Roger O Green

Names not the same, state to state

Ariza; Zyquavious; Kinnick; Khodee; Hudaifa; Petie; Autzen; Neyland; Korver (52 of 90).

There’s this website to which I subscribe, before it became a paid site. A recent email reads:

“Since 2010, 71% of babies named ‘Morrissey’ have been born in California (Californians really love the Smiths). Over the same period, 62 of the 99 babies born ‘Krymson’ entered the world in Alabama (where delivery rooms echo with shouts of ‘Roll Tide!’).

“These findings come to us through a rabbit hole of a query, which scours the latest Social Security Administration data for names where more than 50% of births are from a given state. Want to know which baby names are most characteristic of your state?”

There are an amazing 263 names for which at least half the people so named in the country were from the Empire State. Forty-eight names ONLY show up in New York, such as Trany (89 times) and Ruchel (82). Then there are those names that predominate here, such as Frimet (116 out of 118), Brucha (114 of 116), and Chany (337 of 344).

Other large absolute numbers: Malky (603 of 635), Gitty (714 of 805), Faigy (668 of 754), Raizy (556 of 628), and Yakov (548 of 707).

I figured California might have a lot of qualifying names; there were 63. It had eight names only found in the Golden State, including all seven of the people named Hovik. Also Hayk(85 of 100), Narek (111 of 153), Armen (108 of 174), and Curren (107 of 208).

Hawaii has 33 names where it predominates, including all 8 folks named Kiai and Kuhao, 31 of the 34 people named Hilinai. Mahina (85 of 143) and Nainoa (87 of 126) are well represented.

All 6 persons named Sanjuanita are in Texas, with a total of 28 names on the list. Other names specific to the Lone Star State: Brazos (89 of 98), Kinsler (181 of 247), Roel (252 of 369), and Debanhi (124 of 202).

Pennsylvania has 8 names listed, including Khayr (all 5), Coopar (13 of 14), and the distinctly Amish name Benuel (95 of 136).

All the 6 New Jersey names listed have between 50.5% and 57.6% of the country, including Brocha (74 of 134), Avrohom (344 of 663), and Binyomin (133 of 263).

The 5 Illinois names noted are Szymon (79 of 113), Augustas (5 of 8), Oliwia (44 of 82), Zuzanna (112 of 219), and
Kacper (165 of 325).

Two of the four Florida names are very similar: Dawens (6 of 7), Juvens (11 of 14), Marvens (84 of 118) and Marvins (10 of 19).

The three names from Louisiana: Jamyri (all 6), Jarden (5 of 8), and Amyri (44 of 82).

Massachusetts prefers Joaolucas (6 of 8) and Mariaeduarda (37 of 69).

These states had only one special name each. Arizona – Ariza (191 of 231); Georgia – Zyquavious (6 of 10); Iowa -Kinnick (202 of 257); Maryland – Khodee (5 of 8); Minnesota – Hudaifa (5 of 5); Missouri – Petie (5 of 5); Oregon -Autzen (6 of 8); Tennessee – Neyland (151 of 192); Utah – Korver (52 of 90).

Why I find this fascinating, besides the fact that the information exists at all, is that it is a reflection of the familial, ethic and social fabric of a given location.

The database also can track the most gender-neutral name of the decade. With Rooney, a baby with this name is only 0.29% more likely to be a baby girl than a baby boy. Other gender-neutral names include Clarke, Amory, and Cypress.

My sister Leslie Green in hospital

Rebecca had posted requests for prayers for her mother on Instagram and Facebook.

Coming home from work Monday night, I received a call from my sister Marcia asking if our niece Rebecca Jade had called me. Turns out she had left a message on the answering machine.

As best as we can figure out, Rebecca’s mother, my other sister, Leslie Green, was going to work, riding her bicycle to a light-rail station in the San Diego, California. Whether she hit a pothole or another impediment, we don’t know.

What we do know is that Leslie arrived at a hospital by an emergency vehicle. I get the sense she didn’t realize how injured she was; adrenaline will do that. Fortunately, she had her helmet on, because she might have suffered brain damage, or worse. But her sunglasses probably helped to break some bones in her face. Everyone should take Cincinnati CPR Training in case there’s an emergency.

She was in the trauma section, but she didn’t have surgery until that night because she wasn’t as bad off as other patients, which I suppose is positive news. She had a “temporary” tracheotomy; I do not know what that is. She’s breathing well.

I called a nurse early Tuesday morning, who said Leslie looked remarkably well. The swelling has largely subsided.

She had some plastic surgery on her face Wednesday night, which went well, as shown on My Botox LA Med Spa`s website. I’m mentioning all this, despite hating to write extemporaneously about fluid situations, because Rebecca had posted requests for prayers for her mother on Instagram and Facebook, and one of Leslie’s friends IMed me on FB:

“Is [Leslie] going to be OK? We had no idea last I heard she was on a cruise with her daughter.” And that is true. From Rebecca’s newsletter from a little over a week ago re: touring on two weeks of cruises with Dave Koz and his band:

“It was an incredible experience! From Copenhagen, we cruised to Stockholm, Sweden; then to Tallin, Estonia; St. Petersburg, Russia; and finally to Helsinki, Finland before heading back to Copenhagen. And this year, my mom was able to join me!

“We had a great time, shared some amazing moments together, and she became a bit of a celebrity on the boat, both for singing in the ‘So You Think You Can Jam’ talent contest and for an impromptu jam with the legend himself, Larry Graham, where she and I got to sing together while Larry Graham thumped his bass! It made Larry emotional, as it reminded him of performing with his mom when he was growing up.”

If memory serves, Monday was supposed to have been Leslie’s first day back to work and they were concerned when she didn’t show up. As it stands now, she still has a broken left hand and left wrist – her dominant side -as well as four broken ribs (3 through 6).

She’ll be having more procedures, I imagine, but the Wednesday surgery was two days earlier than I was originally told, so I take that as a good sign.

But it kind of sucks being roughly 2,879 miles away. One of my oldest friends will be in San Diego this weekend, as it turns out, and she will visit Leslie Green and Rebecca Jade. This is some small comfort.

Kapsul Kickstarter catastrophe: owning mistakes

Curiosity has won

Going back to 2009, I have backed 31 Kickstarter projects, 27 which got funded. Of those, 15 came out what I would liberally describe as “on time”; i.e., within three months of the originally stated release date.

This means that there are a dozen that were late, some quite so. One from February 2014, I’m STILL waiting on, though the creators have explained the series of delays.

Another generated this recent mea culpa:

“We know you expected to have your unit by now. It’s getting warmer and you may find yourself gazing out windows that you will once again have to fill with ugly old a/c units instead of the beautiful Kapsul you hoped for. That can’t be a good feeling. For that, we owe you an official apology.

“In April of 2016, we asked for your support and told you that we would reward that support with the delivery of our air conditioner which we estimated to arrive in March of 2017. As you well know by now, we didn’t deliver as promised. Now we can’t deliver until April 2019. For a company trying to reinvent the air conditioner, not cool…Learn more about space heater repair solutions from Landmark to find out the best professionals for cleaning and repairing services.

“We got our timeline really wrong and we’re sorry that the burden of that fell to you, our backers. We messed up a few different ways. Two big ones:

“1. We greatly underestimated the challenges we faced in meeting our energy requirements and bringing our highly-customized product through manufacturing.

“2. We failed to adequately communicate about those challenges as they arose.”

#1 is definitely true, but #2, in many ways more so. And they got in what seemed to me to be avoidable difficulty when they came up with a name that, for trademark infringement reasons, they had to abandon. They can’t mention the name, so I won’t. 14-15-18-9-1. By way of apology:

“As an early and dedicated supporter of Kapsul, you will receive:
1 Year Extended Warranty (3-years total)
40% off your next full-price Kapsul purchase via a one-time use code. You’ll receive one code for every unit originally pledged for when we have units in stock.
Equity in our company. Every backer will be entitled to claim 10 shares of our company at no cost to you, details to be announced next month!”

Now of course I have no idea if the machine really WILL come out, or if its stock will ever have any value. But there is a point for me at which curiosity has won and I plan to wait it out.

If you’re ever in the situation of considering doing a Kickstarter, drop me a line. I’m not sure I’m good at telling someone what actions to take. But I’m pretty expert at warning folks what NOT to do.

V is for voting (or the lack thereof)

Develop a national response to foreign attacks on our election systems

In the last election, there were over 224 million American citizens over the age of 18 in the United States, and yet only around 157 million were registered to vote. Even fewer actually voted.

Chris Christie, the former governor of New Jersey and a current ABC News commentator noted on This Week on a recent Sunday morning: “2017 in New Jersey, the lowest voter turnout for governor in the state’s history. It was 36 percent turnout for a statewide gubernatorial race in New Jersey. To just give you an example, eight years earlier, when I was elected the first time, it was 48 percent. It’s a big, big change.” It may have been 38.5% in 2017, but point taken.

Each state determines how it will run its elections in terms of hours of voting, deadlines for registering. So the ability to stifle the process is quite varied.

The Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law filed a Motion for a Preliminary Injunction in its lawsuit against the Georgia Secretary of State that seeks to remedy an unlawful racial gerrymander. “The lawsuit concerns Atlanta metro area Georgia House of Representatives Districts that were redrawn in 2015 for the sole purpose of helping white incumbents get reelected.”

New Yorkers face unreasonably early registration deadlines, no option for early voting, severe restrictions on absentee voting and long lines at the polls. The state’s user-unfriendly voting laws caused such dismal voter registration and turn-out rates in the last presidential election that New York had the eighth worst turn-out in the country.

There are far too many other examples to list here.

One activist group recommends that Congress must take thesee steps to secure our elections:

Audit elections to verify that ballots are counted and reported correctly
Require paper ballots (or, at least, paper receipts for electronic ballots)
Enact national vote-by-mail
Develop a national response to foreign attacks on our election systems

For ABC Wednesday

Robert Kennedy: 50 years post-assassination

There were 13 shots fired, but Sirhan’s gun only held eight bullets.

As I’ve mentioned in this blog, I wasn’t a big fan of Robert Kennedy when he ran for President in 1968. Among other things, I didn’t trust him as Attorney General under his brother John and briefly under Lyndon Johnson, mostly over the purported FBI stalking of Martin Luther King Jr.

I didn’t support RFK running for US Senate from New York. But being only 11 in 1964, I didn’t have much of a say in the matter. He won, of course, beating out a perfectly nice moderate Republican named Ken Keating, back in the days when there WERE moderate Republicans.

Still, I was up extremely late watching the results of the California primary on June 4/5, 1968 when Bobby Kennedy declared victory. “On to Chicago!” A short time later, as I was finally getting ready for bed, I heard what turned out to be shots fired, followed by pandemonium.

So many people I knew were devastated by the news of his shooting and eventual death on June 6. As were people I never knew: The busboy who cradled a dying RFK has finally stepped out of the past, for example.

Now, 50 years later, Who killed Bobby Kennedy? His son Robert Kennedy Jr. doesn’t believe it was Sirhan Sirhan. While RFK Jr. can have views I don’t subscribe to – autism from vaccines, e.g. – it seems that, at bare minimum, he and his sister Kathleen Kennedy Townsend are correct that Sirhan could not have been the only shooter.

There were 13 shots fired, but Sirhan’s gun only held eight bullets. Sirhan faced RFK, but the fatal shots were to the back of Bobby’s head.

It’s interesting that, while there were many people milling around the Senator, the details get lost in the trauma of the moment. This killing, along with that of his brother Jack, will be fodder for conspiracy theories, quite possibly for the next half century.