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I have never been one to bestow upon a new pet a ridiculous name and frankly, it is a phenomenon I do not understand. Is it a manifestation of some instant yet latent dislike for the animal? A strange form of of tough love in which giving the pet the most absurd name of all the pets in the neighborhood is expected to force it to stand up for itself rather than be bullied by the pets next door? Whatever the case, I will have nothing to do with it.
OK, so I did briefly consider naming my new kitten "Kohr-Ah, Destroyer of Worlds", simply "Kohr-Ah", or perhaps "Lord 1" in a peculiar moment at which my fondness for the Star Control universe, my sense of humor, and my realization that my new kitten would somewhat resemble an Ur-Quan Kohr-Ah converged at a dubious nexus between information and decision, but I was likely sleep-deprived at the time and certainly, I cannot be held accountable for every mere idea that passes through the winding mass of my brain without being made manifest. Such is the case with these musings; they were musings only and my kitten has since acquired a very suitable name that is unlikely to prompt an unfavorable reaction from anyone.
It is also true that I named my last two kittens "Philo" and "Sophia" after both philosophy itself and its etymology, but those names are perfectly good individually, both being well-suited to the cats who now bear them, and the humor of their combination never descends to the depths of any pet name that starts with "Mr." or contains "iggle", "uggle", "worth", "ington", or the like save for very rare cases in which a pretentious name is clearly warranted and is thusly bestowed free of association with nonsense syllables. There may be several historical reasons for naming a pet "Farnsworth" or "Paddington", but a case could be made for criminalizing the endowment of names such as "Mr. Sniggles" or "Lexington Dogsworth III" or even "Fluffy" and if pets had both the mental capacity and legal standing to file civil cases, I suspect that many would.
Certainly, any Greek scholar or any fan of the Rocky movies, Carl Weathers, or any incarnation of Battlestar Galactica can testify to the prudence of naming my first hamster "Apollo" when I was a young boy. We shall speak no more of it.
Wanting to bestow upon my new kitten a name that would be both suitable and dignified, I was in no hurry to discover it. For days, I addressed her by description rather than by name and we got along perfectly well in that manner until one day when we were laying upon my bed and I asked her if she liked the name "Milla" and would like to have it as her name. She answered my question with a loud, clear purr, which I took as a yes. It is one thing to select a name for a pet, but it is far better to select a name with that pet. Perhaps it is only my imagination, but Milla seems to like her name and that is good enough for me.
I don't know if my little Milla can fight off zombies or save the planet from evil like some of the characters portrayed by her most famous namesake, but she definitely has a cute name that will not prompt any of the other cats to try to beat her up.
