When it comes to naming a baby, people can have some pretty wild ideas!
But while "Lizard" may still be in the joke phase, real people have given their babies some, uh, unusual names...or come up with names in really interesting ways. Here are 50 from members of the BuzzFeed Community that I will NOT forget:
1. "I had a teacher named Mrs. Butz who named her son Henry. His nickname was Harry....so his name was HARRY BUTZ. I genuinely think they didn’t put two and two together/didn’t think about it with their last name!"
2. "My mom wanted us to both have a middle name that started with 'K,' but I guess 'Knacole' (exactly how you think it sounds) was all she could come up with instead of literally any other 'K' name."
3. "My dad met Matthew Perry on a plane about a week after he and my mom found out she was pregnant with me. He was a HUGE Friends fan (and turned me into one), and I was born in ‘96, literally the height of the show’s popularity. Once he came home and told my mom that he met Matthew Perry, it was decided I would be named Chandler. I got teased for having a 'boy name' as a little girl, but now, as an adult, I absolutely love my name."
4. "I have a friend whose name is Breech. Yes, she was born in breech presentation."
5. "My friend recently told me that his grandmother saw a really pretty name on a flyer and told his parents how much she liked it. The parents agreed and ended up giving him the name. It was a flyer for a missing child."
6. "When my husband went to cut our son’s umbilical cord he said 'Hello there, Donald' and the midwife turned to him and said 'I don’t say this very often, but please don’t name your child Donald.' He is named Harry, thankfully."
7. "My mom cheated on the man she was married to and got pregnant with me. The man she was married to wanted to name me Matilda, but when I was born he realized I wasn't his kid and left. When they brought the paperwork in for my birth certificate, my mom couldn't think of anything so she saw a calendar and named me April."
8. "My great uncle was born on the farm (first born of eight) and his parents literally just didn’t name him. They called him by a variation of his last name and never filled out a name on the birth certificate. When he went into the army, he learned his legal first and middle name: Baby Baby. He legally changed his first name but kept his middle."
9. "My brother's name was taken from a business card. My parents were still deciding on the last day of registering my brother when my dad found a business card in his pocket and noted the contact details. He asked mom what she thought of this name. She liked it enough to go with it."
10. "I was supposed to be named Alicia, but my mom wasn’t present when the nurse came in with the birth certificate and my dad realized he didn’t know how to spell Alicia, so he went with the closest name he could spell — Ashley."
11. "Everyone asks my brother if our parents are fans of Saved By The Bell because his name is Zach Morris but they didn't even know that show until after they named him!"
12. "My name was going to be Rebecca, but when my mom was about eight months pregnant my father read an article about a woman named Caitlin who was arrested for a bunch of IRA bombings. His thought was basically, 'Oh that's a good name for a girl.' This was 1983, way before Caitlin became trendy. I've only met a couple of other Caitlins my age."
13. "My sister's baby names are currently the talk of the family. She and her husband met at college in a musical performance program, so they are naming their children based on musicals. Their first daughter is named Truly, from Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. Unusual, but a pretty cute name once we got used to it. Her second daughter...sigh. She's currently two months old and everyone is struggling to come up with a nickname that my sister will accept. Her name is Edelweiss, from The Sound of Music."
14. "I know two sisters who are named after their dad's first wife and the daughter he disowned."
15. "I was named after '50s pin-up model Bettie Page and my dad's hot neighbor who babysat him when he was a child named Paige. Weird reasons to name a BABY."
16. "My oldest three children are named after the X-Men. Logan for Wolverine, Storm-Aurora for Storm, and Rogue. They all have the same father who was X-Men obsessed and I really didn't have any ideas."
17. "My name is Carly Dale. I'm named after cars and race car driver, Dale Earnhardt."
18. "My sister was named after my imaginary friend. She was going to be named Grace, but as my mom’s pregnancy progressed, it became clear that was not going to fit. So I had an imaginary friend named Kathleen, and my mom liked it, and named my sister that. Basically, my imaginary friend became my real life-long friend. ❤️"
19. "My parents are both lawyers so I was named Miranda after the Miranda rights — you know, what police officers read to detainees being arrested: 'You have the right to remain silent, anything you say can and will be used against you...'"
20. "My former sister-in-law named her son after a popular DJ in her town. Why? He was running the contest, 'What Would You Do For a Free Pizza?' She said the pizza was good."
21. "My parents' friends' had a little shih tzu pup named Tiffany. They loved the name. My parents then got a female hamster who they named Tiffany. Fast forward to my conception, and they still weren't over the name. And so the story goes. I was named after a hamster who was named after a dog."
22. "My mother announced she and my father (who had been married for only two years) were expecting a baby. My asshole grandmother said it was a dumb idea and that having a kid wasn’t something to do as a lark. Hence, my middle name is Lark. They were married 37 years before she died, so it all worked out."
23. "There was a woman my best friend used to work with who named her children Jack, Jamison, and Bailey... and she tried to convince us she didn't have a drinking problem!! O_O (And their dog's name was Hennessey...)"
24. "I had a family friend whose dad wanted a boy and insisted that the next child be named after him. When it turned out to be a girl, he didn't even use a feminine version. She was just a girl named George. By the time I knew her, she had a great sense of humor about it."
25. "My mom was a huge Disney fan and wanted her first girl to have a princess's name. My dad, however, hated Disney and refused. So my mom suggested 'Aurora' and my dad — unaware that was the name of sleeping beauty — agreed. He only found out when I was two and a stranger asked 'Aurora? Like the Disney princess?' He wasn't too happy."
26. "My Star Wars fan friend named his twins 'Lucas' and 'Leah.' The wife (now ex) refused to go for Luke and Leia so they compromised."
27. "I was supposed to be named after Stevie Nicks of Fleetwood Mac buuuut there’s another band member named Lindsey Buckingham and my mom thought Lindsey was Stevie and Stevie was Lindsey. Sooo I ended up being actually named after a man."
28. "I went to high school with a girl named Nikki Nicole. Her dad gave the middle name not knowing Nikki was short for Nicole."
29. "I knew a girl named Taryn, she was named after one of Freddy Kruger’s victims in A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors. Frankly, I thought it was kind of cool."
30. "When my great-grandmother was pregnant, she read a newspaper article about a man who’d just been convicted of murder. She’d never heard his name before and loved it, but had a lot of Catholic guilt about naming her baby after a murderer. To balance it out, she used the name of her priest for the baby’s middle name."
31. "A coworker LOVED He-Man and wanted to their baby to have a name from the He-Man universe. The wife said absolutely not. He suggested Marlena. The wife said it was a pretty name, so that's what they went with. Guess what He-Man's mother's name is? Marlena. His wife was not happy when she found out later."
32. "I know a girl that was born in 1999 in the middle of the Y2K panic and her parents named her Yedoska, Y2K in Spanish is pronounced Ye-Dos-Ka."
33. "My parents were sure they were having a boy, and decided to name the baby after my dad, David. Cut to the day of labor and my dad didn't get the junior he was expecting. So, with no back-up name, they slapped an 'a' on the end of my dad's name and Davida was the result. I hated it for the longest time and was teased for it, but it's nothing a few punches couldn't handle."
34. "My brother's middle name is E. My mom didn’t realize she had to spell out the full name, which was supposed to be Edward. So she just put E. on the birth certificate."
35. "My dad really enjoyed the movie Who Framed Roger Rabbit and thought that Jessica Rabbit was sexy, so here I am named after an animated character with big boobs."
36. "My mom was a bit new-agey in the '80s and went to get her 'past lives' read by a medium who claimed to be channeling the spirit of a long-dead Tibetan monk. The 'spirit' told her that her soul had once belonged to a priestess in the lost city of Atlantis named Alaia. My mother liked it so much she made it my middle name."
37. "My mom had me when she was 16, and named me Rayden after a character in her favorite video game, Mortal Kombat."
38. "My name was supposed to be Samantha but my shit dad was in jail and happened to see a character named Cecily on All My Children. He called my mom as soon as he could and told her that's what he wanted to name me. My mom liked it but didn't know how to spell it (and never bothered to look it up) so she added an extra 'e', making my name Ceciley."
39. "My former history professor was named Wendy because her mother drove past a Wendy’s billboard when she was pregnant."
40. My mother-in-law is named after her dad's mistress. Same first and middle name as his mistress at the time. I’m not sure how her mother allowed him to get away with that one."
41. "So my son's middle name is Adam. My husband is obsessed with Adam Sandler, they have the same birthday (10 years apart though), and he thinks they're, like, destined to be friends. He bugged me until I agreed on Adam as a middle name. Anyway, if anyone knows Adam Sandler please inform him that he has a 34-year-old stalker. Kthanks."
42. "My mother named my sister and I after English Queens. So my sister Elizabeth gets to rule generation after generation, and I, Katherine, get my head chopped off by Henry the 8th. Guess we know who mom's favorite is."
43. "My parents wanted an old, unique name for me, so where do you go in the nineties to find those? Graveyards. They picked a name from an old gravestone, made no changes at all, first and middle name, and gave it to me. That grave is still there and they have taken me to see it before. So I am named after some random dead lady."
44. "I had a friend who told me that his granddad, Herbert, wanted to name his newborn son after him, but didn’t want it to be exact. So he named his son, Sherbert. Kid went by his middle name, George, for the rest of his life."
45. "I went rock climbing with a guy named Rancis. His mom wanted to name him Francis but she spelled it wrong on his birth certificate and then was too lazy to change it."
46. "My parents decided before I was born that my initials would spell ‘ALF’ because it was the '80s and my dad smoked a ton of weed and loved that show, of course. Later, my dad called my mom from the bar and said, 'We should name her Amber!’ His inspiration came from the beer he was drinking. So I'm named after beer and an alien who eats cats."
47. "My friends named their son Steven Tyler after the lead singer of Aerosmith."
48. "My mom suggested the name Kelly but my dad was only half-paying attention and thought she said Callie. They both liked Callie, though, so my name came from a typical guy not listening."
49. "I once ran across a child named Arson. Thought the parents said Carson at first, but once they said her name again, I realized I had heard incorrectly."
50. And lastly, here's an unusual name that turned out to be absolutely perfect: "My son’s name started out as a joke about 'artsy' baby names, but the moment my husband said it he actually liked it. Oak was born a premie with a heart condition, and is a fully healthy 2-year-old today who has more than lived up to his name."
And before you go, look at the amazing follow-up comments this story got:
"So about two years ago I was on an airplane with a lady who just had a grandson named Oak! She said she wasn’t sure about it at first, but since Oak went through so much as a premie with a heart condition she loved it now! So either there’s a second Oak with a similar story OR I sat next to your mom/MIL on a plane???? Wild! She was really sweet and offered me her Southwest free drink coupon lol."
"Chelshu this was most likely my MIL!! This comment made my entire day!! She travels a lot for work and always flies Southwest."
"Jah and Chelshu, OMG!!! This is the most exciting comment thread I've ever read on BuzzFeed. What are the odds?!?!?!"