Family intervention

[muckefuck]

I'm in total agreement with my brother-in-law when it comes to naming children and he insists "You have to have a theme" and his choice of one--begining with vowel letters in alphabetical order--isn't bad. But something must be done to prevent my sister from going with her choice of a name that is:

1. Different from his older brother's name by only one segment (i.e. /ð/)
2. Horribly trendy (ranked 68 in the USA last year compared to 156th most popular when we were born)

At yesterday's barbecue, I pressed my case that since gentle persuasion has failed--Isidore ("Patron saint of the Internet!"), Ignatius Loyola ("He'd get into the Jesuit college of his choice--FOR FREE!"), Immanuel, and Ichabod have all ended up on the trash heap--the time has come for concerted unilateral action: We need to form a consensus on a nickname now and begin employing it exactly as if his parents' choice were a figment of someone's imagination.

My model for a successful nicknaming is my mother's baby brother. When I was an adolescent, I couldn't figure out why all my cousins called him "Butch" when Mom had told me he was named "Vincent". The family story is that he was a very pretty baby. When his older sisters took him out for a ride in the buggy, passers-by were forever asking, "She's so beautiful, what's her name?" Someone (no one can agree who) started replying "Butch" and it stuck--boy, did it stick.

We tossed around dozens of possibilities without coming to any agreement. Here's an incomplete list:

• Slim
• Sly
• Slimer
• Tad(pole)
• Dale [requires renaming older brother "Chip"]
• Ion
• iBaby
• Ivan [from his stepmother by phone]
• Killer

Hmm--they seemed better in a post-prandial caipirinha haze. Do any of them look like they might have legs? Further suggestions?