The Bishop and the Butterfly: Murder, Politics, and the End of the Jazz Age
    Richard Day's picture

    WHAT'S IN A NAME?

    By Richard Day on Wed, 02/09/2011 - 8:04pm |

    Rip Torn

    A popular former mayor of Fort Wayne, Ind., is looking likely to get passed over by a selection committee charged with commemorating a new government center, simply because of his name: Harry Baals.

    Baals, pronounced like "balls," is the clear frontrunner in an online vote taken to gauge support for the various candidates, but on Tuesday, city officials suggested that they didn't want to humiliate the city by giving people a reason to snicker at the name of the structure.

    "We love Fort Wayne, too. We're not going to make any decisions that look bad," Deputy Mayor Beth Malloy told the Fort Wayne Journal Gazette, clarifying that a potential "Harry Baals Government Center" was "probably not" going to happen.

    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/02/09/harry-baals-fort-wayne_n_820826.html

     

    Okay. So what is a mother to do?

    Well, if your surname is Baals and sounds like balls

    FOR HEAVENS SAKE DO NOT NAME YOUR KID HAROLD!!! 

    I mean Richard would not be that advantageous to the tot either, I suppose.

    Why not James or William? Well, Billy Balls might be worse than Jimmy Balls.

    Now Boehner had a good idea. I mean, baaaaaaaaaaaner. Although I am sure he was known as Woody in Middle School.

    Now Rip Torn kind of works as a name. Always liked that guy. Could never figure out the name but it really is very hard to forget.

    If your name were Little, would you name your first born son Chicken? Again Richard really does not work well in this context!

    If your last name is Cloth, do not name your son Terence.

    And a lot of people have the surname Koch. Probably best to throw a t in there somewhere.

    But even with a t, stay away from naming some poor kid Harold or Richard for chrissakes.

    No I aint even getting into this Focher thingy.

    Getting back to poor old Harry.

    Would you seriously consider dining at a café called: Harry Balls? How about a bakery?

    Even a dance hall would not really work with a sign stating that you are now entering Harry Balls Hall!

    And forget about hanging a sign outside a barbershop declaring:  Harry Balls Salon.

    It might work for a Men’s athletic store.

    And streets? I mean streets in Indiana?

    Meet me at the corner of Ft. Wayne and Harry Balls!!!

    Comments

    You had me laughing two paragraphs in.  I can't wait to see the comments that this post generates. 


    by LisB on Wed, 02/09/2011 - 9:57pm

    Obviously his folks should have named him Claude.


    by Donal on Thu, 02/10/2011 - 8:08am

    hahhaaha Sounds so painful!!


    by Richard Day on Thu, 02/10/2011 - 11:55am

    Oh, ouch.


    by LisB on Thu, 02/10/2011 - 12:44pm

    Michael Hunt is another name parents should avoid.  Embarassed


    by wabby on Thu, 02/10/2011 - 1:24pm

    I knew a poor girl named Anita Head, and she was a preacher's kid, to boot…


    by Verified Atheist on Thu, 02/10/2011 - 1:33pm

    Why?  I don't get the gag in the name.  

    That may be because I have known someone named Michael Hunt my entire life so when I hear the name I picture him.


    by EmmaZahn on Thu, 02/10/2011 - 1:37pm

    Micahel Hunt = Mike Hunt => My ****


    by Verified Atheist on Thu, 02/10/2011 - 1:39pm

    Ah, maybe if I learned that word before I was 23 I might have gotten it sooner.  

     


    by EmmaZahn on Thu, 02/10/2011 - 1:41pm

    Yeah Emma, Keith O played a video of a horse race where Hoof Hearted won. hahahaha

    And Hoof Hearted is coming up the outside....


    by Richard Day on Thu, 02/10/2011 - 2:05pm

    Dick? Dick?!! Izzat you, DICK???!! 

    You gotta be the last man in the world who should be making name jokes. 

    - Mike Hunt. 


    by quinn esq on Thu, 02/10/2011 - 4:28pm

    That's Mr. Day to you!!!


    by Richard Day on Thu, 02/10/2011 - 5:00pm

    Very well said. 


    by Anonymous (not verified) on Thu, 02/10/2011 - 5:25pm

    Well thank you, I think!!


    by Richard Day on Thu, 02/10/2011 - 6:31pm

    I believe it was the late sexologist, Dr. Jack Meoff who said, names are mostly chaff, but then for some of us, can incorporate a kind of predestiny for our true selves, though we are likely to be not fully actualized beings at the time of our naming. 


    by miguelitoh2o on Thu, 02/10/2011 - 5:36pm

    Hey Miguel!!

    It all started with William the Bastard.

    Well he became William the Norman (King)

    Then William the Conquerer!!

    He has so many names this Norman Willie!! ha

    Dick, Dicky, Richard, Rich, Rick, Richie, Ricky......

    In a manner we choose our own names after all!!!


    by Richard Day on Thu, 02/10/2011 - 6:30pm

    My favorite was Ethelred the Unready ... d'oh!


    by Donal on Thu, 02/10/2011 - 8:30pm

    There was a girl in my class as a kid called Helle Bitsch. I mean some names should maybe be censored or something.

    Not a very nice person, funnily enough...


    by Obey on Fri, 02/11/2011 - 7:56pm

    Zounds; one of the recalcitrant horses in one of Larry McMurtry's novels was named 'the Hell Bitch'.

    Might have been Lonesome Dove. 


    by Anonymous (not verified) on Fri, 02/11/2011 - 8:46pm

    Well her name might have set the tone!!


    by Richard Day on Fri, 02/11/2011 - 9:59pm