Monday, May 30, 2005

nomenclature

sometimes i'll get a random name stuck in my head. it may be a semi-celebrity or just something i heard over the p.a. at the airport or in junior high. most usually it's a person whom i have never seen or can't remember. something whose existence revolves almost completely around the sound of its name. like jeff gillooly.

it'll show up and stay in the background. in between thoughts, it'll pop in, on the off chance i had forgotten.

ron hornbaker!

once in awhile i'll try to say it over and over to get it out of my head, you know like playing a song you've got stuck so that it'll exit when you hear the ending?

annika sorenstam annika sorenstam annika sorenstam annika sorenstam annika sorenstam annika sorenstam annika sorenstam annika sorenstam

that only has about a 25% success rate.

other times, i'll think i've gotten rid of it and then, as i'm staring at the contents of the refrigerator trying to decide what to take, it'll sneak up on me again.

daaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaamon lindelhof!

and then there are those horrible times when i'm trying to listen to someone important explain a new work policy or give directions, their sentences are peppered with the name of the moment.

'see, it's all very simple. bo bice! when you see the gas station on the right, you just bo bice! and then make a right at the bo bice! it's the fourth house on the left. got it?'

um...

this doesn't happen enough to be a problem, just often enough to annoy me. maybe it's karmic justice for my unending scrutiny of local birth announcements. but i'm sorry, giving your child a five-letter name when only one of those is a traditional vowel should be a crime, Alxys' mom and dad. and i'm not even talking about it in the they-won't-be-able-to-find-a-keychain-or-mug-with-their-name-on-it sense. honestly, people. the child will have to live with that name for LIFE. and i refuse to back down. so if i have to deal with a little idle brain torture in exchange, so be it.

jeff gillooly!

11 comments:

omar said...

This doesn't happen to me often, but it did during the presidential elections with Barack Obama. I couldn't stop saying/thinking about his name.

I couldn't agree with you more about the baby names. People make such an effort to make names "different," and it's the kids who have to suffer. I met a kid a while ago named "La'Jayson." The apostrophe is bad enough, but La'Jayson? Seriously?

Anonymous said...

sadly, recent research shows that a child's name influences how others perceive/treat them such that teachers rate a child with a less traditional name like "La'Jayson" as having less potential than say even their sibling with a more traditional name :(

on a sillier note...OMG this posting has me cracking up bc i so know what you mean!!! Esp Jeff Gillooly. Other "intrusive" names include: Irina Slutskaya, Picabo Street...
and more recently, the psychologist, Dick Woodcock...who with another psychologist created an achievement test called the Woodcock-Johnson! c'mon!
;)

Jon said...

Hmm… the name thing doesn’t happen to me very often, but I do get songs stuck in my head all the time, and when I can’t think of something that I’m sure I know, like the name of an actor or a band, that can keep me up for hours and hours. And even though I could very easily look it up on the Internet, (thank you imdb.com) I feel like that’s cheating.

But really all this post did was make me think of a song by the Crash Test Dummies.

Unknown said...

my family is crazy about various names and stuff-- there are these names of people or things that we have come upon at one time. The entire family would be notified and the story would be told and retold so that when we talk about something or in a certain situation that particular name would come up. (my family is nuts) -- for example: my granpa had this coworker with this great name... and basically saying this name in certain cituations has been passed to my dad and to me... it's going to be. My cosin and i also had these competitions about remembering names or numbers... like the combination of the lock on the old summerhouse backdoor.. he STILL askes me if i remember it.

Mike said...

Oh great, I'm gonna have Jeff Gillooly stuck in my head for a month!
;)

Jon said...

Ok, this comment is going to be slightly off topic. I just got home from the Dodgers vs. Cubs game… when asked to describe how I felt about the game, I think I used words like “poop” and “horse puckie.” I’m sorry you had to read that, but that’s just how I felt about it. First of all, I felt like I was in the twilight zone… no matter what happened, people cheered. I’d say half the people there were Cubs fans and you know what, they were not gracious winners. I’m sure the alcohol didn’t help bring out any extra graciousness, but as a matter of etiquette, you shouldn’t gloat when you are on the visiting side. It’s a good way to get shot in L.A. But the biggest question is, what are all these Chicago natives doing in L.A.? Anyone? Anyone?

Which brings me back to my main point, yeah, what’s up with the stupid names people come up with for their kids these days? You know, you can be unique without being what I like to call a “ufreak.” Take my youngest sister for example. Her name is Madelyn. A name I absolutely love. It’s also a real name, but it’s unique in that you really don’t see it very often. Sometimes you’ll see a Madeline, but that’s as close as you’ll get. (ok, I set myself up for this one. I expect to get no less than 1,000 responses from people who either know a Madelyn or are a Madelyn. Bring it.)

cadiz12 said...

omar: La'Jayson? lA'jAYSON?
as someone who has one, i know that an apostrophe can look like a choose-your-own-vowel-sound marker to many a substitute teacher. i sure hope this kid decides to go by Jay. i can't even comment on the random caps.

i'm down with cool names, but only ones that aren't gratuitously tricky and whose spelling will not get the poor child beaten in the lockerroom. (certifiable ethnic names are exempt -- except for ones that obviously sound dirty. that's just cruel.)

coolcat: slutskya! oh totally.
were johnson's parents hoping for a career in the adult film industry for their son?

ale: that seems like a very sound method to test for senility. btw, do you remember that back-door combo?

jon: don't you know that being a cubs fan is the cool thing to do? (except my brother, who liked them when everyone thought they were lame) chicagoans are everywhere, my friend. just ask someone what they'd like to drink and if they say 'paap,' you'll know.

and madelyn is lovely. a slight changeup on the original, but not one that confuses people. (now if you said something like m'add-lnn, i'd have to kick your ass.) my only question is, is it supposed to be pronounced madel-in? or madel-line? they call the french cartoon girl 'line, but when you have the 'lynn, you think 'in'. see? that's why spelling really counts.

i know, it's 4 a.m.
i had caffeine during my shift.

Jon said...

No, it’s Madel-in. It was my great great grandmother’s name and it is not a variation, it’s just not very common at all. Her middle name is Suzanne, so I often call her Maddy-Sue, which is something she hates to hear from anyone but me. I’m her favorite brother, so I get preferential treatment like that.

omar said...

As I remove my foot from my mouth, allow me to claify. I meant that an apostrophe in a boy's name is bad. Like La'Jayson. Or the football player, Na'il Diggs. That just ain't right. With girls' names, anything goes.

cadiz12 said...

yeah, if you're the favorite sibling, you're golden. i'm sure anyone else trying to call my brother 'highness' would have been short a few teeth.

and omar, no need for claris; i happen to think apostrophes in any name is generally a bad idea. (but wouldn't lose mine for the world; i'm enigmatic/hypocritical like that.) however, you don't even want to know what kind of havoc it wreaks at the DMV and on magazine address labels.

Unknown said...

ofcourse i remember it cadiz! :) but i can't say it on "air" since its also the code to all my cosin's credit cards, atm cards, etc.. etc... how do i know?? hahaha... well just a lucky guess! heheheheeh--- good thing he never checks his balances and stuff!! Haaaaahahaha