What Would Happen If I Named My Kid...Bozho

Not as in the clown Bozo.



But as in this guy I vaguely knew named Bozho who went to my grade school and my cousin's grade school.

I kept thinking about the clown whenever I heard this guy's name, but in high school, he played football and looked decidedly tougher in his football picture. He was playing foo-ball foo-ball! Must prove masculinity! GRRR.

His smirk reminded me of the intensity captured in this Olympics Nike commercial.



Bozho would be out for your blood, motherfucker.

What Would Happen If I Named My Kid...Myron

Based on this little kid I knew of in grade school.

He looked this.



Now imagine that kid dressed with shorter hair, in a school uniform, a red button-up sweater with his name knitted on the left side in capitalized big alphabet letters.

Awww, that's my Myron!!!

What Would Happen If I Named My Kid...Brad

Loosely based on a conglomeration of Brad Pitt and Brad Miller, but mostly in reference to fromer Mavericks player Brad Davis!



That's the Brad I think about when I hear the name Brad!

Who wouldn't want a kid with a porno 'stache?

Brad was always a white person's name, the quintessential white American buckaroo's name.

I think I would get a kick out of naming my kid Brad if I married this super-ethnically diverse Indian/Brazilian/Korean/Black woman, and instead of taking the opportunity to create a new unique name reflecting my hypothetical kid's various ancestries and identities, ultimately borrify people with an Anglicized plain-ass American name like Brad.

What Would Happen If I Named My Kid...Amar'e

Like the NBA Suns forward Amar'e Stoudemire.





I'm a Chicago Bulls fan, I used to frequent message boards, and one of the funnier message board posters called him the "big stupid guy who isn't afraid to start a fire in the hole and lead a charge [that we need on this team]"

Hell yeah.

Definitely in the consideration if he moves to Chicago.

Amar'e Jamie Delas Armas.

What Would Happen If I Named My Kid...Gio

As in Giovanni Van Bronckhurst, formerly known as Gio from Barcelona. Not Geo from the Blue Scholars.



Another one of those FIFA 07 names. In Espanol, the announcers would call him "Gio" and made that sound cool. In English, he was simply van Bronckhurst.

I suggested this to my mom, just the name Giovanni, and from her place on the couch she looked at me and grunted with eyes to the ceiling "Lord, have mercy."

What Would Happen If I Named My Kid...RR

Like RR from the popular Filipino show Wowowee.



I'm decidedly chauvinist when it comes to these names, as they are mostly names for a hypothetical male kid. I don't really like thinking about girl names, because it would be a little weird to have a daughter to have the same name as her would-be mom and also because I would hate to over-objectify and speculate on my hypothetical daughter.

But RR is definitely a name I can have fun with.

I see her dancing on the show, and there's a lot of direction-pointing and camera jerkiness on that show, so I guess my kid could turn out that way as well.

Least my kid would came out nice looking, but hopefully known for ingenuity AND beauty.

What Would Happen If I Named My Kid...Fulton

Like Fulton Reed from the Disney Hockey franchise the Mighty Ducks.



Fulton Reed was the badass with the badass slapshot.



They played a lot of Queen in these movies, and so I thought of the song "Another One Bites the Dust" whenever I saw this dude.

Fulton Reed.

What Would Happen If I Named My Kid...Marco

Based on the singer of LA Band, For Elise and my friend from high school named Marco.

Amd NOT Marco Polo.

I associated this guy Marco with the song by Lord Tariq and Peter Gunz when I saw this guy, mostly Peter Gunz, because he was Peter Gunz' skin color and seemed to have his cockiness too.



In high school there was also a tall white dude with glasses, flannel shirts, and some kind of white guy-fro in my Martial Arts classes who looked like his name was Marco too, but I decided he looked more like a Coleman.

Coleman is a name I would never mention on this blog.

What Would Happen If I Named My Kid...Jamie

Like Jamie from Small Wonder, Jamie Baker from the Ottawa Senators, Jamie Foxx, or Jamie from the Real World.

Let's see:

No picture for Jamie Baker, but I always made fun of kid in my class because I thought he would look like this random player named Jamie Baker for the Ottawa Senators in my video game NHL 94.



Well, for the lack of a better term, that kid looked like a wanker.



Jamie from the Real World was kind of forgotten, and Jamie Chung is the more popular Jamie, and she's a girl.



Jamie Foxx is the only somewhat cool person, but I mostly remember him being goofy in the Jamie Foxx show.

Unless your a girl, Jamie seems to be an kind of an embarrassing name to have. I've always associated it with getting your pants pulled down in public, revealing your white boxer shorts with hearts on htem.

No to Jamie at all costs, unless God him/herself tells me that naming my kid Jamie will directly lead to cure cancer, AIDS, world hunger, and fans of Ayn Rand and Ronald Reagan.

What Would Happen If I Named My Kid...Charlie Chan

Based on a business I always see in Mid-Wilshire.

I don't know Charlie Chan, he's just a very visible business to me with a nice ch-ch phonetical flow to his name.

What If I Named My Kid...Kidlat Tahimik

Based on the third Cinema movie maker Kidlat Tahimik.



I was intrroduced to this name via my friend Ivan Penetrante on his blog.

Kidlat Tahimik means "quiet lightning" in Tagalog, which is kind of like the same thought I had when I wanted to name my kid Tromar, which means "thunder" in Spanish.

Personally, before I even saw a picture of the dude, I thought my kid would end up in a dance crew if I named him that.



Except he'd probably wear headbands isntead of a mask.

I also think he'd be a big fan of Hershey bars and/or Kit Kat.

What Would Happen If I Named My Kid...Emmanuel Adebayor

From Togolese Arsenal footballer Emmanuel Adebayor.



Now this is a cool name that the FIFA 07 Spanish announcers would love to say.

Ahhh-dehh-buhh-jjjooorrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!!!!

I would love for my kid to have his named repeated and immortalized in a video game like that.

What Would Happen If I Named My Kid...Benson

Like Benson from Benson or Benson Cherono, winner of the 2006 LA Marathon, my first Marathon.



or



I loved the Benson theme song which payed after Three's Company on TBS, but I remember the show was too boring to even bother.

The theme song had this English pomposity to it with its white house-esque mansion and muckety muck shuckety shuck suits, that made it strangely enticing.



The English pomposity reinforced when Sherman Helmsley accused the butler in the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air of being Benson.

What Would Happen If I Named My Kid...Beckham

Based on English soccer icon David Beckham.



The most popular soccer player since Pele, and it probably has more to do with image and marketing than skill and achievement.

But no worry, he's still pretty good, especially his free kicks. I was even thinking about becoming a Galaxy fan (till he was loaned to Italian team AC Milan).

David Beckham is a fellow Taurus, and because of that he reminds me of my mom, whom I sometimes call "Becks", "Beckham", or "Beck-mom".

What Would Happen If I Named My Kid...Bruno

As in Bruno Latour, veteran of the "science wars."



I'd never seen a picture of Bruno Latour before I looked at his wikipedia profile.

But I've heard and read a lot about him.

The first time I heard about him was from a TA in this very oddball but very interesting History of Consciousness class. She was glowing over this guy like he had a 17-inch penis. She said it "Breuwe-nehyo" with such adoration.

I'd want some empowered woman TA to gloat over my kid like that too.

Breuwe-nehyo, like he's the kind of brawny bruising Brutus from Popeye.



Breuwe-nehyo!

What Would Happen If I Named My Kid...Kaka

Based on the Brazilian and AC Milan soccer star Kaka.

His actual name is Ricardo, but Kaka is his popular nickname, and he's actually respected.



I wondered how any dude could pull off a name like that. I do believe kaka, caca, is one human universal meaning for human...eh...depository material.

Then just on hearsay, I found the website Kakafans.net

They'd have to be really fuckin' dope to pull of a name and change it's association from something crappy, literally to something that people actually want to be fans of.

Kaka! Para la victoria!

What Would Happen If I Named My Kid...David Archuleta Jr.

Based on the teenage American Idol heartthrob below.



And the reason my mom even knows how to use youtube/a computer.

My mom is a fan of the wholesomeness, innocence, and naivety of the kid, would be kinda weird to see how she'd view her grandson.

Especially if that grandson's brother is named Mahmadou.

What Would Happen If I Named My Kid...Billups

Pronounced the Filipino way "Beel-awwpps" from overhearing my dad actually pronounce his name and at various Family functions when the NBA playoffs have been on for the past 5-6 years.



Based on NBA Player Chauncey "Mr. Big Shot" Billups. I'm impressed with how the guy has kind of remade his career from former journeyman to leader-supreme.

I suggested this to my mom while she was pressed on her daily dose of David Archuleta youtube videos. She knows some basketball and knows the dude, but she broke up her stream of concentration to let out an obtuse kind of laughter.

What Would Happen If I Named My Kid...Mahmadou

Based on Real Madrid soccer player named Mahmadou Diarra.



Whom I've actually never seen play or read about, except via FIFA Soccer 07 and via the video game announcers.

They said "Dia-ruh" which made it sound intelligent and efficient, especially for soccer purposes.

When I first suggested this to my mom, she curled her eyebrow inward and suggested "what about Papa-dou?"

What Would Happen If I named My Kid...Edgerrin

Based on NFL football player Edgerrin James.



I didn't know who he was when he was drafted, the same year as Ricky Williams, the same year as Donovan McNabb.

Then I saw this cover and read his story.

I became a fan!

I want my kid to be a big badass football player too!

But my mom, being my mom, would never approve of that name taking one look at the dude.

Introduction

Just a blog inspired by everyday happenings and conversations with my mom, who is 4 foot 8, a nurse in South Central Los Angeles, and kind of hilarious and my lil bum sister who is a lil baby engineering student at UCR.

I've been wondering about whether I'd live the "traditional" get a job, get married kind of life, and it's appealing, so sometimes I think about what I'd name my kid. It started out as being a way to see how my somewhat traditionalist, yet unconventional lil mom would react to some of the odd names I've chanced upon in popular and public culture.

Ever since I was a kid, I wondered how names come to fit the people that take them. Would I have turned out with an extra-long nose if my name was Ezekiel? Or if I was named Omar, would I have these huge eyes like Omar Epps?

Let's begin!