Google really does have something over my hometown newspaper. Although both love their April Fool’s jokes, Google has outlasted the local newspaper.
My hometown daily shut down the pranks after the outrage of an April 1 story that featured the suicide of what everyone assumed was an fictitious columnist. This columnist had a weekly running commentary on events in the community and the extensive story of his suicide was more than people could bear. End of the pranks.
The best one I remember, though, was the discovery of a match farm outside of town. Readers were given close-ups of bushes bearing matches and a lengthy interview with the match farmer. I don’t know how long it took the reporter to tie the matches onto those bushes.
Google, on the other hand, keeps chucking out the jokes.
Here are a few from their archives:
Google Australia announced the development of the “g-ball,” a soccer-type ball with GPS technology. The ball could measure the location, force, and torque of a kick, and “vibrate if player agents or talent scouts want to speak to you.” Google claimed that the ball will cost $10 with a cost-per-kick set of payments in addition to the basic fee.
Users were told that Google Docs could upload anything, including things easily lost such as your car keys and remote controls. Using control-F would allow you to search the world and download your item for a small fee.
Google proposed a keyboard with a single key for each Japanese character.
Scratch and Sniff books were added to Google Book Search. Users were instructed to please place their noses near the monitor and press “Go” which would then load odors.
Google Mobile offered Brain Indexing. Users could put phone to their forehead for brain indexing and then simply think their search query.
Google became Topeka for a day. Apparently town fathers in Topeka, Kansas had changed the name of their town to “Google” for a day in hopes of capturing a spot on a broadband/fiber optics project. Google returned the honor, replacing their logo with “Topeka” for the day.
Google users were offered an option to print life-size cardboard cutouts of all their photos.
But this year may top them all. Google and YouTube have joined together to announce that YouTube has really been a contest and it will disappear for the next decade while judges sort through all the entries. Check out the video:
Because I am currently in first place in my group’s March Madness bracketing, I’ll reveal my system. It seems to be working as well as my granddaughter who, last year, got a long way in her brackets by picking the winners based on their mascots. Cutest won, I think.
I wish my system was as sweet.
March Madness Experience logo (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Mine is simple and fast: pick the games based on ranking and, when rankings get close toward the center of the bracket, go with defense. We’ll see how that works out in the final rounds.
But my favorite March Madness story goes back many years, when I was a cub reporter on a tiny newspaper that didn’t even have typesetting capability. This was waaaay before the Internet.
So I traveled to another site a hour away once a week to get our newspaper typeset, arranged, and sent off to the print shop.
One of the employees at our sister site was big into office pools and he insisted that I put in my dollar for the March Madness brackets. Each round required a new dollar but I wouldn’t see him for a week. A dollar seemed a polite and easy way out of plunking down a dollar a day.
When I got back a week later, I discovered that I had won the first day’s pool. And Kent reinvested my winnings because he knew I’d want to do that. Uh-huh.
Well, I won a second time during that week. And Kent knew I’d want in every day.
By the time I got back to manage my winnings, there were none.
So that year I won twice in March Madness, had nothing to show for it, and it only cost me a dollar.
I didn’t think we were going to Cuba until two days before we boarded an airplane at Cancun and headed east. “Americans can’t go to Cuba,” I told our missionary host.
Fortunately, he ignored me and we went. Four days were spent in Havana before we drove across the island to the mountains at the east end.
English: (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
On our first night in Havana, we went to a fancy restaurant where waitresses wore black dresses, white aprons and white caps. Like old-fashioned maids. Glittering crystal adorned each table with heavy silverware resting on starched napkins at each place setting.
And a pianist filled the air with sweet music.
When he saw us, he recognized us as Americans. Americans are rich in Cuba. No matter what money we had.
So he immediately began playing tunes by Frank Sinatra. Cuba seems lodged in the 1950’s and the musician must have assumed that Sinatra melodies would net him a nice tip from the Americans.
Emboldened by his strong Sinatra performance, the pianist then approached our table. “I know many other American songs,” he said. “What would you like to hear?”
My husband leaned toward him. “Could you play Amazing Grace?”
The man frowned slightly as he searched his memory banks. He finally shook his head. “I do not know that one.”
We smiled at each other and then my husband surrendered. “How about some Sinatra?”
“Oh, yes, sir!” The pianist scurried back to the piano and played instead I Did It My Way.
A good story is like a nice collection of chocolates: it’s hard to have too many.
In my 20’s, before I had children, I hung out with my friends’ kids. Kids and stories are made for each other.
At age 4, Rene already loved a good story. And, lucky for me, she thought my stories were good.
Together, we crafted a story about Paintbrush the Smurf who lived in Smurfville and loved to paint. (You had to be there.) If we had much time together, we’d work our way through our stories.
But Rene enjoyed other storytellers as well. One evening I was invited to her house for dinner and I arrived before the meal was ready.
“I’ll read you some books,” I told her, “if you want.”
She spun and disappeared into her bedroom. And didn’t come out.
Well, I thought, she must not have wanted stories read after all. I waited a while and then started for the kitchen to chat with her mother.
At that moment, Rene burst from her bedroom, her arms stretched out, holding what looked like every book she owned. I’m not sure how she squeezed all those volumes between her hands.
Of course we sat down and read. Who cares about dinner when you can read about Corduroy and a runaway bunny?
Her brother was less enthralled with my stories but that was OK because he had a way of supplying me with fresh material.
One day he visited my house and planted himself before my computer. There, Ken played a dartboard game for a long time.
Then he raced out of the room and flung himself at me, energy exploding from his face. “You know that Darts? Two people can play it so I decided to play against myself. I played and played. And guess what?” He was nearly breathless. “I won!”
Their younger brother came along a little later. By that time, I had a son who was just a year older than Curt. On my son’s birthday, he was at kindergarten and I was babysitting Curt who wanted to help make the birthday cake.
So we pulled up a step-ladder so Curt could reach the counter and began putting ingredients in a bowl. I stepped away to grab the flour, turning back in time to see Curt slam two eggs against the edge of the bowl and drop the glob -shells included – on top of the butter and sugar.
“Do you do that at home?” I asked him.
His eyes wide, he looked up at me. “No. My mother won’t let me.”
Participating in social media means pictures. Photos. Readers are very visual and a post with a picture is better.
I ran across this cheat sheet for social media photos and thought I would share with you. I have a lot of work to do on my social media. Maybe you, too?
My roots are in rural America. I revel at the whippoorwill’s cry in the early morning mist.
A combine harvesting corn. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Seasons for me are planting, growing, harvest, and rest. Translation: spring, summer, fall, winter.
My neighbors are people of the soil with an uncanny understanding of corn hybrids, marketing tools, and diesel mechanics.
They know how to read the clouds and how to signal an auctioneer. They embrace technology when it saves them time but reserve their evenings for homemade ice cream and warm apple pie.
My neighbors know who plants the straightest furrows and whose wife/daughter/uncle is fighting an ailment. They will band together to plant or harvest crops for a downed farmer and contribute generously to fundraisers for kid, accident victims, and others in need.
They also know how to laugh.
There was, for example, a farmer who called the service manager of the local tractor supply company. A pump had failed on his tractor during harvest.
Harvest in the Valley (Photo credit: Quiltsalad)
The service manager checked the parts book and found two different pumps for that model, one on each side of the tractor. “Which side of the tractor is the pump that failed?’
The farmer hesitated. “The one on the west side.”
Harvest mania does that to you. In a controlled panic, farmers try to get the crop collected before the hail or wind seizes its share.
Another farmer was harvesting corn. He turned his combine toward the road one morning only to see the sheriff’s car, lights flashing, at the end of his field. He finished that pass in the field and stopped his machine near the deputy, who stood with hands on hips but revolver still in its holster.
“Hey, James,” the farmer dusted off his hands, straightened his cap, and extended a dusty palm to the deputy. “What’s up?”
“I’m here to arrest you,” the deputy said.
“What?” The farmer glanced around him for some clue.
“You’re supposed to be at jury duty this morning. Want to just drive in now? Because if you don’t, I have an arrest warrant in my car.”
The farmer missed the morning’s harvest that day.
Then there were the two Jones brothers (names changed) who had missed a couple of rounds when God was handing out wits. The neighbors noticed one morning that they suddenly had a new combine, perfectly timed for wheat harvest.
And the sheriff was notified that morning that a farmer several miles away had reported the disappearance of a new combine.
When the neighbors heard about the missing combine, they called the sheriff who headed out to talk to the Jones brothers.
It had been an exciting morning for the brothers because a guy had stopped by to offer them the deal of the day. For that morning only, they could buy a new combine for $1000. A new combine at that time sold for about $100,000.
In some places, the Jones brothers might have spent years in jail. But the sheriff took the keys and returned the combine.
No charges were filed against the Jones brothers. They groused a little about the $1000 but the sheriff told them to consider it a payment in the college of hard knocks.
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