Quarter To Eight
Well, no doubt you'll all have heard the happy news by now. The Beckhams, who have obviously decided that over-population and scarce resources are just someone else's problem have added a fourth child to their family and saddled the unfortunate sprog with the name of Harper Seven.
However, before we can chortle ourselves into a fine state of mockery, a splendid opportunity for a dollop of schadenfreude arrives in the form of the Guardian journalist who had previously bestowed her own loin-fruit with the self-same handle, imagining it to signify sophistication and intellectual superiority, only to wake up yesterday to find it sent hurtling down to the bottom of the social scale by the Beckhams before you can say "chav". O, the pain of the middle classes, is there any like it?! Any sympathy I may have harboured for the Grauniad Journo is swiftly obliterated by learning that she called her son Thurston. Thurston? Good grief!
But in all honesty I cannot point and mock. When The Daughter was born, I was much taken with the idea of naming her Penelope. Which seems like an innocuous enough name, however when the inevitable diminutive is taken into account, along with the surname bequeathed to her by her father, the result would have been awesome!
Or not. Depending on how you look at things. The Husband vetoed this idea sternly. The Daughter was equally unimpressed when she reached an age to be told how close she had come to being immortalised as a cornerstone of popular culture.
Me: "Of course, you would have hated it throughout your childhood, subject as you would have been to taunts and humiliation, but you would have come to appreciated it later and realise how awesome it was!"
The Daughter: "No. No I wouldn't. Just... No."
Me: "You would have thanked me for it in the end!"
TD: "Mother!"
So then, little Half-Past-Seven Beckham - welcome to the world. Welcome to a world of taunts, humiliation and a million time-related jokes, plus the ultimate realisation that you didn't possess at least one parent with the sense to veto your name. But I'm sure you'll come to thank them for it in the end.
Not!
However, before we can chortle ourselves into a fine state of mockery, a splendid opportunity for a dollop of schadenfreude arrives in the form of the Guardian journalist who had previously bestowed her own loin-fruit with the self-same handle, imagining it to signify sophistication and intellectual superiority, only to wake up yesterday to find it sent hurtling down to the bottom of the social scale by the Beckhams before you can say "chav". O, the pain of the middle classes, is there any like it?! Any sympathy I may have harboured for the Grauniad Journo is swiftly obliterated by learning that she called her son Thurston. Thurston? Good grief!
But in all honesty I cannot point and mock. When The Daughter was born, I was much taken with the idea of naming her Penelope. Which seems like an innocuous enough name, however when the inevitable diminutive is taken into account, along with the surname bequeathed to her by her father, the result would have been awesome!
Click to viewOr not. Depending on how you look at things. The Husband vetoed this idea sternly. The Daughter was equally unimpressed when she reached an age to be told how close she had come to being immortalised as a cornerstone of popular culture.
Me: "Of course, you would have hated it throughout your childhood, subject as you would have been to taunts and humiliation, but you would have come to appreciated it later and realise how awesome it was!"
The Daughter: "No. No I wouldn't. Just... No."
Me: "You would have thanked me for it in the end!"
TD: "Mother!"
So then, little Half-Past-Seven Beckham - welcome to the world. Welcome to a world of taunts, humiliation and a million time-related jokes, plus the ultimate realisation that you didn't possess at least one parent with the sense to veto your name. But I'm sure you'll come to thank them for it in the end.
Not!