Autocomplete Zeitgeist Revisited - 2026 - Part II

Introduction

Last week, in keeping with  my eight-year tradition, I examined Google’s Autocomplete suggestions—i.e., you start a query and have it suggest the rest—to learn about the American Zeitgeist in 2026. Part I focused on crime and punishment (i.e., what Americans fear getting in trouble for) and today I’ll cover everything else.

Who, what, where, when, why, how

Searching on “what is,” here are the top five suggestions Google offered for completing the query:

• What is my ip
• What is the 25th amendment
• What is easter monday
• What is vibe coding
• What is easter about

That first one, “what is my ip,” appeared eight years ago but not four years ago. It’s a pointless inquiry, as your IP address doesn’t actually say much about you or your device configuration ; these addresses are assigned dynamically and temporarily. Gamers and users of VPNs have reasons to want to know this, but they’ve surely bookmarked a website that can actually provide this info. So the popularity of this query is probably based on fear and ignorance: people watched some TikTok video about how “they” are going to “scam you through your IP address,” or they got a scam email saying, “we know your IP address is 192.168.128.230,” and these poor souls are just trying to determine if they’re really in danger. Could Americans really be that fearful and ignorant? Decide for yourself. Perhaps the rest of this post will help.

The second Autocomplete suggestion is surely the result of Americans reading about this or that lawmaker saying it’s time to invoke Section 4 of the 25th amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which allows removal of the president if he’s deemed “unable to discharge his duties.”  The trigger for this saber-rattling was a post from the Donald on Truth Media on Easter Sunday, alluding to the military offensive against Iran: “Tuesday will be Power Plant Day, and Bridge Day, all wrapped up in one, in Iran. There will be nothing like it!!! Open the Fuckin’ Strait, you crazy bastards, or you’ll be living in Hell - JUST WATCH! Praise be to Allah.” Yes, he really said this. The president.

So … does this Autocomplete suggestion support the notion that Americans are fearful and ignorant? Well, I wouldn’t blame anybody for being fearful (either that Trump will be removed or that he’s unhinged, depending on your political bent), and I do not considerate it ignorant to not know what the 25th amendment is. I’d never heard of it either until sometime in the past six months when some other Trump outburst led to the same Quixotic call for removing him.

Moving on to the Easter thing, perhaps Americans are thinking more globally in general, because this didn’t come up four or eight years ago. Obviously Easter Monday is simply the day after Easter (today, in fact) and Americans are probably feeling a bit chapped we don’t get it as a holiday like so much of Europe does. Fair enough.

On to vibe coding: needless to say this query didn’t exist four years ago. Vibe coding is the method of programming where you tell AI what you want, essentially, without caring about how the resulting code works (which makes many in the industry nervous). A coder friend of mine likened it to pulling the handle on a slot machine. I think a lot more Americans are aware of vibe coding than would actually engage in it. I doubt it’d be as popular if it weren’t such an inspired, buzz-y term; if we called it “natural language-directed code generation with deferred comprehension” I doubt anybody would care. But since “vibe coding” sounds so cool, it’s making the rounds, and people don’t want to feel out of touch when it comes up. So it’s not fear or ignorance per se; it’s fear of ignorance.

The popularity of “What is Easter about” suggests to me that a growing number of Americans never went to church, or more specifically to a Christian one. It’s tempting to flag this as ignorance, but then who establishes how knowledgeable an American (especially an immigrant) should be about this (or any) religion?

Okay, let’s move on to “why.” The top five Autocomplete suggestions are:

• Why is the market down today
• Why berkeley
• Why california
• Why is easter called easter
• Why was jesus crucified

Those last two I’ll just lump under the same category as “What is Easter about,” but the other three didn’t show up in either of my last two investigations so let’s have a look. “Why is the market down today” would seem to be a perennial question, other than right now. I mean, why do you think, ya bozos? Could it be related to the world experiencing the largest oil crisis in history? If Americans can’t equate the price of gas to the stock market, I’m sorry—that’s just ignorant. But getting back to fearful, perhaps in this realm they’re not fearful enough.

The “why Berkeley” and “why California” suggestions are a real mystery to me, since the correct answer to both is “duh!” The Google Gemini AI overview responses are, respectively, “UC Berkeley is consistently ranked as the world’s top public research university, offering an elite, rigorous education, top-tier faculty, and massive research opportunities,” and “California is a global hub for innovation, entertainment, and economic power, boasting the largest state economy in the U.S. (4th largest globally).” (As for why these questions seem to have gotten so much search traction, I really have no idea, though my IP address—yes, we’ve come full circle on that—does tell Google my approximate whereabouts, and in fact I live in Albany which is right next door to Berkeley.)

Now we’ll look at “who.” Four years ago people were googling Julia Fox (whoever that is or was); Will Smith’s wife; Moon Knight;  the Super Bowl teams; and Joe Rogan. Here are the top five today:

• Who won march madness
• Who is nancy guthrie
• Who is this
• Who is steve hilton
• Who is this meme

March Madness is obviously some sports tournament that ended less than a week ago so who cares—it probably says nothing about the zeitgeist. Nancy Guthrie is a missing person, the mother of some news personality, who is in the current news because there’s a ransom note now, and a sheriff with an undeclared loaded gun, and surely other bits of lurid intrigue, none of which I care about, because this person is a complete stranger. As she surely is to all these people googling her just because it’s exciting. Seriously, people, go read a crime novel. On to Steve Hilton: he is running for public office and that’s timely, blah blah blah.

Now, “who is this” is a fascinating suggestion. At first I took it to be a sign that somebody forgot he was only using a search engine, and assumed he was in conversation with an AI chatbot, and forgot which one it was. (I myself jump from bot to bot whenever they freeze my session due to lack of paid subscription.) But I went ahead and searched on it, and Google says it’s either the name of a song (it names four candidates) or “a phrase used to ask for the identity of a person, often used over the phone.” On this basis, I’m either going to finally become a rapper and write a song called “What Is My IP,” or I’m going to start asking people, especially over the phone, “Who is this?” Since random telemarketers are bound to volunteer this information anyway, I’ll stick to using it with people I know, whose voice I recognize, and who are in my contacts. Should shake things up a bit.

But “who is this meme” is a real mystery. Perhaps it’s just that “meme” is such a common noun, and the phrase “who is this” is just yearning for a predicate, so Google took a wild guess. Who knows? Who is this knows?

Let’s move on to “where.” The first carryover from previous years is, predictably enough, “where’s my refund”  which suggests I shouldn’t do this report so close to Tax Day. That query came in at #2. The most popular is “where is artemis 2 now,” pertaining to the spacecraft that is heading for the moon (and once again, the popularity of this query says basically nothing about the zeitgeist). Next was “where is the super bowl 2026” which came up last time as well, and I just absolutely cannot fathom the popularity of this query because the Super Bowl happened already, all the way back in February, and if even I know that, despite being totally uninterested, how can so many people not? Next was “where to watch heated rivalry,” another broadcast sporting event; that this suggestion came under “where” is a random artifact of video websites being thought of as places. Ditto “where to watch uconn vs Michigan.” So much for where.

The next query ought to be more interesting: how. What are Americans trying to learn? The only carryover from previous surveys was “how to screenshot on mac,” which at first blush begs the question: haven’t people figured this out by now? But actually this makes sense: it’s because Gen-Z, having been weaned on smartphones, not laptops, is exploring this for the first time, and/or the Mac users have forgotten since they’re mostly phone-addicted as well, and/or entering their demented years. “How to screenshot on windows” was right behind this, in #2. Next was “how to file a tax extension,” making its first appearance though procrastination is obviously as old as time. Fourth place went to “how many ounces in a gallon,” which shows that Americans are apparently no better at math than they were four years ago, but at least they’re thinking bigger, because last time we saw “how many ounces in a cup.” Fifth place went to “how far is the moon from earth,” which again is merely timely, not illuminating.

The future

This brings us to the most exciting part of the post, where we stop living in the past and ask Google about what’s on the horizon. I started with “am I going…” Compared to last time, I see a whole lot of repeated queries:  am I going crazy, am I going to be okay, am I going to hell, am I going blind? There’s kind of a sadness, I think, about people googling these important and existential questions when they have to know Google won’t have the answers, at least not anything they can trust. I wonder if these people are like the speaker in Poe’s “The Raven,” who keeps asking this bird questions—“Is there balm in Gilead?” and (in essence) “will I get over my lost Lenore?”—because he knows the raven won’t answer, other than “Nevermore,” and he wants to torment himself, like some ritual act of self-flagellation. These first perennial Autocomplete queries were so sad, I was almost cheered up by the fifth one, the relatively harmless “am I going to owe taxes in 2025.” (Uh, ask your tax software, dude! Problem solved…)

And now we are on to our final Autocomplete query, “will I ever.” These are very similar to four and eight years ago, with repeat appearances of “will I ever find love,” “will I ever be able to afford a house,” “will I ever be happy,” and “will I ever find love again.” What’s instructive are the suggestions we no longer see: “will I ever get a ps5” and “will I ever get a job.” I guess four years ago it was hard to get a PS5 (don’t worry, Gemini says supply has largely caught up with demand!), but at least people had jobs. I feel bad that people are putting this lugubrious “will I ever get a job?” query to Google, knowing it’s probably as hopeless as asking “am I going to hell?” or “is there balm in Gilead?” All I can advise is a) try touching up your LinkedIn profile, and b) it’s not you … it’s them.

And now, following the tradition I established four and eight years ago, I’ll abandon Google and its Autocomplete and turn to the Magic 8-Ball at www.ask8ball.net. I asked it, “Will I ever be good enough?” It promptly replied, “Without a doubt.” Maybe too promptly … I mean, not even AI seems that fast! So just to make sure that this utterance wasn’t its only stock and store, I asked it, “Is there balm in Gilead?” It answered, “Reply hazy, try again.” I guess I’ll have to google it.

Previous Autocomplete Zeitgeist posts

• Autocomplete Zeitgeist Revisited - 2026 - Part I
• Autocomplete Zeitgeist Revisited
• The Autocomplete Zeitgeist

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Election Result: It Will Be OK

Introduction

This post is not about politics. As I’ve explained before in these pages, I almost never discuss politics, with anybody. It’s pointless. Either you sit around agreeing with one another, in which case the dialogue inevitably drifts toward one-upmanship around who’s more knowledgeable, or you disagree, in which case you feel attacked, your brain goes into limbic override, and you lament even knowing such an ignoramus, much less having to talk to one.

This post is about how to survive this week’s election, regardless of whom you hoped would win. It’s a plea to locate your better mindset and hang on to it for dear life. (If you are not living in the United States, your elections and overall life situation may vary considerably from mine, in which case this post may not have much value to you … but I suppose you could read it anyway if you have Americans in your life.)

Why now?

I am sitting down to write this right now, on the afternoon of Election Day, because I don’t yet have the foggiest idea how the election is going. I am not the type to be glued to the news, riding a roller coaster of emotion as this or that state topples to this or that candidate. I never doomscroll, and especially not today. Thus, this is the perfect time, while my mind is still clear, to try to make some points about the survivability of any outcome, before I run the real risk of having my brain completely saturated in cortisol, and trying to think through the dense fog—actually, smog—which will make self-soothing very difficult later.

Since I am posting this essay ahead of the election returns, you and I will have something topical to read that dates from the Before Times, when it was still possible to take a deep breath and try to reassure ourselves that life will continue to be okay. Naturally, if my preferred candidate wins, and I don’t need to reread this, that would be wonderful. Otherwise, at least I will have something to cling to: the knowledge that a day ago, a week ago, or whenever ago, it was still possible to keep my chin up. And it still is.

What is at stake?

It’s tempting to believe that this election is a way to assess the state of America’s soul. If our strong, honest, virtuous candidate wins, the feeling goes, then we can conclude that our country is in good shape, that we’re still a good people, that the United States still deserves to be a world leader. On the other hand, if the evil, wicked, soulless candidate wins, it’s because America has fallen like Rome, and our people have lost their way, and we might as well be thrown to the wolves. And yet in reality, this is such a close race, it will be decided by tiny fractions of a percent of votes in this or that state, and the bizarre electoral college system, and possibly even by hanging chads or whatever the 2024 equivalent of that is. Whatever happens today (or however long this election takes to be decided), no conclusion can really be drawn about Americans as a whole, unless there’s some massive wave of epiphany that fundamentally alters millions of us overnight. We’ll be the same people next week as we were last week.

To summarize: our national character, I am arguing, is not at stake. Another thing that isn’t at stake is our fundamental quality of life and our liberty in this country. I gather that I may have just pissed you off by asserting this, but I will stand by it, flying in the face of the giant campaigning machines that have been beating us over the head with the fact that nothing less than democracy in America hangs in the balance of this election. I think that’s overstated. Whatever ideals this country was built on, however the Constitution does or doesn’t protect us, our government has a lot of complicated machinery in it, with a bias towards gridlock. There are checks and balances, and the capacity for thunderous disagreements and long, hard, protracted fights before any change gets made, good or bad. Whether the two-party system is lame, or doomed, or fatally flawed, these two sides will not give up easily and are very good at stopping each other from gaining too much ground. Sure, we have seen very important changes in the last eight years, but they were not tectonic. The essence of our experience in this country will not change overnight.

You may beg to differ, you may call me a fool, all of that is fine (and is the reason I so seldom even approach the periphery of politics on this blog). But I think to ignore the differences between the U.S. and, say, Russia or North Korea or China is to be absurdly ungrateful for the strength and resilience of our country.

Crushing leaves

At one point during this century (I won’t be more specific because this is a non-partisan essay), a presidential election went the way I didn’t want it to, and I felt despondent. For the first time in my voting life, the outcome didn’t seem like it could really even be true. I went out for a late afternoon bike ride—my go-to activity for working through stress—and as I pedaled up Monterey Ave, I happened to run over a perfectly dry and crispy leaf. As I’ve blogged before, I love crushing leaves:

Make fun of me if you want—I just love this activity. This is the perfect time of year for it: the sidewalk and street are littered with leaves and on a warm afternoon they’re perfectly crisp and ready for crunching. The sound is almost identical to a cat eating a potato chip, which I’ve been lucky enough to witness. The wind blows the leaves into big piles I can ride through on my bike. I can even feel the crunching, as light as it is. My kids and I dance all over the sidewalk, vying for the perfect leaf. The kids fight occasionally, like two surfers claiming the same wave. Then there is a kind of larger leaf that isn’t crunchable, but rattles along the sidewalk when kicked, like a big weird crustacean.

Out of nowhere, I had the realization that there was absolutely nothing our new president could do to deprive me of this simple pleasure. The U.S. government just doesn’t have that kind of power. (It is true that during China’s “Great Leap Forward” all kinds of dramatic things happened—for example, something like a billion sparrows were slaughtered—but at the end of the day America is still a hog-tied democracy, thank goodness.)

It was a lovely fall day and an abundance of leaves lined the shoulder of the road, and I began steering for them, crushing one after another, getting inordinate joy from the simplicity of this basic act that I was able to do both before and after the election. As my ride continued I began to catalog all the other pleasures available to me: good, clean air that I gulped greedily as I pounded the pedals; smooth roads twisting gracefully through the hills of Tilden Park; robust health; sunshine; a view of the Bay; a pretty sunset; the pleasure of descending swiftly toward home; the satisfaction of having a home to return to. None of this would be taken away just because my candidate lost.

Fun

So: where did that description of crushing leaves come from? It’s a blog post I did ages ago called, “In Defense of Fun.” Why does fun need to be defended? Because we get distracted, and maybe we get guilty, and maybe we’re too depressed to indulge in it, which is a shame. My own appreciation of fun was rekindled by my kids, and that’s what brought about that post. Today I looked back to that post in advance of possible heartbreak tomorrow morning (or whenever I face the music and learn the outcome of this election), to remind myself that it’s okay—in fact, it’s necessary—to seize our capacity to appreciate what we still have, whatever that is, and to enjoy it. We’re not required to be depressed and sullen and spend the next four years crying in our beer.

I’m not saying the solution to political turmoil is to just blow it off and have fun. I’m just taking advantage of having included a list, in my “Defense of Fun” post fifteen years ago, of my top 20 ways to have fun. I went through that list just now to determine how many of these activities will no longer be possible if this election goes the wrong way. Here is the list:

Surprise, surprise: none of these things will suddenly become impossible. Neither candidate promised, “If I am elected, America will no longer have to face the nightmare of people fixing their bikes, snapping photos, drinking beer, and people-watching. My administration will ban the crushing of leaves along with all BS pointless conversations among friends.”

Bigger picture

To be crystal clear: the point here isn’t fun per se. If my “in defense of” post had instead been about soulful connection with family, or the deep richness of decades-long friendships, or the satisfaction we get from improving our minds, or on basically anything that we should be glad for in our lives, we could look at that list instead. The point is, our post-election lives will only be miserable if we let them—if we decide this outcome precludes happiness, whether or not it actually changes the basic facts of our day-to-day lives (which it mostly doesn’t and won’t). Our connection with friends and family is only jeopardized if we blather on angrily or wretchedly about politics and they disagree with us. The United States of America tomorrow will be the same one it was yesterday, with the same dry leaves, the same slanting orange afternoon sun, the same smooth, twisty roads, and the same home to return to; your cat will still nuzzle her snout into the crook of your elbow and/or your dog will still whack your leg repeatedly as he wags his tail. Certainly there will be gradual policy changes based on having one political administration in place instead of another; the winners will have impacts on the country and the world during the time voters have given them. But you don’t need to decide in advance to be miserable about it.

Stay tuned

Keep an eye on albertnet, because I promise next week I’ll return to lighthearted, non-didactic, hopefully humorous prattle instead of this tedious, serious stuff. Maybe I’ll write about A.I…

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Autocomplete Zeitgeist Revisited

Before we begin

In this post, which examines the American zeitgeist, I adopt a tone of playful criticism. Please don’t mistake me for one of those tedious killjoys who only finds fault. Believe me, I am very grateful for my country and its people.

Introduction

As everybody knows, Google Autocomplete is a function of Google Search that starts providing feedback even before you’ve finished typing your query. The search engine predicts what you’re looking for based on what others have searched for. As such, it’s a good indicator of where people’s heads are. In a previous post I asked Google a range of questions designed to examine the national zeitgeist as of March 31, 2018. Today, exactly four years later, I googled the same questions to see how things have changed and what people seek answers for in 2022.

(Note: to improve the accuracy of this experiment—that is, to make it more about the people instead of about me—I turned off “Personal Results” so my own previous searches won’t influence the Autocomplete suggestions.)

Persecution mania

Four years ago, the query “is it illegal to…” prompted Autocomplete suggestions that included “to burn the US flag,” “to drive without shoes,” “to change lanes in an intersection,” “to burn money,” and “to run away.” Today, this same short phrase produces the following top Autocomplete suggestions:

• Is it illegal to drive barefoot
• Is it illegal to collect rainwater
• Is it illegal to work weekends in France
• Is it illegal to hit a girl
• Is it illegal to burn money

Compared to four years ago, it looks like Americans still hate wearing shoes; are perhaps more patriotic, being a) no longer interested in flag-burning, and b) presumably indignant about the lazy French; are apparently clueless about the most basic rules of law and human decency as regards assault; and (the current stock market nosedive notwithstanding) still feel uncomfortable with their own wealth (or have become inured to losing their money). It’s bizarre that anybody might assume collecting rainwater could be illegal … I mean, we’re talking about something that literally falls from the sky! And how on earth would enforcing such a law be arranged? Cops peering over your backyard fence looking for buckets?

Tweaking the query to “Is it against the law” produces just a few changes. Driving barefoot is still the first suggestion, but then we get:

• Is it against the law to dumpster dive
• Is it against the law to record someone
• Is it against the law to slap someone
• Is it against the law to threaten someone
• Is it against the law to hit a woman

How strange that violence against a female is something so commonly searched on. I mean, why would this be a different question than hitting, slapping, or threatening anyone? It’s hard to speculate what was different in 2018....

Moving on to “can you be arrested for,” this yields almost totally different results than “against the law” (the only common suggestion being “for slapping someone,” which perhaps stems from the recent Oscar dustup and the subsequent endless analysis of whether slapping can be assault). Here are the other top suggestions:

• Can you be arrested for speeding
• Can you be arrested for driving without a license
• Can you be arrested for a misdemeanor
• Can you be arrested for trespassing
• Can you be arrested for not paying child support

It looks like the modern American profile is starting to take shape: these are people who possibly can’t afford shoes, are forsaking pricey bottled water for local rainwater, may engage in dumpster diving, can’t afford child support, have no interest in safe driving, and are quite ready to commit violence if they think they can get away with it. Not a pretty picture.

Now, given all the national attention on law enforcement after the George Floyd murder, I was eager to see what Autocomplete would suggest for the next category, “can a police officer…” vs. last time around. In both cases the top five included “take your car” and “lie to you.” This year we have a few new suggestions:

• Can a police officer serve court papers
• Can a police officer run your plates
• Can a police officer transfer to another state
• Can a police officer question a minor
• Can a police officer dismiss a ticket

The “transfer to another state” would seem to be a question asked by an officer; maybe some of them don’t like the increasing accountability their communities have demanded. As for serving court papers, running plates, and dismissing tickets, these might just reflect the popularity of current police procedural TV shows. That leaves questioning a minor; I can’t see why this would be a problem, but the cop should expect to have the interview recorded by at least a few smartphones so he’d better behave.

Last time around, three out of the top five suggestions for “are you allowed to” involved smoking weed. This time, none of the suggestions involve that; I guess people have forgotten that weed was ever illegal, and now just assume that half the citizenry is stoned off their gourds at any given moment, and nobody cares. Here are the top five Autocomplete suggestions right now:

• Are you allowed to retire at age 50
• Are you allowed to curse at the Oscars
• Are you allowed to carry a knife in California
• Are you allowed to fight in hockey
• Are you allowed to leave North Korea

Seems kind of remarkable that there are people who are presumably financially capable of retiring but who nonetheless have no idea how the world works. It could be they're just dreaming, or maybe they want another reason to be angry at wealthy people. As for the knife inquiry and the fighting in hockey, I guess that just reinforces the portrait of a populace ready to beat someone’s ass.

Actually, I’ve often wondered why it’s okay for hockey players to fight, without being subject to the normal confines of the law. Think about it: if two players get in an all-out brawl on the ice, they get five minutes or so in the penalty box, but if they have their fight in the locker room, or out in the parking lot, or at a bar later, that would be assault and they could be arrested. It’s like the rules of the game supersede the law, like the NHL is the higher authority. I discussed this with my daughter today and she wasn’t quite sure what I was getting at. “Let’s take it a step further,” I said, “and think of one player killing another, for which he’s merely ejected from the game.” My daughter put in that this would surely increase the popularity of hockey. I decided more research was necessary. This article quotes NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman as saying fighting is “a thermostat for the game,” and that it “may prevent other injuries.” There wasn’t much detail provided on this, so I turned to YouTube for more insight. My daughter and I watched “Top 10 NHL fights of all time” and though we didn’t get a lot of answers, it was a pretty amazing spectacle … our hearts were racing by the end. Of particular note is that the announcers never passed judgment, like everyone saw with Will Smith’s slap at the Oscars. On the contrary, hockey commentators announce a fight as though it’s a boxing match (“  … and Smith comes in with a strong left!”). The cheering of the fans, and even the music playing in the stadium, continue unabated even with some of these fights lasting for several minutes. Anyway, I don’t know where I’m going with all this, but sometimes that’s just how blogging goes.

Who what where why how

Now on to the larger, more existential matters. Concerning the “what” questions, four years ago Americans sought information about Palm Sunday, Bitcoin, their IP addresses, rambler, and net neutrality. Today, the only one of these questions still puzzling people is “what is my IP,” which is pretty silly because these addresses are assigned dynamically via DHCP, so they’re practically the opposite of a fingerprint (i.e., they mean nothing). Here are the other top inquiries:

• What is alopecia
• What is an nft
• What is wordle
• What is a viscount
• What is lynching

The alopecia inquiry pertains to the ailment, suffered by Jada Pinkett Smith, that caused her baldness, which led to the Chris Rock joke that in turn led to the legendary slap by Will Smith. I guess Oscar fans are trying to educate themselves so they know what side to take when they start in on their trolling. With that in mind, along with the cringe-inducing, long-overdue inquiry “what is lynching,” I have to wonder if there’s any point to the human race.

As for NFT (i.e., non-fungible tokens), that’s arguably a variation on the theme of cryptocurrency, so nothing new there except you’re possibly buying nothing for nothing as opposed to something for nothing. Wordle is apparently a word game that as an English major I guess I should love, except that working out the solution to a pointless quiz is no match for actual reading, which is something most Americans know about only from books and have never actually attempted themselves.

Moving on to viscount, I chalk it up to fans of the TV show “Bridgerton,” the insanely popular soap opera that rips off actual literature and gets away with it because, again, nobody reads. So it appears our broke, violence-addicted, bored Americans still don’t understand the royal hierarchy that well. (Which is fine ... I mean, who gives a shit?)

Shifting gears to the “why” question, the first one (“why is the sky blue”) is the same Autocomplete suggestion as four years ago, and “why is my poop green” moved from fourth place to third. Here are new suggestions for 2022:

• Why is russia invading ukraine
• Why is my eye twitching
• Why is gas so expensive
• Why is my poop black
• Why is russia so big

Let’s consider the top answer to the first common question, “Why is the sky blue.” Four years ago, the first response was, “Because it’s a beautiful day.” Today, the top answer is, “The sky is blue due to a phenomenon called Raleigh scattering, which is the scattering of electromagnetic radiation (of which light is a form) by particles of a much smaller wavelength.” So we can conclude that in the last four years, the Internet authorities have lost their sense of humor.

As far as the other questions, since these are what’s on people’s minds, I’ll save you a Google search (and the pruning invariably required) and give you some quick resources so you don’t have to sound completely clueless should these come up in conversation.

Regarding the question of why Russia has invaded Ukraine, this article is pretty useful, and states, “The Russian leader's initial aim was to overrun Ukraine and depose its government, ending for good its desire to join the Western defensive alliance Nato… Beyond his military goals, President Putin's broader demand is to ensure Ukraine’s future neutrality.” I think my own explanation, “Because Russia is led by a blind idiot autocrat,” is probably a similarly useful response for most American audiences, with “commie” and “pinko” available as garnish depending on your bent.

A guide to poop color and what it could mean is here. And some eye-twitching causes are here. I’ve had some trouble with eyelid twitching myself, which I associated with stress. Fortunately, the Atlantic Ocean separates my home from Russia, so my eyelids are behaving at present. (Let’s not get into my poop color other than to say it’s boring.)

The high cost of gasoline is nicely summarized in this article, which states, “Oil and gas are global commodities, subject to the whims of notoriously volatile global markets. Their prices are particularly sensitive to geopolitical events and investor sentiment… In fact, in this case, sky-high gas prices came from a confluence of events. As COVID-19 restrictions eased and economies rebounded rapidly, demand for oil spiked. Pandemic-related supply chain disruptions exacerbated the situation... Then, more recently and perhaps most saliently, [oil markets were roiled by] Russia [and its invasion of Ukraine].”

And why is Russia so big? This short video sums it up pretty handily: Russia was able to conquer Siberia, which comprises 75% of its land, because there wasn’t much opposition, it being “a cold land with only one guy per square kilometer in that time.”

Moving on to “who is,” we get a sense of whom Americans are wondering about right now. Four years ago, the top Autofill suggestion was “Snoke” (some “Star Wars” character now forgotten entirely), with Jesus taking second and third place, followed by “the richest person in the world” and then Marshmello, some music producer. All have fallen of the suggestion list except for “richest person” which moved up to first place, solidifying our sense that Americans are broke and (possibly as a result) have lost their religion. Here are the next four suggestions:

• Who is julia fox
• Who is will smith’s wife
• Who is moon knight
• Who is in the super bowl  2022
• Who is joe rogan

Julia Fox, not surprisingly, is an actress, and I guess she’s a popular search because of her weird Oscar after-party dress and its matching handbag, made out of human hair. Will Smith’s wife is of course another Oscar-themed question, and I’d like to point out that while she (famously) lacks hair, Julia didn’t steal it.

Moon Knight is some stupid comic book character, so our lawless, violent, broke, godless, and celebrity-obsessed modern Americans have officially regressed to childishness as well. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that they’ve already forgotten about this year’s Super Bowl, which was last month.

Rounding out this search topic, we get Joe Rogan, who I gather is mainly famous, lately, for a Spotify controversy where Neil Young yanked all his music from the platform to protest their hosting of Rogan’s podcast. There’s a nice synopsis here. Rogan is a major self-taught pundit, who started out in stand-up comedy as opposed to actual journalism. He is also, as far as I can tell, an idiot. But you shouldn’t take my word for it … I’ve never heard his podcast. (If you decide to check it out, don’t report back because I don’t care.)

Now it’s time for the “where” question. For the second year running, top honors go to “where’s my refund,” which showcases the desperation of broke Americans … they actually hope Google has so thoroughly mined their personal data that they can even pinpoint what part of the IRS machinery is currently processing the searcher’s tax return. And, just as we saw four years ago, the second most popular search is “where am I.” So instead of looking around him, perhaps even out a window, the average American is outsourcing his knowledge of his own whereabouts to Google Location Services. Pretty sad.

But now we get a big surprise: the third most popular “where” search is Where the Crawdads Sing, a book. I’ve never seen a book in Autocomplete before, so I’m going to cry bullshit and declare this a paid result. Rounding out the top five we have “where is the super bowl this year” (see above—totally irrelevant question), and “where can I watch euphoria.” Evidently “Euphoria” is a TV show about sexy young drug addicts … just the thing to cheer up us broke, violence-obsessed, stunted, confused, green-pooping, and godless Americans as we (hopefully) come out of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Let’s look at “how.” What are Americans trying to learn how to do in 2022? No longer are we seeking to delete Facebook (perhaps we’ve either given up trying, or succeeded long ago), or trying to buy Bitcoin (it’s far too expensive now that we’re broke), or learning how to tie a tie (since nobody dresses for success anymore, the COVID-driven shift to teleworking having dealt a fatal blow to dress codes nationwide). We’re still ignorant of weights and measures (the #1 suggestion being “how many ounces in a cup” and #5 being ounces in a gallon), clueless in general (#3 being “how many weeks in a year”—are you kidding me?!) but now we suddenly want to know “how to screenshot on mac” which seems incredibly basic (though, factually, I don’t know the answer, but that’s only because I haven’t used a Mac since 1985). Rounding out the top five, Americans suddenly want to know “how old is bruce willis.” This is because his daughter announced yesterday that he’s retired from acting due to a diagnosis of aphasia. I happen to know what that is, but am suddenly surprised that it didn’t come up in my survey of “what is” Autocomplete suggestions. So I tried again and guess what? “What is aphasia” is suddenly #1, Google being as nimble as ever … and alopecia has dropped from the first page of results. (Even though Bruce Willis is famously bald, it’s not because of alopecia. Dang … remember when he had hair? Back then, I had hair too!)

But let’s stop dwelling on the past.

The future

Where are we, as Americans, headed? And how are we feeling about that? To find out, I googled “am I going” and compared the suggestions to 2018 when we were concerned with “am I going crazy,” “am I going to die,” “am I going to hell,” “am I going bald,” and “am I going to die alone.” I see several of these repeated, but new for 2022 are “am I going blind” (probably a result of how glued to our screens we’ve been during the pandemic), “am I going to be okay” (perhaps a hint of optimism creeping through the doldrums?), and “am I going through menopause” (which … I don’t know, might suggest the changing demographics of Internet users?).

Switching to “will I ever,” six of the top eight results (will I ever find love again, find love, get married, be happy, find true love, get over my ex) are the same as four years ago, with only two new Autocomplete suggestions: “will I ever be able to buy a house” (reflects what we already knew—Americans are broke) and “will I ever get a ps5.” I guess PlayStation is seen as the last best hope for entertaining ourselves now that we’ve forgotten how to venture outside our homes.

And now, in keeping with my zeitgeist investigation from four years ago, we move the final query, which abandons Google in favor of the Magic 8-Ball. I posed the question “will I ever be happy again” to www.ask8ball.net, and it responded, “It is decidedly so.” I think that’s pretty encouraging, given that I’m surrounded by a cohort of broke, clueless, violence-obsessed scofflaws who drive too fast without licenses, produce green or black feces, and are as worried about Hollywood celebrities as they are about world events.

(I’m just playin’, America. You know I love you.)

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2009 Holiday Newsletter

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Introduction

As a described in my previous post, every year I write a Holiday Newsletter and send it to some of the people on my mailing list for holiday cards. As newsletters go, it isn't very helpful; it doesn't, for example, describe the highlights of the year. It's actually more likely to focus on a single low point, though I don't restrict myself to any established format or style. I've decided this year to extend my Holiday Newsletter to my extended blog “family.” Enjoy.

December 2009

Happy holidays to your whole family!

I hope nobody is bothered that I didn’t say “Merry Christmas.” My greeting simply acknowledges that there is no single official holiday in this country. Accepting all winter holiday traditions would seem to be a classic example of American freedom. But really, there’s a limit on this freedom: we’re not exactly free to ignore the “meaning” of the holiday, whichever one(s) we do (or fail to) observe. I feel this way with most of our holidays … at the end of every Memorial Day, for example, I get this creeping guilt that while I enjoyed the time off, I didn’t spend so much as a moment thinking of our fallen soldiers.

With this nagging pressure already upon me, I was struck dumb upon entering Macy’s, on the day after Thanksgiving, to see (among the garish fake evergreens) a giant sign reading, “Believe!” The sign was repeated throughout the store—part of a major holiday shopping campaign. Since the only things I actually exhort my children to believe in are Santa and the Tooth Fairy, I took this pretty hard—almost as if the signs had said, “J’accuse!”

Can’t I get through a holiday without having to tap my spiritual side? I have to admit, I kind of envy the British, with their simple “bank holidays” that are just totally free days off with no strings attached. If I’m not mistaken, the English even have a “flip-all day” (though they don’t say “flip”—I’ve made a word substitution, this being a family newsletter). But this envy is an affront to my already battered patriotism, so I’m feeling the need to defend my country by criticizing England. As time off from work and increased retail activity seem to be the two things all winter holidays have in common, in this holiday newsletter I’m going to explore another nexus of time off and consumerism: my harrowing experience shopping in London during our summer vacation there.

The difference between the retail experience in the US vs. the UK is largely a matter of ideology. The US approach is “The customer is always right.” We’re wooed, coddled, pampered, and encouraged at every step. The UK approach, on the other hand, as with so many aspects of British life, seems to be “Soldier on, and keep your chin up.” It seems the Brits would rather showcase their famous stoicism than actually have a good experience as consumers.

Americans have no stomach for things like inconvenience or poor value, and our retail providers know this. Dignity and civility are not expected, or even encouraged, among American shoppers. Consider this text from a Kleenex box: “Say goodbye to the stiff upper lip. Tell calm, cool and collected to take a hike. When tons of stuff stuffs up your nose, blow it loud and blow it proud!” (The French text on the same box, ostensibly targeted at French-Canadians, is much tamer; instead of the stiff upper lip part it merely says, “Vous êtes bouché?” which roughly translates “Are you stopped up?”)

This difference in approach was evident throughout our time in London. First, the lack of wooing: we received no junk mail at the house we were staying in, and only one flyer was left on the porch, from a place called US Pizza. We could have stayed out of the malls entirely except for a little mishap we had in the bathroom. There was no bathroom counter, so when Alexa was done getting a drink of water, she left the glass balancing precariously in the sink, where I tipped it over, breaking it. Not wanting to be a bad houseguest, I immediately set out to replace it.

Back home, I could have walked to a local mall and had a pretty good chance of finding a Bathroom Drinking Glass Emporium. Failing that, our local Crate & Barrel Factory Outlet would have a number of glasses to choose from, all of them fortuitously on sale. But this was no ordinary drinking glass—it was designed to sit in a chromed steel ring that juts out from the bathroom wall (a needlessly clever solution to the simple problem of English sinks not having counters). So this glass had to be larger at the top and then taper down, like a little shelf, so the narrower bottom part would go through the ring and the glass would nestle securely in the ring. But even if Crate & Barrel didn’t have glasses like this, the entirely cheerful and apologetic clerk would offer to order one for me, and since they get deliveries from the other store twice a day, I could stop by later that same day and pick it up. And if the other store didn’t have it, why, they could get one from China within days, and it would just so happen to be on sale for only a few dollars.

But this was England, and nobody I asked seemed to have any idea where to buy such a thing. They looked at me like I was asking where to buy a replacement laser prism for a 3-D hologram machine that hadn’t been invented yet. A couple of people recommended Marks & Spencer, so we headed over there. It was a pretty nice department store, though the whole place had just two restrooms, both out of service during our visit. I found the housewares department and described to the clerk what I was looking for: a small drinking glass for the bathroom, that sits in a little ring that sticks out from the wall. The clerk looked at me like I was crazy. “Now, what is it?” she asked.

I described the glass again, mentioning the larger diameter at the top, and drawing in the air how its sides taper in so the ring will hold it. She assured me there is no such product in existence. So I went hunting for it on my own, and found it right away. I brought her over and showed her. Instead of admitting that my description had been spot-on, and wondering aloud how she could have been so dense, she said, “Oh, you’re looking for a toothbrush holder!”

I thought it would end there: I figured I’d buy two glasses for maybe $10 or $15 total, and be on my merry way. (I needed two, because our hosts’ bathroom had two ring/glass sets, and the new glass wouldn’t match the remaining old one.) But it turns out Marks & Spencer doesn’t sell the glass part separately. You have to buy the whole set—the glass, the ring, and the mounting bracket—for £25 (roughly $45 after the murderous exchange rate and usurious credit card fee), meaning the pair would be about $90. I naively asked, “Can’t I just buy the glass separately?” She looked at me like I was daft. “Why would you want to do that?” she asked. I explained that I’d broken a glass, and she looked taken aback.

This shouldn’t have surprised me, but we hadn’t been in London for very long and I hadn’t yet realized that Brits evidently never break anything. My first exposure to this strange phenomenon came at the grocery store when Lindsay knocked a jar of something to the floor and it broke. Other shoppers gasped and stared, like a meteorite had just come plunging through the ceiling and bored several feet into the floor. When I was a kid, and my brothers and I clumsily broke something in a store, we thought little of it (even though we were craven types given to persecution mania). We’d even compete to see who could best mimic the bored “Wet cleanup, aisle 3” that came over the PA system. But here, I almost expected a Hazmat team to arrive in radiation suits, and for my whole family to be fitted with scarlet letters before leaving the store. We felt the same way after breaking a drinking glass at a London restaurant a few days later.

I asked the Marks & Spencer clerk if there was any way she could sell me the glass by itself, since it was all I needed. “But you see, it’s sold as a set,” she reiterated patiently, as if talking to a small child. I asked what I would possibly do with two extra rings. “You could keep them as spares,” she said. I guess she figured that anybody hapless enough to actually break a glass toothbrush holder is capable of breaking anything.

My search lasted two more weeks, becoming a central theme of our vacation. Half the people I asked were as mystified by “toothbrush holder” as by my description. Finally we found a housewares specialty shop in Ealing that could order just the glass. It seemed like a fairly high-end place, but I figured not paying for the metal hardware would keep the price relatively low. Of course they had nothing in stock, but could order it. “It’ll take about three to four weeks,” the clerk said breezily. When’s the last time any consumer item took that long to get in the States? Still, we figured if the price were right, and it could be shipped directly to the house there, that might be okay. But then he told us the price.

As you’ve doubtless observed, when something costs a lot in the U.S., the clerk generally eases you into the news carefully, sometimes employing fancy names like “timepiece” or “eyeshade system” to reinforce the value even as the quote is delivered. But the English housewares guy cut right to the chase and said, as casually as could be, “It’s £80.” £80?! Was he out of his mind? What’s it made of—crown jewels? That’s like $145, for a fricking drinking glass, and I’d need two of them. What did we look like—billionaires? I thought I was going to have a coughing fit.

Finally, days before the end of our stay, after hours of searching online, I found a place called B&Q in Acton Town. It was on a far-flung subway line, in a dreary part of the city along a loud highway, and when I got there I realized it was kind of the English equivalent of our Home Depot chain. Why anybody would want to emulate the most god-awful of all American retail establishments is beyond me; perhaps it seemed an irresistible challenge to out-awful us while putting the famous British forbearance to its ultimate test.

At least B&Q had a few toothbrush holders to choose from. I found a relatively cheap one, but it was crudely made of cheap plastic and might as well have had “POXY RUBBISH” embossed on it. I’d given up the dream of finding a glass for sale without the hardware, but did discover a glass/holder set of decent quality for about £20. The trouble was, they only had one left and I needed two. I didn’t bother fantasizing about buying the display model (much less at a discount), but I did toy with the idea of stealing it. I could just shove it under my jacket … but of course I wouldn’t do that. I didn’t much fancy spending the final days of my vacation in an English prison, even if it is the birthplace of habeas corpus.

Thus, I had to go home empty-handed and make another trip to B&Q the next day. Customer Service had promised to hold two of the toothbrush holders for me, but when I arrived, they hadn’t the foggiest idea what I was talking about. Luckily, because the toothbrush holders came in bright orange boxes, I happened to spot them on a shelf behind the Customer Service desk, and pointed them out. With a look that said “Boy are you stupid!” the clerk begrudgingly handed them over.

Now I felt I was truly in the home stretch. All that remained now was paying up. I went to the self-service checkout, scanned the boxes, and got out my credit card. Alas, right away I came up against yet another obstacle: their payment system only accepted chip cards. I didn’t have £40 cash on me—that’s a lot of foreign currency for a tourist to carry two days before heading home. But before I even had a chance to complain, a cashier had appeared. I figured word had gotten around about the clueless tourist: “Better go help out that American bloke at checkout. He’s a right dozy blighter, bound to cock things up completely.” I explained that the POS terminal wouldn’t take my card. “We don’t take credit cards,” she said blandly. I handed her my debit card. “We don’t take this either,” she said. She seemed almost relieved, as if accepting my payment would be some kind of defeat.

I asked if she meant that they could only accept chip cards, not magstripe. She looked utterly nonplussed, like I’d asked if her mother had problems metabolizing Technicolor herring-liver pustules. So I asked her what the problem was. She stared at my card and said, “It doesn’t have one of those … things.” Suddenly I noticed that she was holding a fancy wireless payment card terminal with more features than the basic self-service one. (Given my line of work, I have specialized knowledge of these devices.) I grabbed it from her and said, “Look. Have you ever noticed this thing up at the top here? It’s a magstripe reader.” I swiped my card and completed the payment. She continued to stare blankly at me, like, “Just look at this bloody plonker. Americans are even bigger eejits than I thought.” But I didn’t care, because I was done! I made my way back to the house, installed the new glasses, forbade my kids to go anywhere near them, and got on with my life.

So. To summarize the differences in retail cultures:
USA: Believe!
UK: I can’t believe this!

Whether or not you manage to invest this holiday season with satisfying spiritual reflection, I sincerely hope you have an enjoyable time. And if, like me, you don’t take particular pleasure in the consumer aspect of the season, take heart: at least in this country you’re always right!

Love,