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This week’s crop of bad baby names isn’t nearly as good as last week’s, and there’s no clear-cut winner, but I managed to pare it down to one bad baby name.

This week there was only one misspelled name, and that was Dheryl. I have to wonder if the parents were expecting to have a girl and name her Cheryl but instead were surprised by the kid having a penis and deciding that Bheryl was a stupid name for a boy.

There was only one misdemeanour of Gratuitous Use of Apostrophes, and that was for a kid named Ke’egan. Normally these misdemeanours don’t apply in Hilo because Hawaiian names often have okinas in them that are printed as apostrophes in the paper (an example in this week’s list is La’akea, which is a perfectly acceptable name). However, Ke’egan isn’t a Hawaiian name, it’s just Keegan with an apostrophe. Hell, there isn’t a ‘g’ in the Hawaiian alphabet.

But the winner for this week goes to a kid named Hemi. Clearly the parents are fans of fuckoff-powerful engines, which results in a rather unfortunate name for their child. The worst part? Hemi, in this case, is a girl. Any comments about whether this girl can pull a boat or, I dunno, some raunchy remark about Rams and driving and possibly stick shifts, those comments will be summarily ignored. But encouraged, of course. :-)

So I’m listening to the excellent song by Toto called Africa. The main chorus starts with “It’s going to take a lot to drag me away from you.”

The next line… it’s one of those lines that you interpret one way that you know is completely wrong yet even when you know what it is you still think it’s the wrong line. Well, I think that second line is “There’s nothing but a hundred men on Mork Avenue.”

The actual line is “There’s nothing that a hundred men or more could ever do.”

I think my interpretation, although making absolutely no sense, is what they actually wanted to say but didn’t because they didn’t want to get sued by the creators of Mork & Mindy.

In September 2003 a safe injection site was opened in Vancouver, British Columbia, the first of its kind in North America. Its goal was “stop disease, it’s to stop overdose deaths and it’s to stop public drug use,” as Anne Livingstone of the Vancouver Area Network of Drug Users said when it opened. The area of Vancouver in which it opened, the Downtown Eastside, has rampant drug use and epidemic levels of HIV and hepatitis C. Some 4500 IV drug users live in the 12-block area that the Downtown Eastside makes up.

Then-mayor Philip Owen pushed for the site, and current mayor Larry Campbell continues to promote it, not only in Vancouver but all over the province. Campbell doesn’t seem to emphasize its use for stopping drug abuse, focussing on trying to help people who are addicted. “It’s a brave city that accepts what we’re trying to do. It demonstrates the compassion and caring of its citizens,” he said. “I would love someone to tell me we’re not going to keep 10 people from becoming HIV-positive.”

There were some critics of the site, mostly from south of the border. John Walters of the White House Office of National Drug Control Police said that “the cost that’s going to be paid… is more are going to die and are going to suffer in their lives that don’t need to.” Jennifer Devallance, a spokeswoman for the same office, said, “the only way to reduce the suffering of addiction is to treat it, not encourage it — which is what the safe injection sites do.”

Two interesting studies of the site seem to be saying that the goals of the site are being met. The first, released on 28 September 2004 in the Canadian Medical Association Journal shows that public injection and disposal of used paraphenelia decreased after the site was opened. This one looks like a bit of a no-brainer — if you give addicts somewhere safe and clean to shoot up they’re not going to do it in the streets. And since they can dispose of syringes and other items right there in the clinic, the streets and disposal boxes are going to be used less frequently.

The second study, released in the 19 March 2005 issue of The Lancet shows that shared needle use has dropped since the opening of the safe injection site. Again, it’s a bit of a no-brainer because addicts aren’t keeping syringes for multiple use, and thus they can’t share them if one of their friends needs a hit. Decreasing the numbers of shared needles means decreasing the infection rate, helping to slow the spread of HIV and hepatitis C in Vancouver.

The site has also helped addicts having accidental overdoses. Between 10 March and 31 August 2004 there were 107 overdoses at the site. CPR was required in only one instance, and there have been no deaths at the site.

In the six months from March to September 2004, 262 referrals to addiction counselling services and 78 referrals to withdrawal management programs (such as detox) were made. At least one client weekly was referred to methadone maintenance treatment.

Judging from these results it looks like the safe injection site is setting out to achieve all it wanted. Addicts aren’t shooting up in the streets, they’re getting some much-needed help, and some are potentially getting off drugs. If that’s not a success then I don’t know what is. And the site has another couple of years to go in its four-year trial period — two more years of success.

I think I might have to end my weekly Bad Baby Name post streak at two, because this week’s is so bad I don’t think it can ever be topped.

The list of names started off badly enough, with Paychence as the first name. Poor girl, having to go through life knowing her parents were morons. Krystynn was in the list. Replacing one vowel with a y should be a misdemeanour, replacing two should be a felony. Camrenn was in there too, and it’s the name of a boy. Yes, I know that Cameron can be a perfectly good boy’s name, but only when it’s spelled Cameron. Then again, his other given names were Dinan and Llaguno.

Then there was the unholy trio of Jhace, Wylder, and Jayke, and I thought I had my Bad Baby Names.

But six names from the end of the list came the champion. The bad baby name to end all bad baby names. La creme de la creme. The absolute pinnacle (or nadir, depending on your point of view) of bad baby names.

Are you ready for it? Brace yourselves. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.

Abcde.

That’s the name.

Abcde.

I’m not making this up.

Abcde.

I’m sure we’ve all heard the stories of immigrant mothers with a tenuous grasp of the English language naming their kid “Nosmo King” because of the “No Smoking” sign they saw in the hospital. There’s also stories of kids being named Chlamydia or Gonorrhea because it “sounded pretty”.

But Abcde?

I mean, how do you pronounce it? “Ab-kuh-duh”? Do you actually speak each letter in turn?

And why in God’s name would you even name your kid this? Bastardizing a pre-existing name is understandable enough, but the first five letters of the alphabet? What the hell is wrong with people?

There’s an asteroid headed our way! Named AT72198, it’s generating a bit of discussion on the Minor Planet mailing list. It looks like it’s going to come quite close to the Earth, with one calculation saying that it’s going to come as close as 110,000 kilometers roughly 18 hours from now. That wouldn’t be the closest one we know about — on 18 March 2004 the asteroid 2004 FH passed about 43,000 kilometers from the surface of the Earth.

These things are predicted to come this close roughly once every couple of years, so this isn’t really that amazing. Still, you heard it here first!

Slight update: the predicted orbit of AT72198 doesn’t have much uncertainty in it, as the observed positions that went into the calculations were very good, and an impact is ruled out. Don’t go buying any asteroid insurance on account of this one, okay?

Another update: AT72198 has been given the slightly easier to remember name 2005 FN in Minor Planet Electronic Circular 2005-F24. You can also watch its orbit on NASA’s orbit simulator.