The Times today is filled...

...with the obits of individuals with hyphenated surnames, and, in several cases, the colorful and/or unfortunate names, or nicknames, of their offspring.

The first is Lady Malcolm Douglas-Hamilton, a wealthy former debutante with a colonial pedigree and an Upper East Side address. Born Natalie Scarritt Wales, she married four times and was the mother of two daughters, Natalie Wales Winslow, also known as "Bubbles," and Mary-Chilton Winslow Mead, or simply "Mimi."

The second obit belongs to an American-born conductor with the pedestrian enough-sounding name of Stephen Simon. He had two sons, however, with the not-so-pedestrian names Basil and Sebastian. (Veddy, veddy, Briddish, don't you think?)

Finally, there's the case of Charlotte Smallwood-Cook, a New York State Distict Attorney. (Here we go again with the hyphenated names.) In addition to a daughter, known as "Suki" (?), she is also survived by a son, Ed Smallwood, who must have had a particularly difficult childhood with that sobriquet.