In my family, names are... transitory.
That is, titles and animal names are transitory. Everyone in my family has had roughly the same name since birth. But titles--TV shows, movies, books--are not always the same one their creators have bestowed upon them.
For example, in my house, Inside the Actors Studio is known as "The Incredibly Pretentious Guy Show." At one point, there was a theme song for said show, but it never really took off, as it was simply the words "The Incredibly Pretentious Guy Show" with a rudimentary tune.
We used to call Lost "Crazy Island People," but lately have taken to "Rost," which is an extremely obscure joke from the unappreciated Gene Wilder movie The Frisco Kid. We do still have the theme song for Lost, which is sung to the tune of "Brazil":
They're LOST
They've no idea where they are;
They can't just hop into the car;
They're LOST
Granted, it's a little crude, but it does a lot more than one drum beat can to get you up to speed on that show. Although, as my daughter recently pointed out, since everybody on the show now knows exactly where they are, the name of the show should be changed to Confused, which would not only be more accurate, but would also describe the audience at the same time.
Our dog is probably the being who suffers most from our less-than-permanent view of names. While his actual official name is, and has been, Copper since before we adopted him nearly eight years ago, he has, on occasion, been called at least the names listed below:
Horatio
Rudolfo
Mr. Copper T. Dog
His Honor The Dog
The Woofmeister
Copster
Copper (that's the French pronunciation: CoPPERE)
Woofer
That Stupid Mutt (with the greatest affection, of course)
The Hairy Beast
The Mighty Hunter
Craw, Not Craw!
Everybody's Favorite Dog
Mr. Bowser Hannigan
Fred
There have been others.
It's not that we don't respect names; we just love them enough not to stop at one. It's amazing we stopped at one for each child (although I do call my son "Boss," "Chief," "Kiddo," and "Sir"). We did have additional names ready for each child, but we knew both times exactly what we were going to use when the baby was born--although it was a tossup there at the end what Eve would have been named had she been a boy, so we're glad she cooperated by being herself.
None of this applies when I'm naming fictional characters. I'm starting a new series at the moment, and believe me, I detest every single character name I've come up with so far. Just like I hate every character name I've ever devised for any piece of fiction (screenplay, novel, just lying) in my life. Hate 'em. They all sound ridiculous to me, like people who have fictional names.
And yes, I've tried the baby naming books and the other techniques. It's not that I can't come up with names for characters--it's that I don't like any of them.
Luckily, the names we chose for our children have worked out just fine.
