Wednesday, December 16, 2009

The Michael Appleby Theory Of Women's First Names And Relative Hotness

Before I begin this post I have to give a shout-out to Adam Snider (@ink_slinger if you do the whole Twitter thing). Thanks to a small series of recent tweets from Adam, I arrived at the following theory. So without the tireless efforts of Adam Snider (or here if you do the whole World Wide Web thing)(here if you have no idea what a World Wide Web is)(here if you are clinically considered to be a vegetable) I wouldn't have some fresh new material to present to you fine folks in Internet land! Thanks Adam!

Let's face it, this is the 21st century and there is less and less that seems weird to us. Kids walk around with lime green hair and chains in their wallets and we actually mock those kids not because they walk around with lime green hair and chains in their wallets, but because lime green hair and chains in wallets is soooo 2006. This is the brave new world that Huxley was talking about. I think. Okay, I don't know for sure. I'm just putting Huxley's name out there so that you think I'm smarter than I am. It's called name-dropping people! Look it up!

That being said, women's names are becoming more and more varied and unusual. Girls named Copernicus are spelling it cOpernicus as a sort of nod to iPods and any other cutely named piece of kitsch technology. Don't believe me? Just try to spell that girl's name the old fashioned, capital-letter-goes-in-front way and they will rip your nuts off with a kung-fu grip. One of the latest trends in naming girls fresh from the womb is to give them names that were often reserved for the dick-waving gender of the species. Meeting women named Carl, Gustav, Jonathan, Frank, or even Bernard is not that unusual. That, or you met pre-op transexuals named Carl, Gustav, Jonathan, Frank, or even Bernard, but that's a whole different can of corn, Esther!

Aside: I'm not sure who Esther is or what she's doing with cans of corn. It's not an old adage. Seriously, I just made that shit up. That's how creative I am. I make up my own adages!

The name that triggered all this was Michael. Apparently there are more and more women showing up in places who are named Michael.

I have to admit that when I first heard of girls being named Michael I was a bit put off because it meant that my name was creeping toward androgeny where once it had be squarely in undeniably testosterone-laden-cock-and-balls-punch-you-in-the-face masculinity. The knee-jerk reaction to this would be, of course, to get a name change to something that could not ever be given to a girl. But then I thought about it and I'm beginning to think that there is no name left that is so manly it could never, ever be given to a girl. Don't eulogize your testicles just yet gentlemen.

But Michael, I will never, ever meet a girl named Keith or Chuck or Allen!

Wrong! It'll happen. There might not be many or any at all just yet, but give it time. That will change.

Here is my theory. Girls who are burdened with man names are named such so as to limit the number of suitors she will receive especially during the formative years when parents hope and pray their little girls don't come home from dates knocked up.

Think about it: you're some dude looking to get his rocks off. Are you really going to get it on with a girl named Brent? Hell no! Factor into this the fact that more and more relationships are forming online where one of the earliest things we learn about people we interact with are names. If you meet some girl on Craigslist who has a name like Douglas or Clive are you seriously going to believe they're a girl or a "girl"? Exactly.

That's not the end of it, folks! Those same girls with the manly names, thanks to Darwinian law, have to evolve to compensate for the biological setback of their manly names. Biologically speaking they are supposed to find a mate and they are being held back by a name. So what do they do? They blossom into more attractive-looking women. Those dudes who wouldn't even look at a girl named Eric let alone fuck one are now finding themselves looking beyond the name because girl is smoking hot. The girl has evolved because of the setback her parents gave her.

Now, to get back to the name Michael, would I ever want to be with a girl named Michael? Well, I suppose if the right Michael came along I would consider it. Sex with her would be a little like masturbation I suppose. Except, of course, instead of it just being me alone in bed screaming, "Oh Michael!" (whose name did you think I would scream?), there would be two of us in bed screaming, "Oh Michael!" And the kicker is that she would probably be screaming my name. And me, being me, would probably be screaming my name too! I'm that good.

Another thought that just hit me is that if it got to a point where I was marrying a girl named Michael the J.P. or priest or whoever it is we get to perform the ceremony, that guy would say, "Do you Michael take Michael to be your Michael for Michael and Michael?" I know, that sounds too fucking awesome to be real.

I now pronounce you Michael and Michael. You may kiss the Michael. Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you for the first time Michael and Michael Appleby!

The universe would fold in on itself and all existence would simply cease to be. The perfect storm of kick-assery would have occurred.

So, if you find yourself wondering what Michael and I would name our prospective first daughter, the name would be Richard. Really, you could draw a manly name out of a hat filled with manly names, but I think Richard would be a huge obstacle for our precious little daughter to overcome.

She'd be so beautiful it'd make you blind just to look at her.