Naming the Boy

We had a girl's name all picked out. Sort of. Let's say we found a girl's name we could agree on. We had absolutely no idea what we would name a boy, which meant, of course, that we would have a boy. I'll throw out a boy's name here or there, but Phillip has been unresponsive. The other day he said, "Picking a name right now feels too final." Which means, I guess, that we'll be naming our kid on the way home from the hospital?

Herewith are some of the boys' names suggested by ourselves, friends or family, and the reason for rejection (in some cases, instant over-my-dead-body-will-you-name-my-child-that rejection):

• Wang. Who cares if his classmates won't have the wherewithal to ask him if he wants to Wang Cheung tonight? I WILL KNOW.
• Jack. Love Jack. Love it. But Jack Cheung? I'm not so big on the one syllable names. Plus Phillip only likes Jack if it's short for Jackson, which he likes to say over and over in a Cantonese accent, and talk about how our boy could be Jackie Cheung, the Hong Kong movie star. So, that's a no.
• Owen. Another name I love. But Owen is the name of Phillip's coworker's baby, due in January. And as this is the coworker who gave Phillip a Baby Names For Dummies book, it's out.
• Asher. The little Jewish-Chinese baby.
• Charlie, or anything that starts with a 'ch' sound. No. No no no.
• Logan. Simply because Phillip doesn't want to be reminded of my crush on Veronica Mars' Logan every time he sees our baby.
• Gordon. Phillip loves this name. "Everybody loves a Gordy!" he proclaims. "Everybody wants a friend like Gordo!" I think it stinks.
• Stuart. See above, only replace "Gordy" and "Gordo" with "Stu" and "Stewie".
• Any number of classic timeless names, as they already belong to brothers and cousins and cousins' children. I'm not opposed to using cousins' names necessarily, but my favorites belong to my brothers and we simply cannot have either of my brothers assuming we named our baby after either of THEM. AS IF.
• Noah. Loooove Noah. But it sounds too much like one of our nephew's names and we don't want to confuse the grandparents. It's also one of the cousins' children's names. And maybe one of my friends has dibs on it. And maybe Phillip doesn't like it. Sigh.

There really aren't any names jumping out at us shrieking "I'M IT!" There's no rush or anything, but still. It'd be nice to know, if only so I can stop pestering Phillip for new ideas and making a face at everything he suggests. He's really enjoying that.

Comments

[Christina/Mrs Broccoli Guy]

Boys names are way, way harder than girls' names. Both times I named my boys I thought I was going with classic, yet not overused. HA. A~ has to use his last initial every year because there's always at least one other A~. And suddenly I'm hearing Zeeb's name everywhere. Bah.

My favorites when picking Zeeb's name: Theodore (I wanted to call him "Teddy"), Timothy, Alexander (Alex), Matthew, Derrick (so you can call him Rick without that other horrible nickname popping up!) and Shawn (as in Cassidy!). Since we are most definitely done with naming kids, feel free to use any of them - or not! - and my feelings won't be hurt. :-}

[Jenn]

Oh God, I can't stop laughing about Wang Cheung. Everybody have fun tonight! Everybody Wang Cheung tonight!

[lee]

when did you guys take boas off the table?

[Jennifer]

Moses Cheung.

It has a nice ring.

:)

[kelli lu]

what is it with guys and the name "Gordo"?? in high school, my brother and i were fighting over what to name our shared 15-yr-old Toyota (naming cars in my family is a very big deal; don't know why)-- he insisted that "Gordo" was the COOLEST possible name for the car. (I pulled rank as older-sister-by-16-months and named *her* Sadie). of course, a car is so very much less important to name correctly than a baby, but still -- i had to chortle when i saw the Gordo thing. (c:

[Jenny Ryan]

Happy new year! Mmm...Logan...so delicious!

[Angela]

Oh what fun! What pressure!! All I've ever named are fish, dogs, and gerbils... I feel there's probably a little more pressure to get it right with a little person though ;)

I know you'll find the perfect name eventually though--and in the meantime, have a happy new year!!!