Effective Naming Strategies

We’ll not tell what’s-his-name, when he’s old enough to understand, that even in the short weeks before his birth we still hadn’t decided on his name. Lola’s name was practically handed to us on a silver platter and it was perfect on every measure of criteria. This time around however, things aren’t so simple.We’ve tried a few different naming strategies and none of them seem to be doing the trick:1. Awaiting divine, providential, or other-worldy intervention. This is basically sitting around waiting for the equivalent of a silver-plattered answer.2. I floated the idea of naming him after the winning quarterback of the Super Bowl. We scotched that idea when we thought that was a forgone conclusion and neither of us are ready for a Tom III. Eli is intriguing...but can you imagine how many over-exuberant New Yorkers are going to name their kids Eli this year? Scared of that.

3. We’ve asked Lola for her input. So far we’ve gotten “Dog” and “Patsy.” The picture above is Lola asking the man himself for ideas.4. This weekend we bought a book of “100,001+” names from Target. Unfortunately that book is reading more like an almanac of the bizarre and ridiculous. And of the quote 100,000 plus names 18,000 are variations on Michael, Thomas, and Anthony.We’ll keep plugging away. We are firm believers in the last minute.