It’s pretty weird that when you type “can j” in the Google box, the first suggestion it gives you is “can jesus microwave a burrito.” And see for yourself the long, bizarre entry partway down the list that comes up when you simply enter “what.” These and others were included in a survey of “Most Inappropriate Google Suggests” on Huffington Post. You can’t look at these screen captures without thinking they’re fake - until you test a couple and find out they’re real.
Presumably, all of these suggests are questions commonly asked on the Internet. I tried some of my own, using the sequence “does _” where _ is filled in with any letter of the alphabet. No matter what letter I used, most of the results were questions having to do with sex or drugs or alcohol (or testing for them). The expected exceptions were for o (“does obama have a birth certificate”) and u (“does ups deliver on saturday” – no question related to urine, although the last suggest is “does ups drug test”). When I finally arrived at y, I was intrigued to see “does your heart stop when you sneeze” – and that when I clicked on it, it delivered 379,000 hits.
This reminded me of a ridiculous line I’d heard close to 40 years ago: “if you sneeze, fart, and burp at the same time, you will die.” (I had passed this as an anonymous note to a coworker, who in turn left it on the boss’s chair.) When I started to type “if you sneeze,” Google suggested the entry “if you sneeze with your eyes open will they pop out,” with 199,000 hits. When I tried to prompt it by typing “if you sneeze, fart,” I received no suggest to complete the phrase; however, searching on that fragment did indeed produce hits related to the sneeze/fart/burp myth, with hiccups and coughs thrown into the mix.
And by the way: “does y” also shows that “Does Your Chewing Gum Lose Its Flavor on the Bedpost Overnight” lives on in cyberspace if not on the airways. But hey, I’m not doing all the work – you’ll have to find out for yourself if your heart stops when you sneeze.
Interestingly enough, the very first example on Huffpost shows that “i am” produces the top result “i am bored.” Why else would anybody play this game?
Presumably, all of these suggests are questions commonly asked on the Internet. I tried some of my own, using the sequence “does _” where _ is filled in with any letter of the alphabet. No matter what letter I used, most of the results were questions having to do with sex or drugs or alcohol (or testing for them). The expected exceptions were for o (“does obama have a birth certificate”) and u (“does ups deliver on saturday” – no question related to urine, although the last suggest is “does ups drug test”). When I finally arrived at y, I was intrigued to see “does your heart stop when you sneeze” – and that when I clicked on it, it delivered 379,000 hits.
This reminded me of a ridiculous line I’d heard close to 40 years ago: “if you sneeze, fart, and burp at the same time, you will die.” (I had passed this as an anonymous note to a coworker, who in turn left it on the boss’s chair.) When I started to type “if you sneeze,” Google suggested the entry “if you sneeze with your eyes open will they pop out,” with 199,000 hits. When I tried to prompt it by typing “if you sneeze, fart,” I received no suggest to complete the phrase; however, searching on that fragment did indeed produce hits related to the sneeze/fart/burp myth, with hiccups and coughs thrown into the mix.
And by the way: “does y” also shows that “Does Your Chewing Gum Lose Its Flavor on the Bedpost Overnight” lives on in cyberspace if not on the airways. But hey, I’m not doing all the work – you’ll have to find out for yourself if your heart stops when you sneeze.
Interestingly enough, the very first example on Huffpost shows that “i am” produces the top result “i am bored.” Why else would anybody play this game?
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