Monday, October 09, 2006

What's in a name?

What's in a name? People write books, watch astrology shows, etc. to talk about a name and what the name means. My wife and I were looking at names for our future child, and I was blown away by all the names out there. She was on call delivering other people's babies in Los Angeles the other night, and we were on the phone going through lots of names. I probably started to phase out after the first 3 names, but my wife was going through name after name after each alphabet letter. Christina, Christian, Grace(too many other Koreans with this name), George, etc. We can't use this name because it means "dull", this name sounds too arrogant, the baby will get teased if its Sara Lee(baking goods), and on and on.

The funny thing is that we don't even know the gender yet. I was thinking Brutus or Hercules if its a guy, and Booboo or Monchichi if its a girl. My wife did not find that too funny... The tough part about having Lee as a last name is that the name can become an adverb. Mary: Merrily, Ugh: Ugly, Happy:Happily, you get the picture.

Anyways, the hunt for names is still on, and once we know the gender of the baby, we can start limiting it down. I guess women take this stuff more seriously since the child has to live with the name for the rest of their life. Oh man, I don't want to traumatize our baby, and definitely not going to name it after fruit or some Korean dish like Bibimbap or Soondooboo. Anyways, the name search goes on...

7 comments:

daddy in a strange land said...

"Spike" is a good gender-neutral name.

Robyn said...

ooh, even though i will not be making babies for a few more years, i've been reading this site: http://thebabynamewizard.ivillage.com/parenting/
it's so fun! and they talk about a lot of the issues you name (like fathers making up funny names).

And this site tells you how popular any given name has been since like 1800-something: http://babynamewizard.com/namevoyager/lnv0105.html

Also, I know a Sara Lee. She handles it.

Superha said...

My sister's modeling name was Sarah Lee. I also know a TV reporter named Sara Lee.

Have you seen "The Grace Lee Project"?

http://youtube.com/watch?v=HhLZ56iKlv0

It's pretty funny. By the way, I think Lo Siento Lee sounds great!

Marcie said...

How about D'Artagnan? That was my husband's "joke" name when I was pregnant with our son.
If it's a girl you could name her Mary Jane. That gets rid of the merrily thing.
I wanted to name our daughter Mary Jane, but my husband didn't want our daughter to be named after a Rick James song:(

Henri said...

Have you considered Bruce?

Anonymous said...

I suggest going all out. I think all Pinoy babies should be named, "The Great Plebian". Has a sort of ring to it.

Anonymous said...

Ah, names. I dated a guy who went by the moniker spike. He wasn't at all what you picture when you say someone is named "spike."

We are waiting for #3 child [adoption]. As with kids1&2, we will add a western name to #3 child's name. One day, our delightful older kids came to us saying that they had named didi. I took the bait and asked what the name was.

Delightful daughter goes "Chachacha" and falls down next to her brother laughing. So in our house, we call the didi "chachacha."

My mother --lacking a sense of humor--is not amused. Then again, she wasn't particularly amused when the "working title" of our son was "pugsley" (like the addams family) and our daughter was "wednesday."