Much respect to the Moon Units and Apples of the world, but this article is not for you. Regards, Tallulah Does the Hula from Hawaii, who last year was made a ward of the court by a New Zealand judge so she could legally change her name — but you didn't make the list.

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TheBabyWebsite.com, a British parenting site, hired a research company to uncover the most unfortunate or bizarre names in the UK. After a month of empirical analysis with an exclusively derived logarithm (the phone book) the investigators came up with this 'unfortunate' name list:

Barb Dwyer
Pearl Button
Hazel Nutt
Ray Gunn
Helen Back
Stan Still
Lee King
Terry Bull
Mary Christmas
Max Power
Paige Turner
Sonny Day
Tim Burr
Will Power
Anna Sasin
Chris Cross
Doug Hole
Barry Cade

And they found some in America too:

Annette Curtain
Bill Board
Dr Payne
Les Plack
Priti Manek
Dr Sumey

When the BBC reported on the study, the rest of the world weighed in. Susan Mee, a lawyer — Get it? — said she changed her name after she married Robert Mee, a banker. And a Ms. Daisy Picking noted that after all these years she still can't figure out what exactly her parents were thinking. Some take a while to sink in, like Teresa Green, or Jenny Taylor, who wrote in to the BBC to say that her name "tops the lot." In the States, Carey Oakey and the grammatically correct Anna Prentice would find good company with the Texas judge Barefoot Sanders. On a related BBC name thread, one Russell Sprout said his unusual name improved his confidence and helped him make friends.

Mr. Sprout seems to have the right idea. An unusual name, despite the awkward childhood explanations, is not as unfortunate as it may seem. Unlike certain celebrity and Kiwi names, they aren't a result of haphazard (and possibly narcotic-infused) creativity, but were derived through a humorous alchemy of love and circumstance. The parents Case perhaps instinctively knew that their son would always be Justin. And there was rich piece of Texan history carved out by Governor Jim Hogg and his long suffering (but noted philanthropist and art collecter) daughter, Ima.

Perhaps a name can become can become a self-fulfilling prophecy. In his book Freakonomics, Takeaway contributor Stephen Dubner discusses the story of the father who named one son Winner and the other Loser. If it was an attempt to ensure a predictable course for his progeny, it failed. Winner became a serial criminal, Loser became an police sergeant.

On a personal note, I remember as a six-year-old girl having my molars dabbed with fluoride by one Dr. Doktor. And would a Rose Bush by any other name smell as sweet?

Are we missing any? Until we can persuade our colleague Noel to change her name to Jo, we're relying on your to feed our 'unfortunate name' cravings. Tell us your story below.