A Reference List for Unique Names.

Today, I lend my gift of recognizing stellar things to your children and pets.

The quality of a name is one of the more subjective concepts in life. You may be in love with a name you've chosen, but then someone else thinks it's heinous—or uninteresting.

A heinous name is an albatross you'll spend the rest of your life debating whether or not to change. In one scenario, you do. In the sadder scenario, you put in the effort to change it socially, but you have to face records stating otherwise and the name to constantly haunt you until you get used to it—or something of the sort. However, an uninteresting name isn't unscathed either, because automatically you're forced to do the extra work overcompensating for your initial blandness. Yet, there are two types of boring names:

1. The one that doesn't work because everybody else has it—Mark. If I was in Nigeria, I'd be on this boat.

2. The one that's supposed to be interesting but simply doesn't hit the mark—Winter.

Either side has to work hard, but more often than not, if you belong in category one, you're more likely to fade into obscurity. There are some bright sides: You're either that cool where it eventually becomes insignificant, or, those who care about you truly do...because they've had to get to know you that well.

These setbacks are mostly non-existent for pets, on the other hand. Anything works; they're cute, and they'll make it work.

I tried really hard not to use names belonging to anyone I know in category one, but then what am I supposed to use? Every example I came up with, someone had. So to the few Marks I know, I'm sorry.

Here are some names for people who won't have these problems.

Autumn, Ocean, Sonnet, and True.

I know hippie clan sibling names are touchy for most people, but we cannot deny that Forest Whitaker and Keisha Nash were on to something here. Sonnet, however, is the real winner—that's what did it for me.

Fa'idah and Samira.

I once knew two siblings named Fareeda and Samira. They seemed nice—they were my siblings' friends.

Nevada and Iowa.

Although some of these US states are a giant shame, they have great names. Be warned though, you might have to rationalize to people why these names work, which may involve dismissing the existence of the actual state. This is the list: Nevada, Iowa, Ohio, Idaho, and Oregon. Grayed-out "Oregon" is on the chopping block.

Dakota would be on this list, but we've hammered her into the ground, so, no.

Does anyone else name children after states, or are Americans just disturbed?

Odera

The "O" is pronounced "uh", but even when it's butchered, it's such a great name.

Finally, here are some other options, purposely excluding the ones I saved for myself.

Ames

Wells

Rhodes

Rowe

Ford

Noe

Sora

Arlo

Pfizel (someone thought they were being funny misspelling Pfizer on a Twitter name thread— I found two people named Pfizel, so it works. Although, I wish you the best)

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