I’m spinning plates on several new ideas for books, which mostly consists of untangling plot threads like strands of cooked spaghetti thrown in a bowl, calculating how much chocolate I have to consume to generate a brilliant beginning, and wondering if Google is tracking how many times I search.

Once the story starts looking more like Jello and less like melted ice, it’s time for my one-woman NAME THAT CHARACTER show. I’ve tried writing story lines using fill-in-the-blanks, generic s/hes, and Jane and John Doe and their friends the Smiths and the Joneses. The compulsion to marry character and names propels me to sites like Buzz Worthy Baby Names from Inventing Matilda. A dangerously distracting diversion. It also prevents me from consulting the husband who named one of our cats Amelia (after the flying one) because she seemed to jump so high. Our new kitten, Newton, (after the Isaac, not the cookie) is so named because of his daredevil climbing and accompanying falling routines.

It would be entirely too exhausting to deliberate the relationship between names and personalities and impressions. NPR ran a story discussing if your name, specifically your initials, could change the course of your life. I suppose if your name is Ann Sue Smith that might be a story worth hearing.

Anyway…so, today, I’m cruising sites for names, and discover that Nicole Kidman and Keith Urban had a daughter; they named her Sunday Rose. I’m happy, for her sake, she was not born on Thursday. And because I was brain dead from tangled plots, I started investigating this proclivity for reckless baby-naming among celebrities.

Without comment because, really, what’s there to say, here are some of the most pretentiously bizarre names followed by their “celebrity” parent/s.

Sailor Lee                                                         Christie Brinkley
Kal-el (as in the Krypton name of Superman)    Nicholas Cage
Suri                                                                  Tom/Kat Cruise
Elijah Blue                                                        Cher and Greg Allman
Fifi Trixibelle                                                   Bob Geldorf
Peaches Honeyblossom
Little Pixie
Free                                                               Barbara Hershey/David Carradine
Hud (B)                                                          John Cougar Mellencamp
Justice (G)
Spec Wildhorse (B)
Poppy Honey                                                Chef Jamie and model Jools Oliver
Daisy Boo
Reignbeau (G)                                               Ving Rhames
Freedom (B)
Audio Science (B)                                          Shannyn Sossamon
Apple                                                           Gwen Paltrow
Jermajesty                                                    Jermaine Jackson
Tu Morrow                                                   Rob Morrow
Ocean                                                          Forest Whittaker
Destry                                                          Steven Speilberg
Memphis Eve                                                Bono
Pilot Inspektor                                              Jason Lee

Lest you wonder if this was all for mindless listing. But, no. Next time I’m taking a writing break, I’m going to play THE CELEBRITY BABIES, WHAT IF THEY MARRY? game.

Like Freedom and Justice. Or Free and Tu Morrow.

Go ahead. Try one of your own.

Kal-el