Hello, I’m Desirilious Spackle
6 January 2005

Two stories in the Scotsman today on the growing propensity for parents to give their children ‘unique‘ (i.e. made up) names. Before I start, I’ll say this — I’m a bit of a traditionalist when it comes to names.

In Hong Kong and China, I’ve met a Disney, two Silvers, and one Orange. Oh yes. And one named Charade. The days when I thought Johnson was a funny name are over. A Johnson’s nothing when you have a Charade. Now, I’m pretty sure these are all self-inflicted names, so they only have themselves to blame when they realise what they’ve called themselves. But if your parents do it to you and stick it on your birth certificate, I think when you reach school age you can emancipate yourself on the basis of child abuse. Or something.

7 Comments

  1. Is there a reason you keep reading The Scotsman even though you live on the other side of the world?

    Comment by eviltwin — 7 January 2005 @ 12:24 am

  2. evil twin – neil's fae scooooooooooootland. plus she has family there. plus it's a decent paper.

    andrea – i read that article too. i thought some of the current most popular names were TERRIBLE. i'm sorry, but millie and amber are names for pets, not children. keira's pretty awful too.

    Comment by kristen — 7 January 2005 @ 5:18 am

  3. At Xiamen Holiday Inn there are girls called 'Flutter', 'Marlin' and 'Merry'. At our company we have a 'Dewey', 'Gullet', 'Junsel' and used to have a boy named 'Nicole'

    Comment by TuTu — 7 January 2005 @ 8:57 am

  4. We have a bloke named Kaiser.

    Comment by andrea — 7 January 2005 @ 9:15 am

  5. i've heard of eurine and happy. and gwyneth paltrow's kid is named apple.

    Comment by Chuen — 8 January 2005 @ 12:35 am

  6. It is more than just getting teased in the lower school grades. Someone did a survey of companies doing hiring. They found that "normal" names were sometimes five times more likely to get called for an interview from submitted resumes.

    Comment by Terry — 8 January 2005 @ 2:26 am

  7. A man named Sue … The man in black had it pegged years ago.

    Comment by mdmhvonpa — 8 January 2005 @ 11:22 am

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