A rose by any other name

OK, enough with the pity party already. (How American was that eh?) I am moving on to other things. Numbers be damned.

I had an e-conversation with another US/UK blogger who "outed" herself to me. (I know quite a lot of y'all's names now - Mwah ha ha!). The conversation turned to names that aren't pronounced the same in the US and the UK. A real problem when you have a baby as an expat, and have to think about names.

When the Queenager was born, I quite liked the name we ended up with (which wasn't a pronunciation problem so I won't mention it. Apart from the fact that life and limb would be in peril, yet again.) Her middle name is Eleanor; at one point I had considered this for her first name until the Ball & Chain pronounced it. He said "Elenorrrrrr", rhyming with "snore" only much, much worse. In England, we tend to pronounce it with an "a" sound at the end. Phoenetically, I suppose it would be Elena, but that usually ends up being pronounced as "Elaina" in the States. Naturally, it was relegated to the middle name.

My second child's name is easy to pronounce, and my only beef there is that while it was very unusual in 1995, it has since rocketed to the top of the "popular boys' names poll for about the last 6 years. Grrr. When I was pregnant with him, I really liked the name Rory (and still do). The B&C nixed it because he said Americans had a hard time with all the R's, and indeed, if you hear them saying that name, it is rather a mouth full. I was put out, but moved on. I had the name Rory James all planned out, but it was not to be and anyway I like my son's name. 6 years later my godson came along, and, swear to god, his mother picked out the name Rory James with no input from me. I obviously have subliminal powers; pity it doesn't work vis a vis kids and homework.

But I digress.

When the 'bonus baby' came along I was out of names. (I'm sure that was a sub-conscious thing, never having expected another one.) He has two family names, one of them being Paul. I have always liked Paul, even tho' it's now quite old-fashioned. My brother, uncle and cousin are all called Paul, though none of them named after each other. Apart from the fact that we would have had Big Paul, Little Paul, cousin Paul, and now another Paul, have you heard the difference between how Americans and Brits promounce it? While I say it the right way, Americans say it as I would pronounce "pol". I know Americans would understand the name if I said it, but they would they be able to resist repeating it with a terrible English accent? In a bid to save myself years of that, not to mention saving the odd American from being slapped around the head, Paul was relegated to the middle name.

Other names that were considered and rejected were Paige - just imagine that in a Geordie accent; anything with an R in the middle - again, just begging to be imitated; anything with a T in the middle, as this is usually pronounced "d" by Americans, who would then feel obliged to imitate me when I actually pronounced it correctly.

The kids are desperate for a dog and I'm holding out, partly because we'd have to go through the whole naming business again.

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