So Gwyneth Paltrow had a baby girl and named her Apple. What?! Sorry, folks, but “Apple” is not a name. This naming business is a particular peeve of mine. I guess I’m something of a traditionalist when it comes to names, and I just can’t stand people plucking words out of the air and trying to turn them into someone’s name. Don’t these parents realize that their babies are actual human beings who are going to have to spend their lives saddled with these ridiculous names? I once met a woman who had named her daughter Aphasia because she thought it sounded lovely and ethereal or something. For God’s sake, lady, open a dictionary before you put that albatross around your kid’s neck! Or what about the Swedish couple who named their daughter Piggelina? As funny as it sounds in English, it may be even worse in Swedish, as Piggelin is the name of a popular pear-flavored popsicle — who wants to be named after a popsicle?!

Equally irritiating for me is the out-of-control misspelling of names that seems to be running especially rampant these days. I can’t stand that “Mikayla” and “Katelyn” have become two of the more popular girls’ names in the States. People seem not even to recognize that these are bastardizations of the classically beautiful names Michaela and Caitlin. I can go for accepted alternative spellings, such as Catherine versus Katherine, but come on! Mikayla? What is that even about? Worse yet, I’ve even seen it spelled “McKayla,” which spelling may well be behind the naming of the poor little boy I saw in my local Idaho newspaper several years back: McCaleb. I kid you not. I am actually struck nearly dumb by that one. All these people are doing is condemning their kids to a life of having their names misspelled constantly by teachers, doctors, employers, salespeople, etc. I’m sure they exist, but I’ve never met anyone with a so-called “ususual” spelling who thought it was cool. I knew a girl once who was named “Ayricah,” and she said it was nothing but a giant pain in the ass that she was planning to change to the standard “Erica” as soon as she had enough money.

Along similar lines, when I lived in the States I had people ask me all the time how to spell my name, and sometimes it made me want to tear my hair out! At least in Sweden, people seem to realize that as uncommon a name as it is here, there is only one correct way to spell my name, and it’s not Beverlee, Beverli, Bevereley, or anything of the other vowel-laden variants I’d grown accustomed to seeing back home.