They Named Their Baby What?!?!

Did you hear? Somebody named their baby girl #Hashtag.

That’s Hashtag with a hashtag in front of it.

And they announced it on Facebook. Why not tweet it? Good thing these twits didn’t name her Twitter. At least it’ll be easy for her to sign her name.

Reminds me of the Egyptian man who named his daughter Facebook in a feeble attempt at homage following the social media outlet’s role in Egypt’s revolution. He should’ve just named her Revolution and saved her years of frustrating litigation over trademark infringement. Couldn’t he have just sent a thank you note? Maybe posted a really gracious status update?

Look, I’m far from stodgy. My kids’ names are interesting, (Max & Miles) and getting more common. But some of the names people are choosing to lay on their kids for life are just nuts. Go to your refrigerator right now and grab your child’s class list off the front door and skim it. How many names make you snicker? C’mon… be honest. I’m not going to give any examples from my list just in case you’ve just called your own little “Jax” to the dinner table. But seriously, you have to admit there’s at least one name there that came straight from Days Of Our Lives or some shit.

People naming their kids after Kardashians. Cut that shit out!

Celebrities have got us beat yet again. It takes balls of steel to conjure this absurdity. They are unencumbered by convention, living on sheer whim and narcissistic douchebaggery as they name human beings things I’m not sure I’d call my puppy.

Here are some of my favorites.

• Frank and Gail Zappa were perhaps the Mothers of Invention when it came to the art of naming kids crazy shit. (See what I did there?) Their daughter Diva’s middle name is Thin Muffin. Sounds like a porn star with clitoral issues.

• David Duchovny and Tea Leoni named their kid, Kyd. What a cop-out. What happens when Kyd is 18? Does he have it legally changed to Adult?

• If Hashtag and Facebook represent the tech world, they’re in good company with Gwyneth Paltrow and Chris Martin’s daughter Apple, Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes have Suri (close enough) and yes, someone has actually named their offspring Siri. That kid’s iPhone is gonna be more confused than ours.

• The Jacksons score the blue ribbon for weird. Michael wins with Blanket, and brother Jermaine named his son Jermajesty.

• Gwen Stefani and Gavin Rossdale named their first child Kingston. Pretty cool. But baby number two is Zuma Nesta Rock. Sounds like clear beer meets Nestea with a genre. At least it’s got rhythmn. Zuma Nesta Rock. Say it three times. I dare you to resist clicking your fingers and shaking your booty.

• How about Jason Lee‘s son Pilot Inspektor? That crazy f#ck put a “K” in there. What was he thinking?

• Or Sly Stallone‘s kid Sage Moonblood? “You drew first Moonblood, not me”?

• Celebrity chef Jamie Olive and his wife Jools are a veritable cottage industry of loopy names. He claims it’s all her mind wizardry. With names like Poppy Honey Rosie, Buddy Bear Maurice, Daisy Boo Pamela and Petal Blossom Rainbow, all I’m saying is… I’d just like some of whatever she’s snorting. I love how the third names are actual names. Why bother? And Petal Blossom Rainbow is just altogether screwed. She’s gonna shit unicorns her whole life.

• Penn Jillette named his daughter Moxie Crimefighter. Actually, I’m not surprised that Jillette named his kid something weird. What surprises me more is that he has a kid.

• Remember David “Puck” Rainey from one of the early seasons of MTV’s The Real World? Bogart Che Peyote sounds like something he uttered in Spanish to the guy next to him in the peyote tent at a Rainbow Gathering.

• Singer Erykah Badu named her kids Seven and Mars Merkaba. Little Mars has it bad enough, but when George Costanza finds out she stole his name “Seven”, there’s gonna be a whole lotta trouble, Jerry!

• Bob Geldof and his bride came up with Fifi Trixibell. Their daughter should enjoy going through life as a poodle.

• And actress Rachel Griffiths came from the maternity ward with little Banjo on her knee.

I think what bothers me about the whole weird baby name thing is that none of the people who named their kids things like Lizard Lips ever bothered to have their own rather ordinary names changed. They simply see their children as an extension of themselves, assigning names to them befitting their own whimsical natures. Who knows who those kids are going to grow up to be or what their natural inclinations will wind up being. Does the kid really need to be saddled with Zycam Blitzkrieg when all they want to be is an Estate Attorney?

Linda Roy is the wisecracking musician behind the humor blog elleroy was here. She lives in New Jersey with her husband and two boys who swear she’s the female Larry David. A 2014 BlogHer Voice of the Year for Humor, she is a regular contributor to The Huffington Post and Humor Outcasts and has been featured at Scary Mommy, In the Powder Room, Erma Bombeck Writers’ Workshop, BlogHer, Mamapedia, BonBon Break, Midlife Boulevard, 10 to 20 Parenting, Aiming Low, Better After 50, Project Underblog and The Weeklings. She is co-author of the humor anthologies ‘I STILL Just Want To Pee Alone’, ‘Clash of the Couples’, ‘Motherhood May Cause Drowsiness’, and the upcoming ‘Surviving Mental Illness Through Humor’, ‘The Bigger Book of Parenting Tweets’, and ‘Only Trollops Shave Above the Knee’. Kvetch with her on Facebook and Twitter.