Thursday, February 26, 2009

Parents who give their offspring names all starting with the same initial

Forget the Octo-Mom (is she related to Doc Ock?); I’m way more disturbed by 17 Kids & Counting, the TLC show about the Duggar family. Yeah, there are 17 of them. I could comment about the crazy number of children but that would be like shooting fish in a barrel. That’s not what gripes my ass. Rather, it irritates me when parents give all their kids names starting with the same initial. Jordan, Jason, Jinga, Jessa, Jill, Joshua, John-David, Jennifer, Jackson, Justin, James—okay, enough already! Would it hurt you to throw a Kevin or Stacey in there, John Jacob Jingleheimer Jackass?

The Duggars aren’t alone. I grew up surrounded by kids who came from an alliterative household. Carol was kin to Cathy and Christine; Dan’s siblings were Dave, Debbie, and Diana. Dumb.

I don’t even know where to begin with George Foreman.

(For the record, my brothers are Chris and John and my step-sibs are Jay, Joe, Paul, Amy, Denise, and Annette, because, obviously, my parents rock.)

(Photo: TLC)

12 comments:

Anonymous said...

I am related to folks who did this...Lucielle, Lenny, Lenore, my great aunts and uncles from North Carolina. I found this out very recently.
So this has been going on forever!

Anonymous said...

My brother's name begins with a D, not an L, and yet I have first cousins who married. Win some, lose some.

Michaela said...

A few years back I did some work with kids on the Navajo reservation and several families that I met had named their broods using the same name but with different first letters. Thus, Matilda, Bertilda, and Wertilda--I am NOT making this up.

alisten@mac.com said...

My closest friend from high school was a vicitm of this, although there were only two kids, but two cats as well: Stacey, Steph, Scruffy, and Sophie. Parents: Stuart and Shirley. Makes me laugh.

Anonymous said...

I can only imagine what you think of my parents naming us, respectively: Alassandra, Alex, and Alexis.

Juli said...

Marrying someone with the same first initial was not planned. That's just about as bad and makes carving initials on a tree REALLY boring:

JD X JD

What a narcissist.

CarlaCarlaCarlaCarla said...

I never give my kids a name with the word ass in it. It's just a rule.

Anonymous said...

I can top the first initial peeve. I knew a family that named all 5 of their kids George. Boys and girls!

CarlaCarlaCarlaCarla said...

That reminds me:
Facebook has a Group called I Want To Clamp Michael Scott's Face In A George Foreman Grill.

Lauren said...

ah ha ha ha, the duggars. i give them 5 points for some of the creative lengths they've gone to to have that many j names, but i give them -5000 points for having that many kids and an additional -5 for the hair.

Anonymous said...

It's all over in the family I married into: Darlene, Delmar, Delfred, Dennis and Donald. Darlene married Gene and had another Donald. Older Donald married another Darlene and had Dean and Darcy. Dennis married Rozanne and had David, Daniel, Diane, and Dustin. Delfred married Donita. It's a clusterfu** - but do I win for remembering all of their names?!

Marissa said...

Many people think my parents were on that track when they hear the names of 5 of 8 kids. We're all M's, but it wasn't intentional.
How do you feel about identical initials?
Like, D.M.D or M. N. M or... and the names are ridiculous to keep in that pattern.
Yeah, it makes me punchy.