Tomb of the Fallen Name

Knickers and I have started the debate about a name for the unborn. Make no mistake, this will be a long and bitterly fought campaign. All the more so for the effort that goes into keeping up the appearance of nonchalance and bonhomie despite the increasing rage and desperation of the combatants.

First off, a name can't just be dropped into a conversation like a slaughtered minke at a Greenpeace rally. It has to be nudged gently into the periphery of your opponents awareness. Most effectively in the wake of a sacrificial pawn name. If, for example, I was pushing for Chlamydia, my gambit would be such:

'What do you think of Antoinette?'
'Veto'
'Fair enough. It's just that I was talking to Chlamydia at work today and she said she'd almost been named that.'

The veto is another serious hurdle to be overcome. A name must be pushed just enough to get it put on the list, but not so much that your opponent sees it as a serious challenger to their own current champion and invokes their veto.

Once a name makes it to the list you've just got to keep enough pressure on it for your opponent to become familiar with it, and if handled with extreme skill, maybe even start to believe it was their idea in the first place.

The all important middle name is also a useful bargaining chip, but my preference is to use a fairly innocuous first name as a sort of Trojan Horse to carry a preferred name onto the list in guise of an afterthought and the hope it can work its way up the ranks.

Strangely we have a consensus on girl names, though nothing is locked in and the girls smoke their Woodbines, polish their weapons and keep an eye on the horizon during this uneasy truce.

Here is an incomplete list of some of my fallen boy names:

• Tobias Arnold
• Mortimer Rufus
• Kurtis Madog
• Lenny Garcia
• Christopher Xavier
• Ming