But, fear not, I’m back, and so are the names. It’s a good, and particularly weird, crop this week, so let’s get right to them. There were two contenders for the best pop culture name of the week.
Mr. Papagiorgio, a reference (I’m assuming) to the fake ID that Rusty Griswold uses in 1997’s “Vegas Vacation,” is a bit of an obscure reference even for my taste. So, we go with Howard Wolowitz, named for the engineer-turned-astronaut portrayed by Simon Helberg for more than a decade on “The Big Bang Theory.
” “Big Bang” was one of the most popular shows on TV for a seeming eternity, but I’ll admit that I never actually watched the show until it became a staple for endless (and I do mean endless) reruns on TBS. I’m a Space Race nerd. I’ve watched the Tom Hanks-produced “From the Earth to the Moon” miniseries on multiple occasions, and I’m a huge fan of the Apple TV alternate history series “For All Mankind,” the main characters of which are very loosely based on Apollo 10 commander and lunar module pilot Thomas Stafford and Eugene Cernan Apollo 10 was the final test run for the Apollo 11 moon landing, which happened a couple months later.
Stafford and Cernan flew the lunar module around the moon, photographing the planned Apollo 11 landing site in the Sea of Tranquility, though they never touched down on the lunar surface. Delightfully, Apollo 10’s call-signs for its command and lunar modules were, respectively, Charlie Brown and Snoopy. NASA got a little more serious about names once it came time to actually land on the moon.
Hello, friends. Nantz is, of course, named for Jim Nantz, the venerable CBS sportscaster. There are few in sportscasting with Nantz’s resume.
He was the lead broadcaster for the NCAA men’s basketball tournament from 1990 to 2023, he’s been the lead NFL play-by-play announcer for CBS since 2004 (where he displays infinite patience for analyst Tony Romo’s honking overreactions) and, since 1989, he’s had the prime spot in Butler Cabin at Augusta National Golf Club as the voice of the Masters. And now he’s a horse, too! Pauciloquent is an adjective for someone who uses few words in speech or conversation. I think there’s something quite beautiful about finding one extremely long word to describe someone who doesn’t use many words.
Bless you and your many contradictions, English language. Beating out such dignitaries as Radio Goo Goo, Triple Word Score, Notable Bob and the wonderfully random Goats On a Tree, The Bullion Bomber rounds out this week’s list. Why, exactly? Because I’m a fan of any name that sounds like the nickname of a particularly unsuccessful mid-1920s welterweight boxer, that’s why.
Mr. Papagiorgio, Goats On a Tree, Radio Goo Goo, Triple Word Score, Notable Bob, Yingle Bells 1 — Ferris Muler 2 — Lincoln Hawk 3 — Howard Wolowitz 4 — Phileas Fogg 5 — Landbiscuit.
