CELEBRITY KID'S NAMES: A PILE OF SHILOH

Celebrities are just like you or me - if we were self-absorbed midgets with big heads and tiny bodies who are trying to impress an absent parent. And in the world of celebrity, there are several rules to be obeyed, including smiling vacantly on a red carpet, frequenting Starbucks, and calling your kids terrible made-up names. Yes, I’m looking at you, Robert Downey Jnr. Having coke holes in your brain is still no excuse for naming your child EXTON, which makes the poor lad sound like a cross between an abandoned petrol station and a financial services company.

Being the muppets that we are, the general public tend to follow their lead, filling provincial primary schools with outlandishly named kids called Optrexia, Norovirus and Spicée-Nik-Nak. But we must resist. After all, celebrities are idiots, and that's a fact that can probably be proved scientifically by this top 5 list of vile non-names:

BLUE IVY

Perhaps blue is Jay-Z’s favourite colour, and Beyonce was watching old episodes of Corrie and found the drunken acting of Ivy Tilsley unbearably moving. Unfortunately, Blue Ivy could also be the name of a shit nightclub in Stockport. Or a Dulux paint colour you can make in that juddery machine at B&Q. Mind you, I bet she’d look good in the lounge, on an accent wall next to the telly.

BLANKET

Here’s the conversation I imagine took place between Michael Jackson and Michael Jackson when naming his progeny.

Michael: Hey Michael, what am I going to call my son?

Debbie the surrogate: well, I thought…

Michael: SILENCE, EARTHLING!

Michael: Well, Michael, how about naming it after the thing closest to you.

Michael: Liz?

Michael: No, just the actual thing closest to you.

Michael: I don’t know Michael. I mean, Propofol is a registered trademark.

Michael: Ok then, how about that blanket you’re crying and wanking into?

Michael: OK. Blanket it is.

Michael: Shamone!

Michael: Shall we get the robot butler to take us to Space Mountain for ice cream?

Michael: Wooo-hooo! I'm BAD! etc.

SURI

Suri is Scientology-speak for ‘the chosen child alien who knoweth about shoes.' Probably. Maybe it's the fact that I've seen this kid coming out of Prada holding a vente latte and trash talking the nanny, but I think there's something mean about the name Suri. It's a sneer of a name, made worse by the fact that Tom and Katie dress her up like a f-row bitch from hell and indulge her when she has a tantrum because her Marc Jacobs peplum is stopping her from getting on the see-saw. Also, Suri sounds just a little bit like 'urine'.

PILOT INSPEKTOR

Jason Lee, you know that moment when you've taken your gazillionth hit of the bong and you see God's face? That's not the best time to name your kid.

SHILOH

Brangelina's offspring may be many and varied, but they have uniformly terrible names. Maddox and Pax sound like vending machines, whereas Zahara could be a little-used search engine. Meanwhile, international cat-burgling duo Vivienne and Knox are busy infiltrating the air conditioning system of a Vegas casino using Sat Navs and razor wire. But the cherry on top of this inedible name cake is poor little Shiloh, who is so traumatised by her ghastly moniker that she has TURNED INTO A BOY. Sadly, nobody knows whether Shiloh is a boy's name, a girl's name or Hebrew for 'blessed turd'.

Anyway, it's not right, and it needs to stop. It's time to ditch the stupid names and bring forth a new generation of children who can hold their heads high when the morning register is called. Bring back the Colins and the Johns and Brians and the Shirleys! In fact, let's have a celebrity kid called ROGER. Go on, Brad and Ange - I dare you.

LET THEM EAT TWIXES

Class differences are rife in parenting. For a start, you only call it 'parenting' if you earn over £20 grand a year and have money to invest in Keep Calm and Eat A Cupcake signs. Middle class mums pander to the every need of Millie, Francois and Hericlitus, following them about as they reach 'developmental milestones'. Meanwhile, the rest of the world drag their children around behind them while they argue into their Nokias, occasionally stopping to give them a well-deserved kick up the arse.

It's typically superior of the middle class to imagine they're doing things right and the underclass are ill-bred swines who create the devil's spawn. The middle-class mothering mafia might think they've got the edge with their tupperware and Ugg Boots, but just look at their progeny - flinging babyccinos around and running amok in art galleries, wiping snot on the Rothkos. Just because they have tangled hair and applique Boden tops with cute pirates on them doesn't mean they're not odious little shits. Meanwhile, if you're called Jayden and have a mini Celtic strip and an alcoholic Dad who owns a samurai sword, you're a menace to society. It's not fair.

It's time we stopped vilifying working-class children. Remember when David Cameron made all those speeches about Britain's families opening their curtains and going to work? Forget it. There's a lot to be said about not having a job and being around to look after your kids. Big families, lots of support, time to go to the park. So what if the baby's eating a Twix?

I think the middle-class and the working class need to work together and form a new wave of tolerant, enlightened parenting, which gets the balance right between over-attentive fawning and outright neglect. Working class people can teach the middle class to give their kids loads of sweets, put them on the bouncy castle and stop worrying so much. In turn, the middle class can teach them about dental health, Twitter and amusing Emma Bridgewater tea towels.

When this cross-cultural parenting is done right it's a joy. One of my heroes is a mother who wouldn't be seen dead fondling the heart-shaped silicon bakeware at John Lewis. My son has a friend at nursery who we'll call Lee. I invited him to my son's birthday party, and because I'm so hopelessly middle class I thought maybe she'd show up with him and hang around for a glass of wine. But no. Instead he turned up with his granny, who gave me a Toy Story bag, said: 'if he has any accidents, here's a spare pair of pants,' and fucked off. Three hours later, Lee's ma rocked up, hungover to buggery, with a lovebite the size of Canada.

And do you know what? Her son was the most charming and well-behaved boy at the party. Now THAT'S the way you do it.

Occupation: Piss Artist

It might surprise people who read this blog, but I am a writer by trade. 'By trade' makes it sound like I have a van, or at the very least a dungaree pocket containing a spanner, but no. (Actually, perhaps writers should have vans, and take out adverts in the Yellow Pages. 'Sebastian Faulks- Complex Plot Devices While U Wait'. 'Joanna Trollope - Gas Safe Registered Aga Technician' etc).

Anyway, I wish there was a degree of legitimacy to being a writer but there isn't. Unless you're famous or you stand about all day waving a big fucking quill, nobody knows. So you'll just have to take my word for it that I once wrote some books that are at #19,567,984 on the Amazon list. Also, once, in 1997, the Independent on Sunday proclaimed that I was genius. I had the clipping, but NOW I CAN'T FIND IT. Oh well. If you're one of those people *Dennis Norden face* who likes to spot writers in the street, look out for the unkempt fat people who are crying on a park bench. That's us. Or it might be a tramp.

Being a (not very successful) writer is weird, and a source of endless strife. Really, we should get proper jobs and just give up, but we don't. I scrape a living from words, but nobody can really call themselves a writer in casual conversation, even if they've been published, without sounding like a pretentious, cretinous turd. This leads to a perverse state of embarrassment, to the point that you may as well work in an abbatoir. You almost talk yourself out of it. When I was stressing out a couple of months ago, my own mother suggested I get a job at a cheese shop. 'But I'm...a writer,' I stammered. Even I didn't believe it when I said it.

When you've got kids, writing becomes an impossible dream, unless you have an understanding spouse with an inheritance, a large family or an army of helpers. There's no way you can write a synopsis for that elusive bestseller when you've got a chimp hanging off you bollocking on about Balamory. Sitting around making things up seems like a ridiculous indulgence, especially if there's no cash guaranteed at the end of it. You also need time. Lots and lots of time. Time to examine your metaphorical belly button fluff. Time to let your mind unspool, like the multicoloured wheel of doom on your laptop. Time to sit on a park bench and cry and share a bottle of White Lightning with a man called Nobby.

But maybe time's on my side. The other day I registered my son for school. It was a weird feeling. Part of me was sad. Part of me was yelling 'YEAH! BETWEEN THE HOURS OF 9 AND 3 I CAN DO ONLINE GAMBLING AND WATCH REPEATS OF COACH TRIP!'. One thing's for sure - once he's at school I'm going to have to either write myself out of poverty, or get that job at Cheeseworld. (Or both.) So I've had some ideas and I'm writing them down and I'm going to get back to number #19,567,983 on Amazon if it kills me. And if that doesn't work, I'm going to become a plumber.

In 2012, I will drive my family into a wall.

Is it 2012? *checks Busy Mum Calendar with laminated pockets, cutesy font and the inevitable bird on it*. Yes, it is. In that case, my new year's resolutions are as follows:

1. Be the best I can be. At eating.
2. Get more sleep.
3. Write a novel.
4. Learn to drive.
5. Learn basic Romanian in order to converse with husband's family
6. Become a rock star, finally.

Although learning basic Romanian will not be easy (Este ca o rapita in buzunar sau esti multumit doar sa ma vada?*) the thing that scares me most on this list is learning to drive. I'm 40 this year and my inability to drive is becoming more and more shameful. If I'm going to be a fully functioning mother, then surely I have to be able to command a large vehicle and park it on the ziggzaggy bit outside school, narrowly avoiding the shins of the lollipop lady. I'm going to have to drive to the houses of my son's friends to pick him up after an evening of looking at www.bigjugz.com. And I need to take my tank to the supermarket, load it up with huge packs of toilet roll and crates of wine, then crash it into a bollard. To be a grown up mum - a proper capable mum - I need to know how to drive. I will also require two bumper stickers - one with 'Mum's Taxi' on it, and the other bearing the legend: 'MY OTHER CAR IS A BROOMSTICK'. Isn't that the idea?

But the whole thing gives me sweaty palms and a mouth like furry dice. By learning to drive, I believe that I'm technically signing up to murder my family in the grizzliest manner possible. I have no spatial awareness and I get my jumper caught on door handles. I've never had any sense of left and right. And I'm very easily distracted. To sign my name on a provisional licence may be akin to signing my own death sentence.

Then again, you see some major eejits driving cars - people who need a lie down after choosing their lottery numbers. That should make me feel better, but it only makes it all worse. Even if I'm the best driver in the world, the Jensen Button of Sainsbury's car park, I still might bump into a four wheeled lunatic. This seems like too much of a risk to take, especially as I will be one of those drivers who has to switch off Ken Bruce's Popmaster in case a particularly tricky question about ELO sends me careening into the central reservation.

The other thing I've failed to tell my husband, who is ever hopeful that I'll drive his sorry arse home after a night on the booze, is that I have absolutely no interest in it. I would rather learn how tripe is made, or visit a factory that makes paperclips. Hell, I would rather learn Romanian. And as they say in the motherland, 'Nu ti-a pus lingura intr-un cazan care nu se fierbe ai.'**

* Is that a turnip in your pocket, or are you just pleased to see me?
** do not put your spoon into the pot which does not boil for you

My Dream Soft Play

Like most mothers of young children, I spend an inordinate amount of time in draughty, overlit play hangars, cursing God and drinking overpriced coffee that tastes like goose piss. If you've never been to one, think of soft play centres as an amuse bouche for eternal damnation. They are genuinely hellish. In fact, rumour has it that Satan is planning to rebrand Hell as 'Lucifer's Play Barn' and locate it in a hard-to-find industrial estate in East Kilbride.

The frustrating thing about soft plays is that they cost a fortune and are almost always pish - but it would be so easy to make them more bearable. How about some nice lighting? A bar? Some chairs that don't remind you of the interrogation rooms in Red Riding? While you're at it, why not employ staff that don't treat you like a curly dog turd? Yes, it would be simple.

So while I sit there on my plastic Peter Sutcliffe chair, nursing my £5 crappucino and watching my kid helplessly dangling off a 300ft padded ledge, I like to let my mind wander. What would my dream soft play be like? Here are some of my personal fantasy favourites:

CHEEKY MONKEY'S RETRO DISCO BOOZE BARN

Picture this. A large warehouse, just like any other. One side is a fully supervised mega play cage. But the other has a neon sign saying: 'DISCO'. Go behind the velvet curtain and boom - you're in Studio 54 in 1978. Bianca Jagger is riding a white stallion, Salvador Dali is balancing a tangerine on his head, and Andy Warhol looks on, bored to tears. You enter the VIP section, where fashion designer Halston dresses you in a bespoke playsuit with directional shoulders. Cue an afternoon of fabulous excess and hedonism - first one to have a whitey has to get off with
Woody Allen.

LITTLE SNOOZEES

Pay to have your child safely and temporarily 'put to sleep' for 2 hours while you read the papers, catch up on your Poirrot box set or sit in a Windsor chair doing a 500 piece jigsaw of a cottage. Occasionally someone will bring you a cup of tea and adjust your cushions, asking 'do you need anything else?' in a soft, soothing voice.

BILLY BABOONS FLOATATION WORLD

Sometimes the sounds of shrieking kids continually asking if they can have a Ben 10 watch and a Super Mario DS game and the moon on a stick with extra marshmallows can grind you down. At Billy Baboons, your children will be entertained while you indulge in a bit of well-earned sensory deprivation. Go back to the womb in a floatation tank and forget all about the endless responsibility marathon that is now your everyday life. When you get out, you will be wrapped in a fluffy towel and someone will read you a nice story about rabbits.

ROUGH AND FUMBLE

Rough and Fumble does what it says on the tin. It is staffed entirely by attractive men, who will happily offer their services to stressed out mums without even the merest hint of suppressed horror. Not even a massive expanse of bum crack appearing from the waistband of a pair of Asda jeans can dampen their ardour. You can opt for a relaxing shoulder massage if you're not really in the mood, or go all out for a happy finish. They won't even mind if you cry with gratitude afterwards.


So Duncan Bannatyne, are you up for this? I will need ONE MILLION POUNDS. Call me.

DECAY. Moral, physical, tooth

WOOP! I always like to start the day with a bit of chat about DECAY, don't you? Would you like some slow inexorable decline on that toast? No? How about a cup of IMMINENT DEATH? Go on, you know you want to! Hey, where are you going? What do you mean Daybreak's on and you want to see whether Christine Bleakley has tears of despair in her eyes? HEY!!! Your death's going cold!

I don't want to get all Liz Jones on yo ass, but last weekend I had what could only be described as bit of 'rough and tumble' with my husband. Not in front of the children, all very above board, nothing wrong with that. Except beforehand, while I was out, some barman had convinced me to sample a whisky called Glenkinchie, which tasted like it had been strained through the seat covers of the Glasgow to Aberdeen megabus. I don't tend to drink whisky, on account that I cannot fucking stand it, but it had the effect of making our conjugal relations slightly more enthusiastic than normal - (normal being 'lying on back thinking about getting a new table lamp'.)

Now I don't know whether it was the shock of this unaccustomed nocturnal activity or just the fact that I was drunk and pushing 4o, but in the night I took a turn. Being the best mother ever (or so I imagined), I stumbled to the kitchen at 3 am to get my coughing child some Calpol, but then started to feel pretty weird and fainted. I came to underneath my husband's bike with a massive streak of oil and a tyre mark across my belly. Somewhere far away, I could hear Lance Armstrong tutting. My husband hauled me into the bed, checked my pulse, asked me my name, and satisfied that I was still alive, let me go to sleep.

'Mummy, why did you fall down in the night?' my innocent boy asked in the morning. 'Mummy got up too quickly,' said Mummy, cursing the Laird of Glenkinchie and his evil minions. But I knew the truth. 'I am a lush,' I said to myself. 'I am no better than a randy Hogarthian crone begging for change outside the gin palace. I need to get my shit together and do something boring with my life, like yoga.'

Since then, there have been other depressing indicators of my moral and physical decay. My teeth look knackered. My hair is dry. My hormones are doing a horrible dance around the kitchen. My legs are dim, my nose is knackered etc. Everything is falling apart and with it comes an anxious realisation that I am getting old and will one day DIE. I either need a trip to A&E or one hell of a Groupon spa deal.

Then the other day, my child came back from the dentist and was told not to have any juice, or jam or anything children like EVER because he had some decay forming on his teeth. So not only am I sliding into decay, but he is too. More guilt! More self loathing! Since then I've been hovering over him with toothpaste, snatching biscuits out of his hand and trying to keep him away from Haribo. I'm a bad mother! I'm a drunk and my wean's teeth are like toffee! The shame! The shame!

God, it's so stressful. In fact, it's enough to drive you to drink.

Glenkinchie?

SQUARE EYES

My child was born to look at screens. Present him with a glowing square of any size and he'll stare at it for hours, with his expression slowly changing from gormless to animated to gormless again. When Louis is looking at a screen you could tattoo a Numberjack on his arse or audition him for Toddlers and Tiaras dressed as a prostitute and he wouldn't even notice.

For that reason I admit I use the TV or computers quite a lot when a) I'm making dinner b) drinking wine with other harrassed mothers and c) hiding in a corner suffering from exhaustion. It helps me to do important things, like not go mental. So when you're with my child for any length of time, he may sing the theme tune to Hotel Trubble, or exhort you to visit 'www.bbc.co.uk forward slash cBeebies.' He's like a little animated TV channel in his own right. LOUIS TV (Sky digital 6715) is a singing, dancing loony station that shows Tweety Pie/Snoopy/Gigglebiz mash ups, interspersed with him trying to describe what happened in Deadly 60 and then having a giant tantrum at 2pm.

I can't pretend I'm completely OK with this. According to the great accepted wisdom of parenting, (ie the Daily Mail) too much screen time is deemed bad. It delays speech, it does something to their neural pathways, it makes them think that Mr Tumble is their Dad - that sort of thing. You hear about iPhone obsessed babies who swipe their parent's faces with a little finger, hoping to change their Mum's miserable chops for a picture of a zebra or something. Instead, kids should be outside, experiencing nature and making forts from cardboard boxes, right? Even though I didn't enjoy doing any of those things as a child, MY child should be doing that, RIGHT?

Now Louis is old enough to play his friend's Super Mario Kart racing game, the amount of time he spends staring at screens is becoming one of my biggest neuroses. Of course, I forget that looking at screens is all everyone does. I check my phone 879 million times a day with my gob hanging open. I'm staring at my laptop now. I watch TV in the evenings, while live tweeting and ebaying and texting. Screens are everywhere! (Charlie Brooker once a very funny article about that here.)

And while being outside and playing with pebbles is OK, a 4 year old is awake for about 13 hours a day with no nap. So they're going to have to be magic fucking glowing pebbles with the voice of Michael Gambon if they're going to entertain them all day. Anyway, mothers can't always be doing imaginative play and swimming lessons and making faces out of peas and mashed potato. Life is boring sometimes. Let them relax, let them veg out, leave them to it. Let's face it, YOU wouldn't want some berk with a timer coming in and yelling 'COME ON! TIME TO SWITCH OFF THE X-FACTOR AND MAKE A CHARMING ROBOT OUT OF EGG BOXES!'

So I'm trying not to worry about it or feel guilty if I feel like cranking up the cBeebies website or sticking on the telly. He's not going to grow up to be an emotionally disconnected, unfeeling potato whose best friend is Pippin from Come Outside, is he? No.

Mind you, at my Nana's funeral the other week, he did look at me with big eyes and say 'Mummy? Can I play Angry Birds?'

Fuck.