This Is All Just a Big Misunderstanding.

Somebody from home recently went to Comic-Con and had been keeping me apprised of its goings-on via Facebook. That is to say, they posted photos to their timeline from time to time—not so much like a direct channel as I'd like, but just as effective as a direct line to the Kremlin. Facebook was my red phone on my desk that kept telling me that somewhere, someone else was having fun and I wasn't there. I always thought Comic-Con—well, I guess I just drank the Kool-Aid about it being dweebish and unbecoming one of a high station in life as myself (read: over 16 years old). Red Kool-Aid, on my desk, for parallelism's sake. But the Kool-Aid was a lie. It looks awesome.

I was also just alerted by my informant in China—that's unnecessary to this story, but you needed to know that I have powerful friends strategically globe-hopping on the internship phase of their professionalization—to an article about a man with my same name. Middle initial and everything. He was just released from a prison sentence that nearly spanned my complete mortal sojourn, exonerated by DNA evidence for a crime he didn't commit, and he's having the order that set him free framed. Nothing particular about that story, just that I can't imagine what the world would be like without DNA analysis. Well, I can, since it hasn't been here forever, but I mean I'm grateful for it. It's just awful to think about that much of someone's life being taken from them. How do they cope, or make the best of it? Do they, even? Bummer might be as much of an understatement as awesome is an over-, but there it is. It is the ultimate bummer to start your morning off with. And he has my name. Could have been me. Thanks a lot, informant. Let's take it down a notch on keeping me so apprised.

So there's a song that I've taken a particular shine to. It's by a band that I've always assumed was heavy metal—to be perfectly unfair, I apparently thought every single band from before the eighties, sans the Beatles, was heavy metal. Elvis probably dabbled. Anyway I've come to begrudgingly accept my naivety and to see that this song, and presumably this band, is extremely pretty. It's my favorite song of the moment. Meaning it will expire as such in about a week, and I have favorites of more permanence at the moment, but this is this song's time to shine, baby.

Well, it features prominently a name of a girl that I am also starting to really, really love. The name, not the girl. Well, I don't know the girl, so let's not judge unfairly: I at least love the name. I shot it right to the top of my list of favorite girl names for when I have children. It also probably has an expiration date attached. I need some favorite names of more permanence here. To quote Jack Donaghy's surprisingly reasonable advice, you've got to stick to Bible names and kings and queens of England.

Problem, though. I don't want my daughter—my little angel—to be named after a heavy metal song, even one falsely accused as such. Well, really a popular pre-70's rock song isn't going to cut it for my princess either. When they go around the class in third grade to say how they got their names, I don't want her to have to cite a rock band of any generation, quite frankly. I don't often mind what third graders think of me, but if they've heard of that band and made the same assumptions as I have, I will officially be the worst father ever in their little eyes. My little girl needs something better to say. I need to make this name normal. Meaning, today I begin my studies of the Bible and British royal history in earnest. I'll even drum up some forged manuscripts and see if I can get society to buy into them if it will keep me—cool? will that word even be around then?—in the eyes of those (surprisingly judgmental, in my imagination) children. Okay that's why we talk about these things. I've got some serious issues I need to deal with, here. Not the least of which is my rogue underpunctuation and overinterjection.