One of the hundred million things new parents have to do is pick out a name for the baby, preferably before the child reaches his or her 18th birthday, if for no other reason than it is very difficult to register to vote when you are only known as “Baby Smith”.

Picking a name is a little trickier and more important than you first think. You want your child to be successful and confident in the world. You want your child to take charge of life and be able to face others and make good first impressions. It is for this reason that very few children are named “Roscoe” anymore.

Now, before I start getting email and nasty comments from hundreds of people named Roscoe (as if someone named Roscoe could use a computer!) I want to assure you that I think there is absolutely nothing wrong with the name Roscoe if you never want your child to be anymore than a truck mechanic or run a roadside barbecue pit in Kentucky. And with a name like that you can easily save money on clothing because you know there are plenty of bowling shirts and overalls at your local Goodwill that already have the name “Roscoe” stitched right on them. I mean, are there any astronauts named Roscoe? How many nobel prize winners have been named Roscoe? I’m too lazy to actually check this, but I’m pretty sure the number is right around zero, give or take a few.

So how do you go about picking a baby name?

The big trend in naming babies these days is picking a common name and then giving it some sort of “alternative” spelling which breaks most of the common sense rules of the English language. For example, one of the trendiest new boys name is “Dylan” but that’s a very traditional spelling. Modern parents would likely use one of these alternatives:

• Dillon
• Dillan
• Dylin
• Dillllllen
• Dil8an (the 8 is silent)
• Roscoe

If you really want to be on the cutting edge of baby-naming (and, really, who doesn’t?) then you’ll make up some sort of name using the parts of various other popular names. For example, the top ten very popular girl names right now are: Emily, Emma, Hannah, Madison, Olivia, Grace, Elizabeth, Abigail, Samantha and Alexis. A truly progressive parent would come up with one of these variations:

• Emmadison
• Grolivia
• Abixis
• Elizabigailexisamanthannah
• Samadison
• Roscoe

If you’re still having a hard time picking out your baby’s name, you’re not alone. There are, however, a lot of different ways to go about it.

Lots of people turn to books to suggest names for their babies and it’s pretty evident who these parents are when we have little Zeus and Jeronin digging with shovels in the sandbox while Lucritia and Saranese are playing jacks on the sidewalk.

If books aren’t your thing then maybe you should turn on the television for a few hours and simply write down every name you hear and think if any of those sound good to you or not. Being selective is the key here. No matter how pretty your daughter is she probably won’t be named prom queen if she’s named “Larry King” or “Spongebob”.

Lastly, you could always look back into your own family history and name your baby after a particularly important relative. If you don’t have any particularly important relatives, then aim to name your child after a particularly old and rich relative. Hey, it never hurts.

Now that you’ve finally picked out a baby name you can relax, right? Wrong! Far from it!

This is your first chance of many to screw with people’s minds. You’re going to be a parent soon and your mind-screwing ability is going to have to be pretty top-notch. Do you think it’s going to be easy to get a three-year old to go to bed on time every night? Heck, no! (Editor’s note from 3 years after this was written: HELL no.) You’re going to have to tell all sorts of fantastic stories about monsters coming to get him or killer robots enslaving the world if he doesn’t get to bed at a decent hour.

Really, one can argue that most of child-raising is based on the idea of tricking the little buggers into doing what you want them to do. So get used to pulling this sort of stunt. You’re going to be a parent. It’s your duty now.

You see, the last thing you want to do is pick out these great baby names and then tell you friends and family because they’ll immediately make comments like “Oh, are you sure about that?” and “Oh… that’s…. interesting…” and “Oh, dear God!!” And then you’ll be forced to listen to hours and hours of stories about why the name you like for your baby is all wrong and why you should really name the baby “Dillynn”.

No, what you need to do is now spend some time picking out the worse possible names you can possible think of and beginning telling people that those names are what you’re going to give your child. For example, let’s say you found the perfect baby name. You should keep the name to yourself and tell everyone you know that you’re going to name him “Englebert Horatio” with a straight face. You’ll earn extra credibility if you buy a few bibs with “Englebert” stitched on them. Tell your parents how you’re planning on calling him “Eggy” when he’s young.

This way when your baby is born you can surprise your friends and relatives with a the real name and make them all sigh a huge, collective sigh of relief (except for aunt Jane who already purchased a silver baby rattle with the initials “EH” engraved on it).

This will especially please the person you named your new baby after – your old rich uncle Roscoe.

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…I think.

It isn’t entirely unexpected.

You see, my wife and I have been trying off and on to have a child. “Off and on” is the key phrase with how we’ve been going about the whole process. I’ll let you fill in the details.

A few weeks ago we were in the “off” stage and didn’t really think anything of it until my wife mentions that she is a little bit late.

“Late for what?” I ask over a cup of coffee.

“You know….”

“No, I don’t – Oh… Well….”

“Yeah…”

“Okay, then.”

And that is the end of the conversation for the day. A few more days go by and she buys a pregnancy test. But she doesn’t buy just any pregnancy test. No, I’ve taught my wife well. She buys a digital pregnancy test because anything digital has got to be good. She opens it up and unfolds a poster-sized instruction sheet and starts reading through all the intricate and detailed steps she has to take which basically boil down to: “Pee on stick. Wait.”

She puts the test aside and says she’ll use it “tomorrow” and we go about our business, not thinking much of it.

Today is “tomorrow”.

So this morning she wakes up and goes into the bathroom and follows the aforementioned complex instructions and, while she is still in the bathroom and I’m sitting on the bed reading the paper and again drinking coffee I hear her say, “Oh my god!”

I’m a guy and I’m pretty dense so I’m not entirely sure what this initially means. It could mean that she just read another disturbing bit of trivia about the Nick and Jessica breakup in People magazine, it could mean that she can’t figure out the instructions to the pregnancy test, or it could mean –

“I’m pregnant!” she says when she walks in the room a moment later.

I smile and she smiles and we hug and I tell her she’s going to be a wonderful mother and she says I’ll be a wonderful father and I ask her if she thinks it’s mine.

It’s remarks like that which keep a marriage lively.

Now, this was only one test. And even though the package claims to be “99%” accurate (they wouldn’t sell many tests if they were advertised as “71%” accurate, now would they?), we’re going to hold off telling anyone or even thinking too much about it for the moment. She’s going to take another test in a day or two and make an appointment with her doctor and go through all the necessary checks and balances.

We spend the rest of the day going shopping and fixing up the house and doing all the normal things we do on the weekend. Then, as I imagine most people do when they find out they are going to be parents for the first time we go out to dinner and drank beer and smoked cigarettes and come home and make love like crazed weasels, knowing that this night would be the last time we could probably do this for the next 18 years.

And, of course, we talk about the baby the whole time. Life is good.

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