Baby Name Ideas

Apparently, more than 4000 Chinese children have been named Aoyun in the last 15 years. I know, that probably doesn't sound very interesting but Aoyun means Olympic Games. How would you like to be named that? I guess it's better than being named after the Pan Am Games.

There's more. Other popular names are Defend China, Space Travel, and Civilization. The latter is the name of almost 300,000 people! You have to love a nation that will take names from just about anything.

Which reminds me: I strongly believe that everyone ought to be given a provisional name by their parents, with the option of changing it when they reach the age of 18. At that point, you could change it without question to something that you really like, something good, like Aloysius or Ezekiel.

Lisa and Brian and Helen and John and Anne and George

It turns out that your name can say a lot about you. Some dude named Richard Wiseman collected the opinions of 6000 people on names and it turns out that some names are poorly perceived. The Name Experiment came to these conclusions:

Least successful: Lisa and Brian

Least lucky: Helen and John

Least attractive: Ann and George

I think this is silly. What about Burritt or Laksmono or Abundie or Nattapong? What about Pornwadee or Thembisa or Berneatha or Mistymarie? You can't tell me that Rupert is more attractive than George or that Chastity is more successful than Lisa.

But, I just realized that this survey happened in the UK, so it all makes sense. Happy Friday.