What's in a name?

It's 3:30 in the morning, baby boy is playing wallyball with my insides, and I am wide awake with too much on my mind. I have always heard that third trimester pregnancy insomnia exists to prepare a mom for the sleepless nights that are ahead with a newborn. But seriously? What a cruel form of preparation.

I think that baby woke me up on this early morning because he is wondering, like many inquiring minds, when he will know his name. Now, I'm not a fan of "officially" naming a child in utero, calling the embryo and my belly by his name before he is born and whatnot, but this time around when it feels like we should really be settling in on one, we're not quite there yet.

Naming a child is a bit of a daunting task. A 40-week gestation is difficult enough without slapping on the added burden of choosing the perfect name, not to mention being responsible to make sure the first name flows with the last, forseeing what bad nicknames may be in the future, and wondering if the child will someday file an official name change with the government due to what he deems was a very poor choice made by his parents. (I'm exaggerating a bit here, I know that it's not THAT big of a deal, people)

For Christmas, as kind of a joke, Alisa gave me a book titled, 50,001 Best Baby Names, which, it turns out, I was actually pretty excited to receive. After reading through almost the entire thing, here are the official numbers:

50,000 to begin
-25,000 : out because they are suited for the female gender (but we sure loved some of them)
-100-200(ish) : that although we might like, are out simply due to their association with an annoying student that has come through Jeff's classroom over the past years. (For you people with non-teacher spouses, this number is much smaller and limited to annoying co-workers, roommates and acquaintances)
-50-100(ish) : out because they have already been selected by close friends or family members (not that we're against naming our children after people we like, or carrying on family names; this mostly includes cousins, etc. that are currently alive and don't want their name poached simply because we like it too)
-24,696 : out because they sound bad with Fuller, are too popular, or are just plain ridiculous.

Okay, so what do your awesome math skills tell you is left over after that complicated equation?

That would be FOUR(ish) possible names. And even a couple of those are still questionable.

I had no idea I was this picky. The psychology of why we like/hate certain names is too complicated to delve into, and, frankly, I don't really understand it, so I'll refrain from analyzing it here.

So we just can't decide. Well, I should say I can't decide--Jeff has somewhat of a more decisive opinion this time around. I'm the one dragging this whole process down.

Therefore, when the question is posed, "what are you going to name the baby?", the answer really is we don't know. It's not that we're keeping it a secret, we just don't know. (And in case you're wondering, Swampfire has remained on the short list, at Owen's insistence)

For now, Baby Boy Fuller might just be the name he comes home with (hmmm, that has a simple, organic quality to it. It can be changed to Boy Fuller, Teen Fuller, and Man Fuller as he grows up. Like calling a thing what it is--a spade is a spade is a spade).