Woman named Marijuana Pepsi!

[웃 910]

Marijuana Pepsi will see you now

Think that name's odd? How about Tahiti Starship or Yellow Light Bree?

Woman goes through life with 'Marijuana' first name

Dec. 31: Think you've got an unusual name? MSNBC's Contessa Brewer profiles a woman who was named Marijuana Pepsi.Today show

By Mike CelizicTODAYshow.com contributor

When Shakespeare asked, "What's in a name?" he didn't live in a world where pop stars call their babies Bronx Mowgli and students sit outside a college counselor's office underneath a sign that reads: "If You're Waiting for Marijuana, Sit Here."

Celebrities giving their offspring names that they call creative and others call bizarre is nothing new, as Moon Unit and Dweezil Zappa could tell you. So when singer Ashlee Simpson-Wentz and rocker Pete Wentz had a son in November 2008 and named the tyke Bronx Mowgli, it wasn't that surprising.

But celebrities aren't the only ones who enjoy inflicting challenging names on their children. Take, for instance, the aforementioned Marijuana, whose full name is Marijuana Pepsi Sawyer.

Standing out

Somehow, as NBC News' Contessa Brewer reported Thursday for TODAY, the woman named after a psychoactive weed and a popular soft drink made it through childhood, college and grad school and became a college counselor. "I've grown into my name because I am a strong woman. I've had to be," Marijuana Pepsi said, adding that she still wonders what made her mother pick that name.

"I want to know, what was it about me that made her go, 'You just look like a Marijuana Pepsi,' " she said. (Perhaps "Marijuana Doritos" didn't have the same ring.)

Brewer found many other otherwise normal people with names that stand out even in a crowd of celebrity babies.

"My name is Tahiti Starship. My parents were hippies," one young woman reported. "They said they were dreaming of Tahiti. And they named me Starship after the band."

There's a man named Yellow Light Bree and women named Cupcake Sanders and Crystal Sunshine Turpin Lemons. And a lovely young girl called Tygerlily Gagnon.

Name games

Then there are the names that are plays on words, like Stan Still, Mary Christmas, Justin Case, and the Wood kids, Drift and Timber. And don't forget Rob Morrow's daughter, Tu Morrow.

TODAY Marijuana Pepsi Sawyer became a college counselor despite her odd name.At least such names are just playful. Others can be embarrassing, like the folks who go through life with monikers that have become immortalized in Bart Simpson's prank calls to Moe's Tavern. That's right: There actually are people named Al Caholic, Oliver Clothesoff, I.P. Freely, Seymour Butz, Mike Rotch, Hugh Jass, Amanda Hugginkiss, Ivana Tinkle, Anita Bath and Maya Buttreeks.

You could look it up at Ancestry.com or the U.S. Census, where you'll also find people named Tyranny, Hellion, Devious and Apocalipsis.

Unusual pressures

David Figlio, a social policy professor, said that parents should be aware that unusual names put unusual pressures on kids.

"If you want to give your kid a unique name, you need to be aware of the fact that no matter how wonderful you think that name is, society reacts to names," Figlio said in Brewer's report. "If you have an uncommon name that connotes low status, you might be treated differently by your teachers. You might end up being picked on more in school."

Brewer noted that she herself has gone through life with a name that's out of the ordinary.

"When I was a little girl, my parents told me my name, Contessa, meant 'little princess,' " she reported. "As I got older, I learned it's actually a title, like countess. And if my parents were going for royalty, why not aim higher?"

What, then, is in a name? Shakespeare said, "A rose by any other name would smell as sweet."

But would a Marijuana Pepsi by any other name be counseling kids about college?

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/34641678/ns/today-today_people/

Edited January 1, 2010 by Confucian

[웃 910]

I love posting articles on VJ through the Linux Operating system. So fun to edit the posts...

[Nagishkaw 510]

Makes for a less Confused Confucian.

[slim 1,533]

I got all choked up and I threw down my gun

And I called him my pa, and he called me his son,

And I came away with a different point of view.

[slim 1,533]

And he said: "Son, this world is rough

And if a man's gonna make it, he's gotta be tough

And I knew I wouldn't be there to help ya along.

So I give ya that name and I said goodbye

I knew you'd have to get tough or die

And it's the name that helped to make you strong."

[Nagishkaw 510]

A boy named Sue.

[Jasman0717 9]

A boy named Sue.

Ah, miss the man in black