The Name Game: Pressing On!

People.

Round #4 of chemotherapy starts on Monday. From that point forward, we will have just nine weeks before the official end of the chemotherapy portion of treatment and, therefore, the end of The Name Game.

We have 416 names to go if we're going to hit 800.

That means we need to find an average of 46.22... names a week if we want to hit our goal. Can we do it? Can we do it???

Some housekeeping items:

Sister #2 suggests in the comments that if we take "Rudolph" into the men's list, then we must also take his companions, Dasher, Dancer and so on.

But I don't think so. Dasher, Dancer, Prancer, Vixen, Comet, Cupid, Donner and Blitzen are not actual men's names. Stage names in certain bars, perhaps, but not men's names, per se. So, just as Ben is a man's name used to describe a rat (we think), and so we take it, we take Rudolph, a man's name used to describe a reindeer. But this doesn't mean we take all reindeer names, just as we wouldn't take all rat names.

Except for "Mickey," of course. A rat on two different levels. (Holla', Suzanne!)

Second item: Last week, I said we wouldn't be counting, "Peggy Sue" as different from "Peggy" and "Sue."

I'm going to claim a HER moment on this one. Why wouldn't we? My own sister is named Mary Jean, and she definitely not called Mary, and definitely not called Jean. Mary Jean is its own name.

So Peggy Sue is in. As is Mary Lou, which Mary Lou Queeney tells me is in a song from years ago.

That's 2 more!

Sister #4 came up with Tallulah from the cute movie, "Bugsy Malone"--a film that gave both Jodie Foster AND Scott Beo their big breaks. Without it, we might never have gotten Charles in Charge. Whew. I don't even like to think of that national treasure never coming into production.

Sister #3 gave us Nicki from Prince's song, "Little Nicki."

Which brings us to another note: Nicki, even if we already have Nicole? Judges are going with "yes" on this. Nicknames are in. Because how are we to know if that birth certificate read Nicki or Nicole? My sister-in-law is named "Sandi," and not Sandra.

Am I stretching the rules a tad to facilitate the climb to 800? Yes.

And that's it from the trenches. Two new names. Two names from last week that we're now counting. 4. Four names.

Well shy of this week's average requirement.

But let's not despair. I've done a little thinking of my own. So. Ahem:

Sandra Dee from 'Grease'

Evangeline from that song that hit the Pop 40 when I was a Freshman in college. . .so the year was. . .1997-98. Don't know the group. But I'm sure many of you do. Nick, for instance, knows exactly what I'm talking about, right?

Gidget from the TV show

Dot from the Animaniacs theme song

Cynthia, a Springsteen song by the same name

Early Pearly, so, Pearl, also from the Boss in 'Blinded by the Light'

And from Mambo #5, we get several names, some of which are already on the list, but new ones include:

Angela
Pamela
Monica
Erica
Tina

Finally, and I think it's time to unsheathe this weapon, we have a little help from Google.

For instance, I thought of a random name, Babette, and plugged it into Google as "Babette Lyrics" and sure enough, there is a Frank Zappa song titled "Babette."

Then I thought, "Hmm, each of my sisters' names is on the list except for Leslie's."

Same thing. Came up with "Leslie is Different," by Small Fred.

I don't know who Small Fred is. I don't know anything about him except that a) He's probably small is some sense of the word and b) he wrote a song titled "Leslie is Different."

The question now is this: Does Google work on your computer, too?

I mean, with Google on our side, we could have this thing licked in a week or two!

For now, 17 new names to add.

Check the Name List on the labels to see the updated total.

FINALLY: It occurred to me as I was trying to think of names, too, that part of the frustration here is the long list. I thought of "Alberta," for instance, from Clapton's song, and then scrolled up and--DOH!--it's there already.

Maybe this kind of thing is holding you back. You don't want to have to look it up to see if it's there. And so you don't bother at all.

Well don't hold back any longer! Put up all the names you can think of and I'll sort through which ones are new.

Oh, finally, no, seriously, this is the final point: I plan to blog live again from the chemo barn on Monday. Dr. Science should be back in, and I'm hoping he did his homework on the family history thing so I can fill you all in on the madness that got this game started.