Google Searches That Piss Me Off

Not that anyone is reading this blog, but is anyone else as pissed off about the fact that when you Google "Project X," the 1987 film starring Matthew Broderick and Helen Hunt doesn't even rate the first page of search results? Hell, the "short-lived hardcore punk/youth crew band from New York City" Project X even gets fourth billing.

Giant Cell Phone

'Nuff said.

Sometimes There is So Much Google in the World...

So my sister posted this great review of The Hunger Games earlier today, in which she wrote the following line in reference to Wes Bentley's portrayal of Gamemaker Seneca Crane:

"Sometimes there is so much beauty in the world; I just have to put it in a computer generated arena and force it to kill itself."

Which then prompted me to think, "Hmmm....I wonder what imagery pops up when I do a Google Images search for that line?"

Well, in the ten or so pages of images I searched, there was not one American Beauty reference...although you would think that the first part of that quote would have at least warranted this image of Thora Birch and Wes Bentley:

Screenshot from American Beauty in which Ricky Fitts says, "Sometimes there is so much
beauty in the world, I feel like I can't take it, and my heart is just going to cave in."

But no.

Instead I got the following treasures...

The image Lauren used in her
review post...makes sense.

Jacob wrestling the angel...a little less sense.

Everyone's favorite "arena" board game.

I'd like to "force" this movie to "kill itself" too.

John and Yoko. Go figure.

There are no words....

HAHA...because this image happens to
be from a post on the same site as
Lauren's The Hunger Games review.
God bless, Google!

Fancy Nancy Comes to Norwood

Fiona wants to be Fancy Nancy.

Every night, we read Fancy Nancy and the Mermaid Ballet.

And, every night, we stop on a page that has this picture.

For about twenty minutes.

Fiona's greatest dream is to live this picture. She wants a tutu bathing suit:



Which I got.
And a flower cap. That I'm working on.



So in love with these caps am I that I've decided for this year's family excursion to Ogunquit that I will buy every member of my family an efflorescent hair protector!

So my dad will look like this:

Why I Love My Students - Reason #512:

Today, one of my students came up to my desk looking to pass in his assignment. In one hand he was carrying a folded up piece of paper. When I asked him what was drawn on the paper, he showed me this line drawing he had made of a chubby little duckling. As it had nothing to do with the class assignment (although I am a high school art teacher...so it wasn't entirely out of my curricular area), I asked him what the drawing was for. His response:

"I googled 'cute'. and that was the first thing to come up. So I decided to draw it."

So I tried to google "cute" in hopes of finding the image to share with you. That image is no longer the first image to appear...but this one is pretty damn cute, too...

Almost as awesome as Limecat....almost.

I Love You (in Handcuffs)

I'm constantly amazed by what people out there create in their spare time. Recently, a friend of mine posted some impressive "Law & Order" inspired embroidery.

Which got me thinking.

What else does the nation's longest running legal drama franchise inspire (aside from some very questionable fanfiction)?

I got this:



Dun Dun

In Retribution

I'm not a good blogger. I make no pretenses. I work full time, have two kids, and prefer to zone out reading crappy books, watching crappy television, or playing crappy kiddy games with my progeny.

But I never, ever let my sister get the last word.

So, I googled.

"JenJen smells"

Yeah, I did.

When you do that, the first thing that comes up is a facebook status: "JenJen smells like big foots doodle hairs."

Now, I can only assume that JenJen's punctuation and grammar skills are as finely honed as her personal hygiene. So, I'll let you imagine the subtleties of that and leave you with this haunting, corresponding image (i.e. what pops up first when you type it into the google machine):

I Am Not Making This Up

The first image to appear when I searched for "lauren is a slacker" this morning (make sure you have the quotes if you're trying this at home):

Lauren Fidler...you are my density...I mean...destiny.

Paula Deen Googles Twinkies

Even celebrities google things they shouldn't google...

My Step-Father Looks Just Like David Bowie

So I've got a teaching intern presenting his own lesson plan this week, and since he's running the show, I'm playing the part of student. The assignment: a musically-inspired image incorporating song title and artist. My song: Distopian Dream Girl by Built to Spill. As part of my research, I did a google search for image inspiration. How surprised was I when I ran into this gem while searching for "distopian dream girl"...

This GIF is even more enjoyable
when viewed while listening to B2S.

A Dadaist Approach #1

I haven't encountered any decent "why did I google that" moments in the past few days, so I decided to try new approach: open up a dictionary and point to a random word.

Today's randomly selected word: intestine

My Favorite Image Search Result for Intestine

Wil Wheaton Blows Up My Googleverse

I just googled "Things I Don't Get" in hopes that somewhere out there in the midst of the googleverse someone else was feeling the same ennui/misanthropy/etc. that I currently am.

Instead, I got this:

You can't even make that shit up.

Then, when I decided to google this blog title to see if google will bring me to this site, I got Wil Wheaton's and Felicia Day's Google+ accounts.

What???

There is some sort of global google conspiracy out there to unite these two in googlematrimony.

I'm sure of it.

I Blame My Friends

Last night, my friends and I played our new favorite game...Telestrations. For those of you unfamiliar with the game, just imagine if the games Pictionary and Telephone had a baby. (Yes...Telephone...that game where you whisper in each other ears and what was said to the first person may or may not be what the last person says.)

Well, one round last night involved the phrase "surprise party" (which, oddly enough, was a phrase we had the last time we played this game, also resulting in insanely disturbing imagery), and the first person drew someone with their hands on their face making a "surprised" face. You know what I'm saying here, right? Of course the character with the surprised look on his face was interpreted by the next person as none other than...you've got it...

Macauley Culkin. And although the phrase "surprise party" did not make it very far down the chain, that same image of Macauley Culkin putting the aftershave on his face did.

So that got me thinking...would Google also immediately think of that iconic moment in Home Alone when anyone typed "Macaulay Culkin" into its search field? Would that image be found in the majority of its search results? Of course, I had to try it out:

Macaulay Culkin Search Experiment #1
Click on image for larger view.

Clearly, Google would not have done well
in our game of Telestrations last night.

Who's That Guy...In That Movie...With the Thing...You Know, He's On That Show...

When I'm not busy googling rectal remedies for my toddlers, I'm trying desperately to regain my hold on the fragile threads of my memory. While my brain used to hold such secrets as the pre-vowel shift pronunciation of various medieval words, it seems, lately, that I struggle desperately to recall simplistic terms...like fork.

Or sleep.

So, imagine my immense distress when, upon my 500th viewing of National Treasure 2: Book of Secrets, I failed to recall the name of this guy:

Now, before you all get your Declarations of Independence in a twist, I should probably mention that I do not watch "Modern Family" at all; therefore, the name "Ty Burrell" is about as common to my lips as, well, pre-vowel shift English is these days.

Your next query might be: um, why are you wondering about THAT guy at all? He's in, like, 7 minutes of the movie..

Simple: in my dreamy haze this morning, I awoke to the scene where Diane Kruger comes home from a date with Burrell's character to find Ben Franklin Gates doing some clandestine business IN HIS OWN HOME (don't get me started on that tangent!).

In case you forgot, Diane Kruger looks like this:

I'm pretty sure, even at her mousiest, she'd never condescend to go out with him. I mean, after all, he's no Pacey.

And, so, google I did. And learned that if you type in the words "National Treasure Book of Secrets Ty Burrell" and about midway down the images page, your eyes will be treated to what I can only tentatively describe as an emaciated man-boy, possibly castrato, en nude.

I didn't click to enlarge the image or to see exactly how any of those words applied to his photo.

One of These Things is NOT Like the Others...

Today I took Part 1 of a two-day workshop for CPR/AED certification. One of the nurses leading the training mentioned that when applying the pads of the AED on someone, we might encounter a pacemaker in the way. There were no visuals to provide us regarding this seemingly small detail, but we were instructed that it would be easily seen (being embedded just under the skin) and that we should avoid making contact with the AED pad to that area of the victim's chest.

So me...and my morbid curiosity...wanted to see what that might look like. After all, someone with a pacemaker does seem more likely to require CPR, no?

Well, now I know what I'd be seeing in the case of a victim with a pacemaker. But that doesn't explain the girl with the plate of spaghetti...

Well, I thought it was spaghetti...
Turns out it is rice with curry. And the picture goes to a
story about this 32 year old woman with a 'bionic stomach'
(read the full article here)

Computer Literacy or Motive for Murder?

So I fully expected to find the various dunce imagery, computer clipart, etc. when I typed "computer literacy" into the Google machine just a few minutes ago. I was not, however, anticipating this photo...

Click on the image above for a larger view.
(The photo in question is towards the lower right corner of the screen.)
This photo will either be that girl's yearbook baby photo in 12 years
 or marked as Exhibit 5 by her defense attorney. It really could go either way.

Bad Mother...Shut Your Mouth

I've googled a lot in the name of motherhood. Childhood illnesses ranging from pneumonia to norovirus, all manner of rashes from impetigo to hand, foot, and mouth disease, and even more common queries, i.e. common toddler allergens. I'd thought I'd seen most of it, and even built up an immunity to it. Then, I googled "bleeding baby bottom" for some questionable diaper rash.

Thankfully, there were no pictures.

Instead, I was taken to forum after forum of all natural motherdom, where, time after time, seasoned veteran/hippie mother would espouse some ancient family recipe for all-natural diaper rash cream. A recipe, they promise, that will heal my baby of all her bottomly ills and free me from the corporate chains of polluted commercial creams!

I am a bad mother. I like Desitin. The way it smells (the blue package, not the purple), the way it reliably attacks my baby's tush, healing it of its rashes and relieving her of her pain. I don't want to become the Rachel Ray of rectal rashes, brewing up some homeopathic potion of EVOO and beeswax.

Mommy!

Last week, I googled "lego mom" for a meme I compiled per request of my sister (Exhibit A). The image I managed to find in the end was much further down in the Google Images search page; however, I have included a screenshot  (Exhibit B) of what does show up towards the top of that search. Perhaps you can find the image that shocked me the most?

Exhibit A
The "lego mom" image I used is seen above "What my kids think I do."

Exhibit B
You can never unsee this image. It will scar your lego retinas forever.
I've kept this image small to protect the innocent...but the image is
the last image on the right in the third row. If you need a larger view...
click on the image or just google "lego mom" for yourself.

Avert Thine Eyes

What do you get when you add "infant conjunctivitis symptoms" into the Google machine???

This:

The First Rule of the Google This Blog is...

This is what you get when you
google "first rule of fight club" (FYI).

Rule #1
No googling "naked pictures of elf lords"

Rule #2
No googling "animals performing coitus"

Rule #3
Lauren has to use proper capitalization in her blog titles but may opt to use all lowercase for her actual blog copy.*

Rule #4
Jennifer needs to not obsess over every design detail.**

Rule #5
Yes, she does (in regards to Rule #3).***

Rule #6
Lauren can add as many asterisks as she wants to Jen's rules, posts, etc.

*or does she???

**doesn't this rule negate your previous rule???
***and no, it does not!