Thank Nevaeh for Little Girls

I'm behind the times, I admit it. But I'm also behind the Times. I guess that's not much of a surprise, either.

My daughter just told me about a name that's become very popular for baby girls: Nevaeh. Aside from bring unpronounceable, unintelligible and appearing to arise from nowhere, I wouldn't have thought too hard about it until she told me its derivation: it's Heaven spelled backwards.

To which one can't help but reply, So, does that mean they'll name their sons Lleh? (Perhaps it's an old Welsh name.)

Well, the New York Times' Jennifer 8 Lee beat me to it -- she had a story on this topic back in May 2008, the headline of which was "And If It's a Boy, Will It Be Lleh?"

According to Lee, Nevaeh has become a popular name with evangelical Christian parents. Which seems very odd to me -- aren't these the same people who think that song lyrics played backwards contain satanic messages?