1011: Baby Names

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Baby Names

Title text: I've been trying for a couple years now but I haven't been able to come up with a name dumber than 'Renesmee'.

Explanation

This comic is a list of comically terrible baby names invented by Randall. It may relate to his other comics about why he shouldn't be allowed to have access to babies.

This is a list of the names with a short description:

• Ponzi - An Italian surname, most often associated with "Ponzi scheme".
• Eeemily - A corruption of "Emily". May also be a marketing plug for the Asus Eee brand.
• Fire Fire - Even a single "Fire" would be odd as a name, at least in the American dialects. It would also not be a good idea to call your child's name in a crowded place. This name could also be the inverse of "Ice Ice", a common joke baby name referencing Ice Ice Baby.
• Chipotla - A frequent mispronounciation of chipotle chili or the popular Chipotle Mexican Grill restaurant chain. Many people would readily attempt to correct you when you called your child's name. Possibly reads as a feminine version of chipotle.
• Astamouthe - Could be pronounced "Ass to mouth".
• Eggsperm - A child is conceived by combining an egg and a sperm, this child's name is conceived by combining the names of the two things.
• [sound of record scratch] - This cannot be spelled or reliably pronounced.^{[citation needed]} Likely a reference to any movie where a record scratch plays and the protagonist says "that's me".
• Parsley - Parsley is an herb and is not commonly used as a name unlike other herbs like Rosemary and Sage. It is, however, probably the least terrible name on this list.
• Hot'n'Juicy Ann - "Ann" is a normal name. Prefacing it with the sexual "Hot'n'Juicy" would not be appropriate for a child's name.
• Ovari - Female reproductive organ, misspelled.
• Friendly - Odd enough on its own, but when referring to her possessions it would create confusion with the restaurant Friendly's. Can also be humorous in introductions - "Hi I'm Friendly and I hate you."
• Sean (pronounced "seen") - While this isn't an incorrect pronunciation, the more common pronunciation would be "Shawn". Very likely a reference to the name of the actor Sean Bean (whose name is pronounced Shawn Been), which uses the exact same pairing of letters for two pronunciations.
• Joyst - Corruption of "Joyce". May also refer to the term "joist", which is a beam used in construction to support ceilings or floors, or the first part of the word "joystick", a video game controller.

A further analysis of baby names is presented by Randall in the Blag post "The Baby Name Wizard".

Renesmee (from the title text) is the name of Renesmee Cullen, who is the baby born in the book and movie Breaking Dawn to parents Edward and Bella. Edward and Bella get "Renesmee" from an amalgamation of the names of Bella's mother, Renée, and Edward's adoptive mother, Esme. Randall's point is that all those names are terrible, but (arguably) not nearly as terrible as the name Renesmee.

Transcript

[Cueball sits at a desk, thinking with his hand on his chin, his other hand holding a pen over a piece of paper. Megan stands behind him, looking over his shoulder, also with her hand on her chin.]

[Above the drawing is the list they are writing by hand.]

Names for daughter

1. Ponzi
2. Eeemily
3. Fire Fire
4. Chipotla
5. Astamouthe
6. Eggsperm
7. [sound of record scratch]
8. Parsley
9. Hot'n'Juicy Ann
10. Ovari
11. Friendly
12. Sean (pronounced "seen")
13. Joyst

Trivia

• Eemili is a real Finnish (man's) name, cognate to Aemilius/Emil in other European languages.

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Discussion

"Old lady" names like Edith or Margaret are also pretty awful for a girl. She's gonna have to live her early years with a name that makes her sound like she's 50. Davidy²²[talk] 13:13, 18 February 2013 (UTC)

There's a young Margaret in A Wrinkle in Time. Also, I know a young woman named Margaret. However, I can hardly imagine a worse name than Bertha. Dfeuer (talk) 16:09, 2 February 2014 (UTC)

Remember that they are only "Old Lady" names because they were popular baby names 50 years ago! In 50 years time people will say don't name your child Hunter! That's a grandpa name! (Yes people actually call their sons that!) --LostFire (talk) 09:54, 24 June 2013 (UTC)

I once met a man in his mid-50s named Austin. For half his life he got people commenting on how old-fashioned his name is, and for the other half he's gotten people saying when they saw his name on the list they were expecting a kid.173.245.52.70 01:39, 14 December 2014 (UTC)

I'm from Brazil and I find interesting that the concept of names that makes children feel much older exists in other languages. 108.162.254.119 03:47, 29 January 2014 (UTC)

It's common to pretty much all cultures, name fads come and go. In Brazil, for example, you don't see many girls named "Lourdes", or old men named "Felipe". --108.162.210.241 15:18, 2 February 2014 (UTC)

Interestingly this problem seems (to me) to be relatively unexistant in Poland. This seems to be helped by our attitude to name variants (i.e. considering them same name in most cases). 141.101.89.216 21:06, 31 March 2014 (UTC)

What... I'm from Poland and I think this does exist in Poland Take Stefan, Kasimierz, Władysław etc. I even found this article: http://www.edziecko.pl/ciaza_i_porod/1,79473,18054856,Helena__Aniela__Kazimierz_i_Wladyslaw__stare_imiona.html

I suspect "friendly" is so it would play out in introductions as such: "Nice to meet you. I'm friendly." --108.162.225.148 14:05, 17 March 2014 (UTC)

Still can't think of a name dumber than 'Renesmee'. 'North West' comes close. 108.162.221.53 02:07, 29 March 2014 (UTC)

My friend married a man named "Durr." First child was named Kathy. I suggested Corianne for the second 173.245.63.146 (talk) (please sign your comments with ~~~~)

I have a friend who was briefly called Parsley. When she was born, her Grandfather got the call instead of her Grandmother, and reported that her name as "Parsley". He then went straight back to sleep, leaving the Grandmother quite frustrated. After reading this comic, she felt sort of famous. 108.162.221.77 (talk) (please sign your comments with ~~~~)

Technically, "Sean" should have an accent on the 'a', so that it is pronounced "Shawn". It's a transliteration of "John" into the alphabet that was in use in Ireland a couple of centuries ago. If you leave out the accent, it's a different word, a prefix meaning "old" and pronounced "shan". Using family names as given names is also a thing. "Kim" is a nice name for a girl... but in N Korea? And finally "Joyst" as a reference to "Joyce" recalls the arts graduate from Dublin looking for a job as a builder... "The difference between a joist and a girder? Well, Joist wrote Ulysses and Girder wrote Faust"162.158.38.208 21:35, 12 September 2018 (UTC)

Guys "Astamouth" is definitely worse than "Renesmee". 162.158.111.13 07:47, 3 August 2019 (UTC)

There is currently a very famous child who is named a wifi password and I think this comic is much funnier because of it. 172.68.38.44 01:29, 26 July 2020 (UTC)

Elon Musk's child has an even more weird name. ^{[citation needed]} ColorfulGalaxy (talk) 21:12, 11 December 2022 (UTC)

i have a friend called agahar. i know, it's a weird name An user who has no account yet (talk) 20:39, 10 October 2023 (UTC)

In response to the comment attached to this edit, I must admit that I still say "chipotle" to rhyme with "bottle". Self-consciously... didn't know what it was when I first encountered it, and even now that I know it rhymes with "outlay" I rarely go with that at the stressful point of deciding which sauce(s) I want on my sub/whatever. People more right than me could still easily cut it short with a schwa, much as "bottler"(/"botla"), or another short-high vowel. So I can indeed believe it could become "chipotla" (however they pronounce that, in their accent) for them. 172.70.90.53 13:37, 29 November 2023 (UTC)