How did anyone survive without Google? I almost can’t fathom it.
If I think about my own, personal use of Internet searches, the bar graphs would be short at first. Little toes in the water here and there, mostly for fun or curiosity. No real conception of how powerful is the tool. I’d searched on Yahoo!, Ask Jeeves, Altavista, Hotbot, Excite, and probably some others I’ve long since forgotten. But those searches were sure so mundane. So pedestrian. “Good Halloween Costume,” maybe. Or, “Red Sox Schedule.”
I didn’t realize the unbreakable magnetism Google held over my life, really, until we got a puppy last May. That little black furry creature brought a whole bundle of “what the hells” with her. And a whole new epoch of ridiculous-in-retrospect search queries began.
I’m savvy enough to have long-since discarded lengthy queries with proper sentence structure and punctuation. I haven’t asked Jeeves anything in a very long time. Particularly in seemingly urgent situations. So a brief sampling of my initial, Wailea-related Google searches looked like this —
dog eats vomit
dog eats own vomit
dog eats dog poop
dog eats poop then vomits
These sorts of behaviors are not things that matter to you until you get a dog. They probably wouldn’t even penetrate one’s consciousness before then. If you don’t have a dog, I disgust you. Sorry about that. The fact that I typed them in then, and now, with such detachment (“hey, what’s the big deal?”) is in itself odd. I admit that readily. I love my dog, and I am not afraid to type just about anything in that search box, no matter how seemingly disgusting.
If, on the other hand, you are searching for the answers to these sorts of questions and you don’t have a dog? Now that would be weird. You’re very likely on some NSA list somewhere. Guess you’ll find out next time you try to slip nonchalantly through the airport security line, doing a quick mental inventory of all your recent Google searches.
Actually, by now, perhaps we should all be conducting said inventory. Sock-footed, pants drooping beltless held up by the occasional one-handed tug, eyes darting among grey-trayed valuables about to be x-rayed. Mannequin-smile covers up the sophisticated mathematical computations jumping from one synapse to the other in our brains. Thinking, “Let’s see now, is there anything illegal about searching for ‘kill my dog’? There was that time last week when I had to jet spray her poop off the driveway and some splashed in my mouth. God, it would be highly embarrassing to have to explain that story to the TSA agents. But I would do it. I hope this would be a private conversation in some side room, not right here with all these people staring at my plastic bag of shave cream and splay-bristled toothbrush. What else? Well as a joke, I did type ‘bury wife in parking lot’ on my buddy’s laptop the other day.”
That query sat there for hours, unnoticed in an extra browser window, surviving a few laptop sleep cycles. It was funny as hell when discovered, the humor enhanced by my steadfast denial that I had any idea what he was talking about. The vision of his face looking around the room with outstretched hands, eyes leaping from one friend’s to another’s, voice sounding increasingly pinched. Initially laughing, then pissed as we all stare down on him with (faux) judgment, then even a bit defensive — “C’mon, do you really think I want to bury my wife in a parking lot?!? That didn’t come out right, I don’t want to bury her in a parking lot. I mean, I don’t want to bury her anywhere. I mean, I don’t want to bury her at all! I mean I LOVE my wife, guys! Aww, goddamnit, this is ridiculous!” Laptop slammed shut, curse words mumbled inaudibly.
That was good comedy. But at what price? (I ask myself now, standing in the airport security line).
I mean, that can’t be traced back to me, somehow, can it? These TSA people with their mall cop uniforms and crisp haircuts and inside jokes amongst themselves and X-Ray screens that we can’t see — do they know about the “parking lot wife” search query? If they do, I’m afraid I will have only one choice: To twist the knife a bit further into my buddy’s ribs. The buddy who left his laptop open, vulnerable. It will be hard for him to explain this all to his wife — “Hi honey, I’m, uh, in jail and need you to come pick me up. I was on my way home from the Tahoe trip, sitting at my gate at the airport. Suddenly two TSA agents tapped my shoulder and started asking all sorts of odd questions about my Google Search usage. Apparently someone–I have to assume it was Keir– had typed ‘bury my wife in a parking lot’ on my laptop while I wasn’t looking. Now you know how much I love you, and that I do NOT want to bury you in a parking lot. I mean I don’t want to bury you…[the scene repeats itself from above, and so on]….
So all of this has flashed through my mind as in a long daydream. But now I snap to, suddenly, finding that I have miraculously slipped through to the other side. Scrambling madly now to retrieve all my belongings as my fellow passengers rush around me. Somehow I made it through security. My Google Search history has set off no alarms, the TSA agents’ stone-faced gazes have turned on other Google Searchers yet to be scanned. I breathe a sigh of relief, and shuffle, continuing on my way.
Safe for now. Or at least until our dog manifests her next outrageous act, sending me sprinting in a panic with outstretched fingers to the nearest keyboard, blindly mashing out my next Google Search, tripping some silent alarm somewhere. The next airport trip is going to be really uncomfortable, I fear.
Thanks for reading.
The Lemonade Chronicles 
I like the way your mind thinks (read: paranoid). My sweet mother-in-law is on a no-fly list, in Canada no less. We can’t figure out why. Now I think I understand.
aeeriev
True. Most of us these days suffer from ‘Goolitis’! The day is not far off perhaps when we shall shall merrily play hide and seek, confident in the belief that we shall be able to Google ourselves!!
Here is a post you may like:
http://ashokbhatia.wordpress.com/2014/01/23/why-become-a-slave-to-technology/
Great Post. This inspired me and would like to know the story behind the name and logo. The fact that I can type in Bob Ross Ninja for fun and lo and behold “The Afro Ninja” comes up in search terms. I honestly wasn’t expecting anything to come up for that one. Google is more random than I ‘am..the corporation was even sneaky and put 666 in the logo and Chrome.. Google is not a trend and will stick around for a while.
Pregnancy Goole searches also contain some, shall we say, “interesting” queries. Google’s auto-complete guesses now are also “interesting”. I’m sure you can imagine! Remember Metacrawler?
This is very true! My searches when I started owning a dog were closer to. Can dog eat peanut butter, milk, grass , onion etc. etc.
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Google is absolutely necessary. And we need a dog.
As a high school student, I use Google Search every day to look up information. It makes me wonder why we have become so dependent on the Internet when five years ago, I was doing just fine without my own computer. And yes, it is true that people can use your browsing history against you. This gave me a good laugh. Great post.
I am completely dependent on Google. Life becomes boring when I lose my Internet connection.
http://mybeautifullife96.wordpress.com
Best search engine! East or West, North or South, NEWS Google is the best forever!
nice article@great post!
#wordpress!
Reblogged this on CabbageTalk and commented:
I think it would be extremely amusing to be able to travel, only if your internet history is clean. I think immigration have it all wrong. 😉
Reblogged this on The Observer.
I literally google everything!! lol brilliant post!!
http://www.ownkindofbeautiful.wordpress.com
Totally hilarious, I fully snorted tea onto my iPad at least once. I can barely function with Google, the thought of having to do it on my own gives me palpitations.
Were those searches all in one 24 hours? Maybe in the order of ‘dog eats dog poop’ then ‘dog eats poo then vomits’ then ‘dog eats own vomit’.. I can see the story playing out in my mind.. I’ve had similar situations with my dog.. I laugh now.. Not so funny at the time though
Google has always been the passageway to great laughs
Reblogged this on vaibhavln.
Food cloth shelter google
Reblogged this on The World's Chronicle.
Please see my post, The Calm Within.
Reblogged this on Suicide.
Google kinda cool. But does it twerk?
Nice article. I too love Dr Google and his other hats of helpfulness lol. I am not sure what I enjoy more – finding a strange query that Google hasn’t had before or coming up with crazy questions for the iPhone “personal assistant”
To see what answers come up
Reblogged this on mrpurededication and commented:
Trying to figure out google myself
I could not have said it better myself. Google has surpassed the dewey decimal system in all time greatest research inventions. Where would we be without it? (Please note, I had to google how to correctly spell Dewey…..)
Reblogged this on Coolicool Official Blog and commented:
i cannot work without Google
Google is a search engine? I thought it was a hobby. Hmmm I have a bunch to consider after this post but on a side note the search on Google of “sheep killing man” yields incredible few results that are relevant. it destroyed my theory that anything could be Googled and 10k + results would come back.
On the bright side I have now found your blog which I believe might cut back on my Google hobby some.
I think I learned more from Google than I did in school! But on the topic of dogs, I’m a vet tech and started a site http://www.sickdogtips.com I hope you find it helpful!
This is hysterical and makes me think of all the crazy Google searches my co-workers and I have done at work!
Reblogged this on The International Blogspaper.
Ahh, accidental dog poop in the mouth flashback. One day I attacked a corner of my backyard with a weed trimmer. That corner just so happens to be my dogs’ toilet. Yes dogs. German Shepherd/Husky mix. In a word, it was a splatterfest. I shudder to think what Google would return if you researched that word.
Reblogged this on It's time to tell a story… and commented:
Reblogged this on Naija online journal.
This is great. I Google everything and it makes me wonder how weird my searches would look to a stranger who doesn’t know the whole story.