashley" and "Gingerly," now Paris is totally a whorey name-and you don't want your kindergarten teacher to think you're raising an adorable little stripper.
Thursday, April 8, 2010
42
New York Times blog commenters continue to be the best commenters:
I can still recall the place and time at which I knew, without a doubt, that this child-to-be in my uterus would carry the name Maizie.
My brother's dog is named that! She's a really sweet dog. It's a perfect name for her.
Well, when was it?
awww, because she's such a sweet little corn-cob.
There was a golden brown French Bulldog at the San Diego dog park I used to frequent, with the name "Corn Nut." I think this would be a fine name for a child, as well. Especially the mother passes her.
OMG my cat growing up was Maizey! I got it from a Judy Bloom book... the one about Deenie? She was also an awesome cat. If you brought home powdered sugar donuts she knew even when they were still hidden away in the bags.
I very much enjoyed this comment.
Five or six years ago everyone seemed to name their sons and their Labrador Retrievers "Max." In the past 18 months, of the four baby boys born to my friends, two were named "Kai" and two were named "Dashiell." None of these people knows the others.
I have friends with a recently spawned Dashiell, too!
Too bad Raymond is so dull, since I vastly prefer Chandler to Hammett. (And of course "Chandler" as a first name needs to be dead for a generation at least.)
@oudemia: I have a 6-year-old cousin named Max.
@oudemia and Setec: ditto.
I knew a Dashiell when I went to college in Olympia. He liked to huff paint stripper in the dorm elevators and he lit himself on fire at least once. Because of this I learned that there really are men in white coats who sometimes will come and take you away. You hear all of the time about people trying to light themselves on fire, but not about too many people who actually pull it off. So Dashiell is clearly a good name if the parent wants a doer.
We just learned this morning that one of our file clerks named her newborn son Makynleigh.
Well, that's one way around the Mac/Mc mispelling issues he might face later in life...
This reminds me of the time I got Bill Murray's face tattoed on my right leg, and how upon leaving the tattoo parlor the first thought that occurred to me was how awful it would be if he were to get arrested with a hard drive full of kiddie porn and I'd be stuck with a pedophile permanently etched on my body.
A week later he was, in fact, arrested, although it was for drunk driving a golf cart through Stockholm after reportedly "borrowing" it because he was in a hurry to get to a nightclub.
I'm OK with this.
This comment is full of win.
-seconded-
I know what you did three summers ago!
Summer? Thew went to all that trouble to change the kid's name to SUMMER?
That's the name of a girl who will grow up to be a swimsuit model -- or one of those women who lies on car hoods at auto shows. If that's the life direction they had in mind for their daughter, well... good job.
C'mon, Summer's greatest aspiration will always be to become a kept woman.
Hey, my friend is a Summer and she is not a swimsuit or car show model. She is also not a stripper or an Oregonian outdoor enthusiast.
I can bear witness to two skank auto-show Summers (one kept), to add to your quotient.
Just don't call me late for dinner.
I don't trust the database - there were no matches for Knuckles.
Punchington.
I would've put Knuckles Punchington in my names tournament Final Four.
Presley's such a nice name. Why not keep the name but go out a buy a better kid?
The only Presley I know is a little (male) shit who rides my daughter's bus. Maybe his parents should take your advice.
"Choire"?
http://www.babynamewizard.com/voyager#prefix=choire&ms=false&exact=false
I used to work with an escort who went by Summer (long story). Sometimes she went by Octavia. I kind of preferred Octavia.
Yer right. Octavia is kind of awesome. Summer is like bleeding to death because you can't pick up the phone to call 911 because your fingers are too greasy but it's warm out.
Octavia was the name I chose for myself in 7th grade Spanish class.
My mother was named "Thomasina," because she was born on the same day as her older brother Thomas. But when my grandparents took her to get baptized, the nuns were like, "Really? Really?" and so she was baptized something else entirely and only ever called by that name. In her 20s she had to jump through all manner of hoops getting her legal name to match the name she used.
Way to go, nuns!
I had friends who named their kid Maggellin (or some similar butchered spelling) because "names with 8 letters are known to have magical qualities".
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QmNoywqfWZ4&feature=related
Or you could just name your five sons "George" and call it a day.
Angelina Jolie you can continue to fuck right off.
I love you so much it hurts.
Precious snowflakes all deserve precious snowflake names.
And that reminds me of a student in my friend's class a few years ago named Precious Unique. Granted we're talkin deep Appalachia here but seriously?!