This sums up my friend's rant when his niece named her new kid "Jayden". God damn what a horrible name Jayden is.

The wife and I enjoy reading the stupid brood-hauling vehicles plastered with extracurricular activity stickers of their spawn and their correspondingly inane, and horribly misspelled names. As the link below states:

One very popular naming trend of today – using alternative spellings of common names – will frustrate census-takers, receptionists, teachers, government officials and the other people who handle the hundreds of forms for years to come.

I personally can't wait until Mikhayla and Jaidyn hit the workforce where people like me will not hire them based on the fact they have jacked up, impossibly hard to spell names.

Darn tootin', we should be using solid real names like Cletus, Bertha, Edna, Floyd, Ina, Horace, etc.

Ha! I have one of the more interesting last names (spelling and pronunciation wise) in my group of friends. It's always been a boon. Great icebreaker. And it's always fun (at competitions) to hear "John Smith on deck and Kyle....with the long last name, is in the hole."

Of course, KYLE is pretty basic.

If I had twin boys, I would name them Kirk and Khan. Alas, it was not meant to be...

Now this begs the question, is the genius of George Carlin being demonstrated because he's making fun of people who react this way about names?

Or was he reallly that anachronistic about the whole thing?

Xela

We chose a name that could be yelled from the porch and look good on an office door- Eli. When we hear a real doozy we tell our son we had considered that name for him. When he was young he would just look sick.

His peers' names, born 1994-1998-ish all sound like fancy names for cheap shoes: Janae, Dorsson, Nicoleene, etc

Some ex-flower children actually gave their kids names like Zapp.

Some in the black community believe that they are handicapping their children with names like Trapeesha, Shanequa, LaQuanda, since it will difficult for them to be accepted in formal business settings.

Pertinent article.

Relevant quote:

Jaydien That's right. Jaydien. Don't forget that I. That I is what sets young Jaydien apart from the mere Jaydens of the world. Now don't you people who named your kid Jayden feel behind the times? You bought the beta version of that name. It's like buying an iPad too early. Six years from now, the name will have morphed into Jayydizzosoian, and then you'll really feel like a sucker.

I teach in the inner city I could throw a handful of abominations at you in a heart beat.

Paladin wrote:I could throw a handful of abominations at you in a heart beat.

Sounds like something a High Demon would say to an impudent adventurer.

Ichabod is a name that should never have gone out of fashion.

My daughter's middle name is Lilith-Danger

JoelB wrote:Some ex-flower children actually gave their kids names like Zapp.

Frank and Gail Zappa's brood; Moon Unit, Dweezil, Ahmet Emuukha Rodan, and the baby, Diva Thin Muffin Pigeen.

Paladin wrote:My daughter's middle name is Lilith-Danger

I'd make an exception to that. Lilith is a great name and danger is too...both also words AND spelled correctly!

Yep, and the kids:
New Boss: How do you spell your name again?
Kid: Its J'auxziph,
New Boss: But its pronounced "Joseph"?
Kid: Yeah, my mom was a moron.

A story he'll have to re-tell until he is old enough to afford a name change.

And no little cheap license plates with his name on it for his trike or bike.

The "cute" lasts 10 minutes but they've saddled the kid with a stupid name for at least 18 years.
I work where I've seen every permutation of of this practice. My favorite is still Dakoduh.

Nosmo King

I still think my granddad had one of the better names, Ignatius.

whitey wrote:Nosmo King

I still think my granddad had one of the better names, Ignatius.

Ignatius is good, or the more Anglicized Ignatz.

But if we're going with famous Catholic saints' names, I like Xavier.

And FS, I'll see your Ichabod, and raise you an Ishmael. What a great response he has to to the question, "What shall we call you?"

In naming our daughters, we favored traditional names that give them a lot of nickname choices (like Elizabeth, Katherine, Margaret, etc.) Smorgasbord names.

My younger daughter's beau is named Max Paradise. Really. Do you think his parents wanted to spawn a porn star?

JoelB wrote:Some ex-flower children actually gave their kids names like Zapp.

Or Amir...

There's a kid (male) who runs a cash register at my local grocery store whose name is... Devonaire! Thanks mom!

At his current school we jokingly refer to my kid as token - he's bright white and blond. Jeez what an unpronounceable disaster that row of cubbies is. Lots of Jaydens, at least three per class, with innumerable spellings. The annoying thing is that people seem to think his name, Kieran, a very old and common (in the rest of the English speaking world) Celtic name, is unusual and difficult to spell/pronounce correctly. He's going to Montessori in the fall where he will be in class with Adelaide, Olivia, Hannah and Brent.

My sister in law used to teach inner city in Oakland, Ca. She had a student whose name was Tae Kwan Do.

My son was almost named Bjorn but then we'd have to move to either the Dakotas, Wisconsin or Minnesota. Instead, Sage Xander is what he got. I joked with my dad that we'd forgo his admonishment and name him Harry Alexander Olsen III. I was seriously almost disowned. My Dad finally hurried the last person who called him Junior in '82...

Xander is a version of Alexander. My middle name is Harry so my dad is happy.

Grandpa Olsen was...interesting. He was proof that we had bear shirts in our lineage for sure.

Some folks have been surprised my wife is white. Not many ladies named Winona it seems.

ErikO wrote:Some folks have been surprised my wife is white. Not many ladies named Winona it seems.

All the Winonas I've known have been Anglo women with big hair.

One year I did have a tequila and margarita in the same class.