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Oct. 26th, 2006 08:58 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
magedragonfireSo I was typing and proofing (endlessly) again today, and I keep seeing certain things happening on the family cards.
Now, the way the company works is, essentially, they create calendars so that small towns or groups can sell them for fundraising purposes. The townsfolk go out, canvass, and get families to sign up. Each family gets a card with their surname (although you can put other people on, too), and this card contains a list of the family members' birthdays, anniversaries, and memorials. These, in turn, get printed on the community's calendar, so everyone can see their special days, etc.
Every year the previous family cards go out, and people update them with new things, and there are usually a few new cards, and so on. It's our job to enter these into the system and then proofread so no-one gets disappointed that their name is spelled wrong or their birthday's on the wrong day or something.
Anyways. I've seen a few names. I've seen a few trends in naming the new kidlets. Some of these have made me very annoyed.
Hence.
DRAGONFIRE'S GUIDE TO NAMING CHILDREN OF SMALL-TOWN CANADA
(or, how not to fuck up naming your sprog so that they'll be teased for the rest of their life and suffer damning emotional scars)
Ahem.
1. There seems to be a huge trend (we're talking giant; I come across ten new listings of this sort in each town's package) in naming girl children 'MacKenzie' or 'McKenzie' or 'McKenna' or other variations of Mc/Macwhatever.
Stop it. Bad breeders. Very very bad.
'Mc' and 'Mac' were (and still are) a common device attached to Celtic/Gaelic surnames. Patronymics, even. They mean 'son of'.
SON OF.
YOU ARE NAMING YOUR GIRL CHILDREN MASCULINE NAMES, YOU DIPSHITS.
And they're not even very nice names to begin with for boys.
2. 'Summerrain' and the like became unacceptable names to use after the 1960s. There are some hippies nowadays, yes, but I do believe none of them hang out in your backwater locales.
3. 'Spike' is a dog's name. Not a child's.
4. Any boychild with the name of 'Drayden' or 'Draygan' or 'Draekin' earns my automatic scorn. Your children are not the heroes of bad 1980s cartoons, or alternatively, the heroes of bad fantasy novels.
5. You may not use international/cultural names outside of your own generalized cultural group without good reason. 'Yumiko Ferguson', daughter of Brad and Chelsea, is scarred for life. Unless she is actually Japanese and was adopted (see good reason), but I doubt this.
6. It is seriously unoriginal to name your daughter after the month they were born in. April and May and June are all very nice names, but seriously. If the kid was born on April Fool's Day, you shouldn't have named her April. She's going to get mocked, you heartless cocksuckers.
7. On the other end of the spectrum, please to not be being too creative. 'Kamrynne' is not an acceptable spelling of 'Cameron' or 'Camryn'. Your child is not a unique snowflake. Please stop trying to name them accordingly. (Or, learn to spell. One of the two.)
No un-needed 'y's. No 'gh's where inappropriate. Doubling letters for no reason is just silly. For the sake of the gods, be sensible. Please?
8. Names such as 'Georgina', 'Myrtle', 'Matilda', 'Cedric', and 'Cyrus' were very fine and dandy. In the 1900s. Please to be keeping your child in this century.
9. Back to unoriginality. Stop naming your line of sprogs with the same letter. Seriously. I've seen it a bajillion times. It's not cutesy or squeeworthy, it's just plain stupid-sounding, and it makes me cringe every. time.
The worst part is that, in the interest of getting them all to have that same starting letter, you often offend in the 'kre8tif' department as well.
10. Finally, I really, really hope that 'Bow Legged' is a nickname. For someone's grandpa. Or maybe a pet.
And while we're on the subject, other annoying things about the calendars:
1. How can you manage to spell your families' names two different ways on the same card? Please explain.
2. While we want to put your birthdays and whatever down on the calendar, it's very hard to do so when you give us a name, but NO DATE. You write the name down, sometimes even write down that it's a birthday or anniversary, and sometimes even the month! But no. No, just putting the whole thing down is way too damned difficult, so we have to phone you, and waste our time and yours trying to figure out what it is.
3. If your handwriting looks like shit, don't blame us when your name or date turns out wrong. We tried. It's not our fault. You need to go back to grade one to relearn how to write, or something.
Also, print. For the love of the gods, PRINT. Your cursive is often difficult to read because a number of your letters look the same!
Although, I shudder to think that maybe the reason why you write in cursive is because your printing is worse.
4. Alternatively, if you have good and neat and clear handwriting, we lub you! :D You get mental thank-you notes along with your calendars.
And that is all I have to rant about presently.
Now, the way the company works is, essentially, they create calendars so that small towns or groups can sell them for fundraising purposes. The townsfolk go out, canvass, and get families to sign up. Each family gets a card with their surname (although you can put other people on, too), and this card contains a list of the family members' birthdays, anniversaries, and memorials. These, in turn, get printed on the community's calendar, so everyone can see their special days, etc.
Every year the previous family cards go out, and people update them with new things, and there are usually a few new cards, and so on. It's our job to enter these into the system and then proofread so no-one gets disappointed that their name is spelled wrong or their birthday's on the wrong day or something.
Anyways. I've seen a few names. I've seen a few trends in naming the new kidlets. Some of these have made me very annoyed.
Hence.
DRAGONFIRE'S GUIDE TO NAMING CHILDREN OF SMALL-TOWN CANADA
(or, how not to fuck up naming your sprog so that they'll be teased for the rest of their life and suffer damning emotional scars)
Ahem.
1. There seems to be a huge trend (we're talking giant; I come across ten new listings of this sort in each town's package) in naming girl children 'MacKenzie' or 'McKenzie' or 'McKenna' or other variations of Mc/Macwhatever.
Stop it. Bad breeders. Very very bad.
'Mc' and 'Mac' were (and still are) a common device attached to Celtic/Gaelic surnames. Patronymics, even. They mean 'son of'.
SON OF.
YOU ARE NAMING YOUR GIRL CHILDREN MASCULINE NAMES, YOU DIPSHITS.
And they're not even very nice names to begin with for boys.
2. 'Summerrain' and the like became unacceptable names to use after the 1960s. There are some hippies nowadays, yes, but I do believe none of them hang out in your backwater locales.
3. 'Spike' is a dog's name. Not a child's.
4. Any boychild with the name of 'Drayden' or 'Draygan' or 'Draekin' earns my automatic scorn. Your children are not the heroes of bad 1980s cartoons, or alternatively, the heroes of bad fantasy novels.
5. You may not use international/cultural names outside of your own generalized cultural group without good reason. 'Yumiko Ferguson', daughter of Brad and Chelsea, is scarred for life. Unless she is actually Japanese and was adopted (see good reason), but I doubt this.
6. It is seriously unoriginal to name your daughter after the month they were born in. April and May and June are all very nice names, but seriously. If the kid was born on April Fool's Day, you shouldn't have named her April. She's going to get mocked, you heartless cocksuckers.
7. On the other end of the spectrum, please to not be being too creative. 'Kamrynne' is not an acceptable spelling of 'Cameron' or 'Camryn'. Your child is not a unique snowflake. Please stop trying to name them accordingly. (Or, learn to spell. One of the two.)
No un-needed 'y's. No 'gh's where inappropriate. Doubling letters for no reason is just silly. For the sake of the gods, be sensible. Please?
8. Names such as 'Georgina', 'Myrtle', 'Matilda', 'Cedric', and 'Cyrus' were very fine and dandy. In the 1900s. Please to be keeping your child in this century.
9. Back to unoriginality. Stop naming your line of sprogs with the same letter. Seriously. I've seen it a bajillion times. It's not cutesy or squeeworthy, it's just plain stupid-sounding, and it makes me cringe every. time.
The worst part is that, in the interest of getting them all to have that same starting letter, you often offend in the 'kre8tif' department as well.
10. Finally, I really, really hope that 'Bow Legged' is a nickname. For someone's grandpa. Or maybe a pet.
And while we're on the subject, other annoying things about the calendars:
1. How can you manage to spell your families' names two different ways on the same card? Please explain.
2. While we want to put your birthdays and whatever down on the calendar, it's very hard to do so when you give us a name, but NO DATE. You write the name down, sometimes even write down that it's a birthday or anniversary, and sometimes even the month! But no. No, just putting the whole thing down is way too damned difficult, so we have to phone you, and waste our time and yours trying to figure out what it is.
3. If your handwriting looks like shit, don't blame us when your name or date turns out wrong. We tried. It's not our fault. You need to go back to grade one to relearn how to write, or something.
Also, print. For the love of the gods, PRINT. Your cursive is often difficult to read because a number of your letters look the same!
Although, I shudder to think that maybe the reason why you write in cursive is because your printing is worse.
4. Alternatively, if you have good and neat and clear handwriting, we lub you! :D You get mental thank-you notes along with your calendars.
And that is all I have to rant about presently.
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no subject
Date: 2006-10-28 01:29 am (UTC)ADDENDUM:
11. DO NOT FUCKING NAME YOUR CHILD AFTER ANYTHING IN POPULAR MEDIA
no subject
Date: 2006-10-28 05:27 am (UTC)