As you may or may not know by now, I have a penchant for social studies, particularly those that are a little off the beaten path. Today’s example comes to us from Newsweek, albeit about a month after I read the article. Forgive me, I’m lazy.

The article talks about name-letter preference, where a person is drawn to things that start with the same letter as their name. Those things can be both good and bad. They cite Ken Griffey Jr. as having a higher-than-average strikeout ratio (Ks), an inordinate number of people named Dennis who are dentists, and an abnormally large number of Mildreds living in Milwaukee.

As you also may know by now, my name is Chris. I like cookies, paying with my credit card, cats, caped superheroes, Captain Planet, corn, corny jokes, chicken cheesesteaks, cartoons, Christmas, Calvin & Hobbes, my cell phone, and the word “cantankerous.” I think those are all good things.

But then again, I don’t prefer Coke, cocaine, carp, calling cards, the Chicago Cubs, using cash, Celine Dion, C&C Music Factory, visual depictions of cornucopias, Calvin Coolidge, clams, chai lattes, or communism.

Scientists behind one of these studies are supposed to publish their findings this month. They cite higher grades for people with names starting with A and B, lower for those with C and D as name-starters. Also a higher career strikeout rate for the Kennys than the Robertos. The margins were not large, but the article cites an adage: “If you discover a way to levitate objects with your thoughts by one millimeter, you don’t focus on the millimeter–the size of the effect–but on the fact that something happened at all.”

They should have called me. I did better in school than my “C” name would have them suggest, and my extreme love of Pepsi over Coke should send their study straight to the shredder. Then again, if Carrie Underwood were to come calling, I might be convinced.