NSYNC’s Chris Kirkpatrick has a new four-legged family member, and his name might evoke a decades-old beef with Eminem.
The singer’s wife, Karly Skladany, introduced the adorable new puppy on Instagram, revealing that the 8-week-old miniature American shepherd is called Marshall Mathers, aka Slim Shady.
“We added to our family yesterday!!!” she wrote, alongside a slideshow of the pup bonding with their 7-year-old son, Nash, and the family’s older dog, JoJo. “We already love you to pieces”, she added, tagging the dog with #miniaussie.
Of course, naming the pup after the rapper who once dissed your husband in a chart-topping song raised some eyebrows. The reference goes back to Eminem’s 2002 hit “Without Me”, where he rapped:
Chris Kirkpatrick, you can get your ass kicked.
Chris recently revisited that moment in the CW docuseries “The ’90s Boy Band Boom”, explaining how stunned he was when fans first told him about the song. “I started getting all of these text messages… ‘He makes fun of you in the Eminem song’”, Kirkpatrick recalled. At first, he thought it was a group jab. “And then I hear, ‘Get your ass kicked’, and I’m like, ‘Oh, yeah… I guess it rhymes with that’”.
It is not the first time animals have been named after Eminem, from majestic horses to mischievous meerkats, but it might be the most ironic.
Is it a peace offering? A tongue-in-cheek tribute? Or a way of turning a decades-old diss into a household inside joke? Either way, if Kirkpatrick hopes this puppy will lick his wounds, he better be ready — because even a pup named Slim can still bite.
Whatever the reason, one thing is for sure: this specimen won’t be anyone’s lapdog.
