Today I was going to beg off from Coffee. I woke up with a headache, Gracie is barking at the world and I’m cold. Yup, I am also whining. The house is so cold my furnace would have gone on this morning. I even put on some socks and a sweatshirt. I really do miss my slippers, but they are gone now, gone where slippers go when they are passed their prime.

I got to thinking about names this morning. Who knows why? My brain just takes off on its own sometimes and brings me along for the ride. When I was growing up, there were, counting me, three Kathleen’s in my class and two or three Catherine’s. Mary by itself or combined with Alice or Ann was well represented. Patricia was a big one, and they were all either Pat or Patty, not a Trish among them and not one Patty with an i instead of a y. Susan, Donna and Carol rounded out many of the rest of the names of my classmates. My friend Maria was the only Maria, and there was only one Beatrice. My two best high school friends were Bobby and Jimmy. Add David, John, Michael and Tommy, and those were the names of most of the boys in my class. There was only one Henry, and he was called Henny.

It strikes me funny when nicknames are longer than the full names. Johnny is one of them and Pauly is another. I guess John is just too pedestrian. Nicknames also had to end in y, a rule of thumb back then. Think Billy, Larry, Ronny, Ricky or Joey. I knew them all. They were all in my class.

Now there are no rules for names. Make up one if you want. Name your kid after a city, maybe even the one where he or she was conceived, or after a planet or whatever strikes your fancy. If you’re a celebrity, be cutesy or even a bit strange. Think North West, Bodhi Rain and Cricket. I don’t know about you but I’d hate to be named after a bug. Hello, I’m mosquito!

My grand-nephews are Ryder, son of my nephew Ryan, and Declan, son of my niece Sarah. I have another grandnephew arriving in August and a grandniece in late July. Declan’s brother will be Jackson with the middle name George and will be called Jack a popular name in itself. Ryder’s sister will be Georgina, an uncommon name, and will be called Georgie. I like that. Both are named after my father. I like that part the most.