March 11, 2011 02:31:26
Posted By P & L Blog

A recent New York Times article, When Your Life Becomes a Verb, talks about how Charlie Sheen's last name has become a verb meaning "partying, questionable decision making and public humiliation." I started thinking about other last names that are now common words in English.

Lynch, boycott, and sandwich were the first that came to mind. Zamboni and jacuzzi are the last names of their inventors, but they have become generic names in their categories.  We forget that these eponyms were once closely associated with human beings. Will "sheening" have legs, or will it disappear once we move on to the next celebrity scandal?
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