July 25, 2008
You know those long, rambling conversations you can have with your closest friends? The rules sprung from one of those. WE were just sitting around, BS'ing one day. I don't even know what started it off, but eventually both of us (and Ben. He was there, too) were tossing out rules for what names you can and can't give your kid. Over the years, we've gone back to them, as friends have had and named their own kids, and had a few laughs, I must admit.
So here's a list of our rules:
1. It must be a classic American name, spelled in the most standard way. Our children's heritage is classic EuroMutt with a dash of Native American and heaping helping of Armenian. The best way to describe them will be American. So we think their names should be, too.
2. It can not be one of certain names. I would list them, but I don't want to piss people off. It's just that, with a few exceptions, in our collective experience, everyone we know with these names is some kind of asshole. To the point that it's like "well his name is (one of those), you expect that".
3. It can't be a family name. Too much animosity. If I name my kids after my side of the family you can bet his family would be pissed. And vice versa. There may be some leeway for dead relatives used as middle names, but in general, it would cause more fuss than I'd care to deal with.
4. Probably best listed as a corollary to 3: There will be no juniors. There's enough confusion in the house with 4 different names now (two of which, I might add, belong to DOGS), I don't need to add on the confusion of calling for DH and getting answered by DH, Jr. Plus, we both think our kids should have their own names.
5. They must be full names. Alexander, Elizabeth, Johnathan, Katharine are all acceptable, for example, while Alex, Beth, Jon, and Kathy are not. Give the kid the whole name, and they can choose from a multitude of nicknames for themselves.
6. The Asswipe (that's Os-Wee-Pay) Rule: No easily made fun of names. Hubby's name is very similar to the quirky title character of a popular song during his childhood, and my last name laid me open to years of taunting comparing me to a comic villain. We'd like to spare our kids as much as possible. So under this rule, no Richard (Dick), Peter, Johnson, etc.
7. No rhyming. Dear God no. Thankfully, neither of our last names rhymes with many first names.
8. No multiples. This is mostly an issue for people with first names as last names, and we'd really have to stretch it to get that to work for us, but seriously. You couldn't think of anything more creative than Thomas Thomas (my mother's orthopedic surgeon) or Martin M. Martin (a teacher at our high school)?
9. No objects. Thing names are for animals. "This is our daughter, Ladybug." "This is my cat, Ladybug." "how nice." NOT. There's a reason some names refer to people. Abstracts are ok, however, such as Faith, Joy, Hope, Honor, etc. Although in my experience such names often turn out to be no more than wishful thinking on the part of the parents....
10. Fictional Characters are sometimes ok, under these conditions: the character must have a real name (Luke is acceptable, Han is not), and the character's reputation won't come back to bite the kid in the ass (again, Luke is acceptable, Homer is not). Naming your kid after a villain is usually a bad idea, as well. Especially if it's a villain in a kid's movie....
11. There should be a reason you're willing to share. Someday your kid will ask you "mom, dad, why did you call me Paris Nooner Lastname" and you have to be willing to explain your quick trip back to the hotel that ended up being more than a bag drop-off....
12. Gender appropriate names are a must. Gender neutral names are ok, but for GAWDS SAKE, don't give a girl a boy's name or vice versa. Even if it is acceptable as a name for the opposite gender. Leslie is a girl's name. As is Stacy. Cameron is a boy's name (see Ferris Bueller). So is Kendall. Trust me, it's hard enough to pronounce the names people give their kids. Don't make me look a fool by calling a "he" a "she" in class.
I'm sure some of our rules go against what you like or even some of your names, but this is what we want for our kids. Because life is hard enough without being known as Chlamydia Vagina.
More on the worst baby names ever compiled here.
So what do you think? What are your rules? Which of these do you agree with? Disagree with? That's what the comments are for, hint, hint.
UPDATE: Check out this poor girl's name. I would like to beat her parents. (h/t Richard Cocking)
Posted by: caltechgirl at
01:45 PM
| Comments (18)
| Add Comment
Post contains 895 words, total size 5 kb.
My great uncle's name was Leslie, so that probably reinforces it. July 24, 2008
Posted by: caltechgirl at
03:41 PM
| Comments (1)
| Add Comment
Post contains 23 words, total size 1 kb.
July 21, 2008
Despite the fact that GMT is home for the summer, the yard has been getting away from us shamefully. It has just been too hot to work in the yard for long periods, so the list of things to be done has far outpaced the the things we can GET done. Add to that a tree that decided to DIE in the middle of the yard, and well, it was starting to look like there were a few dead cars arriving to be parked on the lawn in a week or so.
Finally this weekend we were able to tackle some big projects. First up was the dead tree. Our lovely plum tree just turned brown and withered. We'd known it was sick, with some disease that didn't affect the other fruit trees in the yard, or the neighbors yard. But then it just up and died. So we took it down before it fell and killed someone.
Hubby clipped off all of the small limbs and branches with pruning shears and then we borrowed a friend's chainsaw and chopped it down a piece at time into a rather cheerful looking pile of firewood.
When Hubby got to the stump, the reason for the tree's downfall became immediately clear: Termites had infested the base of the tree and killed it from the inside out. Of course, we sprayed the stump with bug spray and threw the termite pieces in the trash. They live in the soil in Pasadena, I know, but the fewer the better is my motto when it comes to Termites.
When the plum tree was done, we moved the operation to the front yard, and using our awesome pole trimmer and tree saw, we took out all of the lower branches on the nasty tree that shades our driveway (and drops leaves and makes the car sticky from its secretions), mostly because the branches were likely the cause of our cable having loose connections, and because the branches were beginning to brush the roof. Yeah, not good. I've noticed these trees all over Pasadena, and it seems to me that most people who park under then DO NOT experience sticky, leafy car like we do, and I realized, most of the other trees are higher above the cars, so hopefully the trim will help with that, too.
Then, later last night we went over to some other friends' house and picked up their mini-whisper-chipper. This should allow us to get rid of most of the tree waste by making it into some lovely mulch. YAY!
I am totally exhausted.
Also from this weekend, it seems we stopped watching House entirely about the time we went into escrow on the house. Regular lurkers will know that was well over a season ago, strike or no strike. So this weekend we picked up where we left off, and have watched 9 episodes or so, which brings us up to just about the last pre-strike episode. It's nice to have all that TiVo space back, too. Just 12 to go. I expect we'll get through them in the next couple of days. Then we have a whole season of Ugly Betty to get through. As well as a whole slate of summer shows.
Speaking of summer shows, we were both very impressed with A&E's The Cleaner, starring Benjamin Bratt. Despite a few cheesy moments (including a Pulp Fiction-esque heroin rescue and a very amateurly foreshadowed suicide), it was gripping and we're looking forward to the second episode on Tuesday.
Also, our all-time favorite, Psych, is back on USA. This season started off with what I consider to be just a "meh" episode, despite the much ballyhooed arrival of Shawn's Mom: Cybill Shepherd. She was actually excellent, and seemed to fit right into the cast. The plot was MORE than a tad contrived, with Shawn resorting to fraud and blackmail to keep Gus's "dayjob" from forcing him out of the agency. Not his best work, and certainly not the best script of the show. Surprisingly adorable: Henry getting all mushy about his ex and Lassiter crying on the therapy couch after boasting to Jules that he was kicking a$$. Looking forward to a much better season once the writers get over their long winter break.
And a final thought on TV: All-time Foodie fave Ted Allen returns to weekly TV with a new show on Food Network starting next Tuesday (7/29). It's called "Food Detectives" and looks to be the gay love child of Alton Brown's Good Eats and MythBusters. Even if the concept wasn't so cool, I'd be all over this show. How can you not love the man who once advocated that bacon should be its own food group, and later described it as the "best two words in food: Ba. Con."?
Posted by: caltechgirl at
11:02 AM
| Comments (5)
| Add Comment
Post contains 854 words, total size 5 kb.
July 15, 2008
Are you f*cking kidding me? Women have no barriers in science, probably fewer than in any other general field. Over half of students entering medical school this year are women. More than 60% of graduate students in biology and biochemistry and psychology are female. My department chair is a woman. There's no lack of women in science, even at the highest levels.
Yes, you might argue, but the article focuses on Physics and Engineering. And true, there are relatively few women in physics and engineering. But is it possible that maybe women don't choose these fields because they are less interested? Should we force girls into jobs they don't want? It's not like the demands of an academic career in physics are that different from the demands of an academic career in biology or biochemistry. Which even these researchers had to admit was the case:
[T]he institute found that women with physics degrees go on to doctorates, teaching jobs and tenure at the same rate that men do. The gender gap is a result of earlier decisions. While girls make up nearly half of high school physics students, they're less likely than boys to take Advanced Placement courses or go on to a college degree in physics.(emphasis mine)At least the Universities so far are ignoring it:
So far, these Title IX compliance reviews haven't had much visible impact on campuses beyond inspiring a few complaints from faculty members. (The journal Science quoted Amber Miller, a physicist at Columbia, as calling her interview "a complete waste of time.") But some critics fear that the process could lead to a quota system that could seriously hurt scientific research and do more harm than good for women.Yep. And considering today's cuts in research funding and endless Federal investigations looking for reasons to increase cuts, this could be a nightmare for small institutions that don't have the resources to bring in enough female scientists to meet an arbitrary quota.
Posted by: caltechgirl at
04:05 PM
| Comments (5)
| Add Comment
Post contains 369 words, total size 2 kb.
July 04, 2008
When in the course of human Events, it becomes necessary for one
People to dissolve the Political Bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the Powers of the Earth, the separate and equal Station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent Respect to the Opinions of Mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the Separation.
We hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all Men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.
That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just Powers from the Consent of the Governed.
That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these Ends, it is in the Right of the People to alter or abolish it, and to institute a new Government, laying its Foundation on such Principles, and organizing its Powers in such Form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient Causes; and accordingly all Experience hath shewn, that Mankind are more disposed to suffer, while Evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the Forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long Train of Abuses and Usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object, evinces a Design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their Right, it is their Duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future Security.
Such has been the patient Sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the Necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The History of the Present King of Great-Britain is a History of repeated Injuries and Usurpations, all having in direct Object the Establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let the Facts be submitted to a candid World.
He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public Good.
He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing Importance, unless suspended in their Operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
He has refused to pass other Laws for the Accommodation of large Districts of People; unless those People would relinquish the Right of Representation in the Legislature, a Right inestimable to them, and formidable to Tyrants only.
He has called together Legislative Bodies at Places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the Depository of their public Records, for the sole Purpose of fatiguing them into Compliance with his Measures.
He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly Firmness his Invasions on the Rights of the People.
He has refused for a long Time, after such Dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the Dangers of Invasion from without, and Convulsions within.
He has endeavoured to prevent the Population of these States; for that Purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their Migrations hither, and raising the Conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.
He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the Tenure of their Offices, and Amount and Payment of their Salaries.
He has erected a Multitude of new Offices, and sent hither Swarms of Officers to harass our People, and eat out their Substance.
He has kept among us, in Times of Peace, Standing Armies, without the consent of our Legislature.
He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.
He has combined with others to subject us to a Jurisdiction foreign to our Constitution, and unacknowledged by our Laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
For quartering large Bodies of Armed Troops among us:
For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from Punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
For cutting off our Trade with all Parts of the World:
For imposing taxes on us without our Consent:
For depriving us, in many Cases, of the Benefits of Trial by Jury:
For transporting us beyond the Seas to be tried for pretended Offences:
For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an arbitrary Government, and enlarging its Boundaries, so as to render it at once an Example and fit Instrument for introducing the same absolute Rule in these Colonies:
For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:
For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with Powers to legislate for us in all Cases whatsoever.
He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our Towns, and destroyed the Lives of our People.
He is, at this Time, transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to complete the Works of Death, Desolation, and Tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty and Perfidy, scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous Ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized Nation.
He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the Executioners of their Friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.
He has excited domestic Insurrections among us, and has endeavoured to bring on the Inhabitants of our Frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known Rule of Warfare, is an undistinguished Destruction, of all Ages, Sexes and Conditions.
In every stage of these Oppressions we have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble Terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated Injury. A Prince, whose Character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the Ruler of a free People.
Nor have we been wanting in Attentions to our British Brethren. We have warned them from Time to Time of Attempts by their Legislature to extend an unwarrantable Jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the Circumstances of our Emigration and Settlement here. We have appealed to their native Justice and Magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the Ties of our common Kindred to disavow these Usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our Connections and Correspondence. They too have been deaf to the Voice of Justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the Necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of Mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace, Friends.
We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the World for the Rectitude of our Intentions, do, in the Name, and by the Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly Publish and Declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be, Free and Independent States; that they are absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political Connection between them and the State of Great-Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm Reliance on the Protection of the divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.
Signed by ORDER and
in BEHALF OF THE CONGRESS
JOHN HANCOCK,
PRESIDENT.
ATTEST.
CHARLES THOMSON,
SECRETARY.
Happy 4th of July, everyone!
Posted by: caltechgirl at
12:02 AM
| Comments (5)
| Add Comment
Post contains 1365 words, total size 9 kb.
July 02, 2008
I'll be uploading pictures to Flickr, too, sometime later tonight or tomorrow, so check here for new pics shortly.
Posted by: caltechgirl at
09:49 PM
| Comments (1)
| Add Comment
Post contains 59 words, total size 1 kb.
The one thing that changed for the worse, though was her weight. Venison and Kangaroo are both lean meats, and usually less fat is added to the mix in allergy diets. Coincident with our move out here, most pet stores stopped distributing the Eukanuba brand of prescription diets, so we had to switch her to regular Eukanuba adult food (Lamb and Rice, actually, since we knew rice was ok and she'd never had lamb). And well, she put on a few pounds. Especially since the townhouse we lived in didn't have a yard and we had to walk her every day instead of playing....
But I digress. Today we went to the Smart of Pet to get food for the puppy (the Princess currently is being kept on a diet of weight control rations, which is not good for a growing girl). And to our surprise, what did we find in the regular food aisle? Eukanuba Naturally Wild Venison and Potato formula!
It looks and smells a lot like what we used to pay the same price for with a prescription. They both love it, or so it seems by the empty dishes and sleepy bodies. We'll see what their tummies think tomorrow!
I know Eukanuba has gone downhill in quality in recent years, but my dogs love it and they're both incredibly healthy, so we'll see how this goes one bag at a time.
Posted by: caltechgirl at
06:30 PM
| Comments (2)
| Add Comment
Post contains 317 words, total size 2 kb.
77 queries taking 0.063 seconds, 213 records returned.
Powered by Minx 1.1.6c-pink.
