Hi. Jason substitute blogging for Natalie. I believe substitute blogger is only slightly more glamorous than the "fry guy" at McDonald's, but sometimes you have to help out a loved one in need.
In general, everything is going well. There is a slight problem with Munchkin losing too much weight, so the pediatrician wants him to stay overnight. This is a pediatrician who didn't see our child, who's covering for the other on-call pediatrician who didn't even examine our child. He also had the bedside manner of a turnip.
Otherwise, both he and Mom healthy (but very sleepy.) Olga (Natalie's Mom) and I are taking shifts staying with Natalie to help her out. Remarkably, after having a c-section Natalie is moving around quite well (and consuming many KitKat bars.)
Here's a picture that was taken near birth, but is fairly representative of the last 3 days and especially last night, minus the full frontal nudity fashion look.
So, why still "Munchkin" and not a regular name? Well ... we've given it a good amount of thought, but those of you who know Natalie well know that she takes a while to make decisions. This is painfully obvious when we write emails together ... even short 2 sentence emails are reviewed again and again for accuracy and tone. But back to the point. Our approach to naming our child was to dutifully go through a name book of 45,000 names, most of which you wouldn't use to name your parakeet. Still, we wanted to see what would grab our imaginations and didn't want to discard any names too quickly. Actually, a few names were suggested ("Elvis", Beelzebub" and William Robert i.e. "Billy Bob") by one of the parents and were met with immediate and indignant rejection by the other. After going through the list, these are the names that made the first cut:
Anderson
Bryson
Donovan
Emerson
Erickson
Garrison
Hamilton
Jackson
Jansen
Jorgen
Julian
Kenyon
Landon
Laurens
Mason
Matias
Maxfield
Nathaniel
Nicholas
Nolan
Orion
Patrick
Paxton
Pierson
Percival
Preston
Rainier
Ramsey
Rayden
Riley
Riordan
Rockwell
Rodin
Rowen
Sebastian
Sawyer
Sumner
Note that the names stop at "S" (we got too tired to continue with the awful name book) and that there are a lot of "R" names, most of which were being considered as middle names. I *am* concerned that there are so many names ending with "son", and I'm going to be pretty suspicious if anyone name Ander, Bry, Emer, Erick, Garri, or Jack start hanging around the house. Also note that we must have been quite fatigued, as "Orion", "Rockwell", "Maxfield" and "Percival" made the list. I remember going through the name book and hearing one of us saying, "Why not? Put it on the list." So we had this list going in. But clearly it was a long list and needed to be shortened.
After the first cut, this is what remained for potential first names ...
Anderson
Erickson
Hamilton
Jackson
Julian
Kenyon
Landon
Matias
Nathaniel
Nicholas
Riordan
Sebastian
Do you see what's happening? We're choosing our child much like it is done on "American Idol". Damn that insidious reality TV!! Sure, we had our William Hung's like "Maxfield" and "Percival" that were quickly and easily dismissed. But then it got harder.
First, we continued through the rest of the name book (T-Z) and added Theodore to the list at Natalie's suggestion. I suspect this was the pain medications talking, as we only know 3 Theodores (Teddy Roosevelt, our friend "Ted" from Albuquerque, and the overweight chipmunk with "Alvin and the Chipmunks") So we reduced the names further. Matias was too Germanic. Riordan was too weird ... who names their kid "Riordan"? Kenyon was too pitchy ... oops, stumbled back into the American Idol analogy. Anyway, these are the names that survived the next cut ...
Anderson
Erickson
Hamilton
Jackson
Julian
Landon
Nathaniel
Nicholas
Sebastian
Natalie then took more pain medication and I pushed her further, knowing her decision-making defenses were down. She shamefully confessed that her favorite cartoon growing up was indeed "Alvin and The Chipmunks". And we narrowed the list further, deciding that Kenyon, Sebastian, Julian and Landon had to go. Names reminiscent of "Little House on the Prairie" stars only increased the risk that our boy will be beat up at recess on a daily basis. So this is what we were left with ...
Anderson
Jackson
Nathaniel
Nicholas
Theodore
At this point we checked the trends of baby names over the years, which is located on a government site based on social security numbers. Good to see our tax dollars going to good use. Anyway, Anderson was never in the top 1000 boys names. Jackson was the 36th most popular name in 2006 and is increasing in popularity. Nathaniel was #69 and essentially stable, while Nicholas was 17th and becoming slightly less popular. Theodore was 296th and last saw it's heyday in the early 20th century. And with The Chipmunks. But we had to get it down to 3, our "Name Idol" finalists. It was hard, but the final three are:
Anderson
Nicholas
Theodore
Natalie is sleep deprived and wants to wait until the morning to decide. Your thoughts/votes?
