Funny Names and TAing Fears

While working on a rather pointless report last night, I discovered that one of the original designers of the laboratory has one of the most amazing names I have ever heard: Dr. Cosimo Commisso. I considered doing a Scientific Appreciation post about him, but decided that was a little unfair since I was only drawn to him as a scientist due to his enjoyable name (that and I couldn't actually find any information about him when doing a quick Google search... Wikipedia only has an article on a Canadian soccer player who is also apparently named Cosimo Commisso and some sort of Italian organized crime fellow). Anyway, while perhaps an inane thought, I really liked his name... it kind of reminded me of some sort of Mensa or IQ test question:

Cosimo Commisso ...
What is the next word in the above pattern?
A.) Commmissso
B.) Coio
C.) Cosssimmmo
D.) Coosimoo

The answer is, of course, C for Cosimo Commisso.

Speaking of funny names, though, many of my friends are TAing courses this year. One such TA had the unenjoyable task of marking a giant stack of papers the other day, but one of the enjoyable outcomes of that task was he discovered on the students in his class had the last name, "McFail". I feel quite badly for that student, because that is a remarkably unfortunate last name, especially since the poor kid apparently did fail one of the tests (although the student did pass the second test with enough of a margin to pass over all, prompting my friend to consider writing "Congratulations, you McPassed!" on the paper, but his better judgement overruled him). It makes me worry, slightly, for when I am a TA and have to do large stacks of marking. Hours of tedious work tend to errode my judgement, as was the case in first year when I made up highly imaginitive names for my computer program variables (before finally getting docked a significant number of 'style' points to bring that practice up short). I just don't want to end up a bitter TA who leaves comments on papers like those I received in one of my third year courses, including (if my memory serves me correctly), "Don't know basic algebra??", "You're very wrong here", and a smiley face next to some lost marks (that one was the most confusing).