Better than the baby names book: Let's Make Up Good Names!

[Amake]

Have you ever looked at a name like Urkel McCready or Sighild Horsepissdottir or Winner Lane or Mike, and thought "I can do better than that"? Now is your chance! Show your predigistignicative parental powers by making up a name you'd be proud to give your kid. (Parents may also play.)

I submit that the best name ever is Akira American Creed. Yes, even better than Staff Sergeant Max Fightmaster. At first glance it seems like a name trying too hard to be noticed, granted, Akira and American are two names from entirely different cultures that are both by themselves rather unusual, but while it may stand out in America or Japan, it becomes internationally anonymous almost anywhere else. Plus, it's gender neutral.

There's a certain pragmatic sensibility to it, since no one with the name Akira ever fails at anything. In fact every person named Akira seems to turn out spectacularly successful at anything they do, from blowing holes in the moon to making music for the Silent Hill games. I haven't looked into it very far, but it seems the same is the case for the name American. Give your kid that name or some mutation thereof and he or she may end up having not one, but two continents named after them.

And why Creed? Well I may be biased (it's my name), but I like it. It has some heavy associations, and more importantly it rounds off the name and turns it into a smoothly rolling off the tongue phrase. It just sounds good. Not exactly "Cellar door" good, but close. Say it with me: Akira American Creed.

But I'm willing to be impressed by your creativity and aesthetic sensibilities.