2011 Year in Review

When I sat down to reflect on the year that was 2011, more than a few notable events came to mind. Osama bin Laden assuming room temperature. The European debt crisis and riots. Kim Jong Il, the little North Korean pajama-wearing nutbag, kicking the bucket. Britain’s royal wedding, and their major news agency’s royal cell phone tapping scandal. The equal parts hopeful and scary “Arab Spring” protests and civil unrest happening in almost every country in the Middle East. Iran test-firing missiles and the resulting tension in Israel and the US. And, the tragic Japanese earthquake, tsunami, and resulting nuclear plant disaster.

Closer to home we had gold setting record price highs, Steve Jobs passing away, occupy Wall Street, and then occupy everything else, the “Fast and Furious” gun running sting gone completely awry, the U.S. losing our AAA credit rating, and then, most depressingly of all, the 2012 presidential campaigns got underway.

As if all the things I could think of weren’t depressing enough, or maybe out of a sense of longing for some good memories, I did an internet search to find out what I was forgetting.

What I found on that search was more depressing than all the bad news listed above, combined. I had decided to look up the top ten internet searches for 2011, and I found two lists, one from Yahoo and one from Google. After reading the lists, one thing has become perfectly clear to me:

We are doomed. Plain and simple.

Here they are:

The Yahoo 2011 Top Ten Searches

1.      iPhone

2.      Casey Anthony

3.      Kim Kardashian

4.      Katy Perry

5.      Jennifer Lopez

6.      Lindsay Lohan

7.      “American Idol”

8.      Jennifer Aniston

9.      Japan earthquake

10.  Osama bin Laden

The iPhone is a camera and video game that can also be used to make telephone calls.

Casey Anthony probably killed her own daughter, but was found not guilty, and has been set loose. Also, she was apparently fairly loose in the first place.

Kim Kardashian is famous for no reason. She was married this year for about an hour and a half. As near as I can tell, the only thing she has ever actually done in her whole life was this year, when she “lost the weight, but kept the curves!” She is the picture in the dictionary under “loose.”

Katy Perry is a pop singer who is also apparently fairly loose.

Jennifer Lopez is a pop singer who wears tight body suits, and may or may not be loose.

Lindsay Lohan is an extremely loose Hollywood train wreck.

American Idol is one of the conduits by which teenagers can become Hollywood train wrecks.

Jennifer Aniston is a Hollywood actress who excited the world by getting married again this year. Since she has repeatedly ignored my offers to leave my wife and elope with her, and since she evidently eloped with some other guy instead, I must assume she is also loose.

You already know about Japan and Osama bin Laden.

Yahoo users went 2 for 10.

The Google 2011 Top Ten Searches

1.      Rebecca Black

2.      Google+

3.      Ryan Dunn

4.      Casey Anthony

5.      Battlefield 3

6.      iPhone5

7.      Adele

8.      Fukushima Nuclear Plant (searched for in Japanese)

9.      Steve Jobs

10.  iPad2

Rebecca Black is a 14-year-old singer who self-produced a really annoying song that so many people hated, she became famous.

Google+ is apparently Google’s answer to Facebook. Since no one has actually ever heard of it, my guess is that Google just put it as number 2 on their list to get it more attention.

Ryan Dunn was a member of the Jackass squad, a band of stoners who became famous for performing homemade stunts that no one who was not stoned 24 hours-a-day would ever attempt. He died while driving drunk.

As far as I know, Battlefield 3 is a video game, presumably about battle. It is most likely the third of its kind.

The iPhone5 is the 5^th version of the iPhone. It does not exist yet. There are entire websites devoted to rumors about what it will be like.

Adele is a singer. I am obviously very, very hip, but I had not heard of her until I read this list. I Facebooked her instead of Googling her, for no other reason than to spite this list, and listened to a few of her songs. She is very good.

You already know about Japan and Steve Jobs.

The iPad2 is a giant iPhone4 that can’t make telephone calls. It comes in original white and new black, and replaces the original iPad. Besides now coming in black, the number 2 is the only change from the old model.

Google users went 2 for 10 as well, but were less varied than their Yahoo counterparts, concentrating more heavily on Apple, a tech company that, ironically, isn’t too compatible with Google.

There you have it. That’s what the world searched for in 2011. If that depresses you as much as it does me, just remember this: The Mayan calendar says the world is coming to an end in 2012 anyway, so we shouldn’t have to put up with this too much longer.

There you go. Feel better?

I did notice one glaring omission from our two inadvertent doomsday lists. I have to assume that Charlie Sheen was not on either list for the single reason that he was so over-covered and over-publicized during his cocaine and ego fueled rants earlier this year that no one ever had to actually search his name to hear about him. Winning!

See you soon,

-Smidge

Copyright © 2012 Marc Schmatjen

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