Baby-Naming Tips for Expectant Parents

Note: All example names used below are actual names of actual people. To them I say I still love you; the fault is not your own.

• Even though you know your child will be confident and well-liked, make sure your child's name does not rhyme with any common pejoratives (i.e. Mitch, Buck, Jorge), just to be safe.
• Interesting names are unusual names spelled in a usual way: they are not usual names spelled in an unusual way.
• Non-standard spellings are only acceptable if they are the standard spelling in some recognized human language; for example, you can get away with Kjerstin and Ioan, but never Qurysteenah for Christina, and never, ever spell Karen C-A-R-R-I-O-N.
• DO read the list of the most popular baby names for the past couple of years and DO eliminate at least the top six from consideration. DO NOT simply spell it weird (see above) so your child is strapped with Aeydonne until he's old enough to change it.
• If you want to be on the cutting edge, give your child a name that is not a name. Virtues, like Truth (for a boy) or Charity work well, as do flowers, fruit, and certain herbs (Sage and Rosemary, yes; Parsley and Thyme, no). Hospital food and illegal drugs such as Cocaine are not acceptable.
• Do not give your daughter a super-cute name if you are entertaining any dreams that she will work in a professional capacity (doctor, lawyer, judge, CEO, president, etc.). I am sorry to say that few of the Ashlees and Kandis in the world will ever break the glass ceiling. Either give her a stronger name and a cute nickname (Catherine to Kitty), or get used to the fact that her only chance at fame and fortune will be American Idol.
• When a popular character on a popular television show gives their child the perfect name, stop. Resist. Half the country is giving their children that exact same name at that exact same moment.
• Short first names (one to two syllables) go well with long last names (four syllables or more); long first names go well with short last names.

To the nerds of the world

Do not condecend.
Though I may nod and give
a tight-lipped smile,
I am thinking about how
you are not in high school
(where you were so far down on
the male food chain
that you decided to lord it
over the girls: if you
ever ran into me in that stage
I would have stared at you
until you stuttered and blushed
and then taken apart your
flimsy Tetris fortress
until your invisibility
was naked)
and now you can
pretend that you make more
than Mr. Popular (though
in reality his smile-skills carried
him to seven-figures in a corner office
and your C++-skills have you
in the basement), so stop
whining about football.

No, I'm not dead. (At least, I'm pretty sure.)

Hey, why don't you try living in the first half of the twentieth century and we'll see how often you update your blog.
Or, I may just have completely wiped out my last whisp of creativity. My novel, Sleeping Liberty, has kinda reached a stand-still as well.
If you do one thing this summer, read 100 Selected Poems by e. e. cummings. Oh yeah, and watch The Shop Around the Corner: Tom Hanks is not fit to tie James Stewart's shoelaces.

"This is the last time I'll abandon you…oh, I wish I could!"

Sunshine makes this place home. When I look over our wide meadow from my bedroom window, it shines golden rather than paling from wisps of lonely fog. Light flashes into even the deepest shadows from the rustling emerald leaves and the lilies are so bright blue that my fingers would stain if I touched them. Yes, I decide, it really is beautiful.
I am blissfully blind to everything terrible as long as these colors dazzle my eyes.