Things You Should Never Google

After my nauseating results from doing an image search for “big toe” the other day, I realize that I really should be a little less quick to hit the magnifying glass on search engines.  I have had a few times that my results have been more than eye-opening, and I really should know better by now.

Undesirable consequences of searches have plagued me practically since the infancy of internet search engines.  About 20 years ago, apparently when things were a little more willy-nilly on the World Wide Web, I was trying to find some lesson plans for Louisa May Alcott’s book, Little Women.

That was my first indication that there are some truly sick people out there with photo uploading skills.

And, yet, decades later, I still enter impulsive terms into that little search window, assuming that my own narrow and naive interpretation of the phrase is the only possibility that will be considered by the wide nets being cast by the likes of Yahoo and Google.

One time, after hearing the phrase on T.V., I looked up “camel toe”, innocently believing that it had to do with some kind of footwear faux pas.  Yeah, uh, no.  Interestingly enough, 3 people have reached my blog by searching for “sally field camel toe.”  And now that I’ve typed that, there may be more.

The camel's toe is probably the last body part I would have suspected of contributing to my search anxiety. How about the "hump?"

When I first started this blog, and assigned our bulldog the pseudonym of Wonderbutt, I one day became curious about how that Google search might turn out.

Yes, I am that stupid.

In my post that referenced roller-skating, I got a completely astonishing list of sites when I typed in “couples skate” looking for an image.  I really could have done without that sexual revelation for the remainder of my life – which will probably be much shorter due to the complete shock to my heart induced by those results.

And then there are the searches that I knowingly make in the interest of research, fully aware that I am treading on dangerous ground.  Yesterday’s post made me curious about octopus testicles, which was a frustrating quest, to say the least.  Apparently, the creatures do have some, but there seems to be an ongoing internet war as to whether they are located in the head or the mantle or if those happen to be the same thing.  After a few minutes trying to weed through this catalogue of conflicting information, I realized I really didn’t care, and got sidetracked by several videos posted about a poor weatherman who apparently said that Paul the Octopus had testicles.

I don’t believe in censorship, but I’m beginning to think I need a filter to protect me from myself.  Being a teacher, I never thought I’d say this – but there are times when a little more education can be way too much.

photo credit: <a href=”http://www.flickr.com/photos/seyerce/2213283734/”>Ernie Reyes</a> via <a href=”http://photopin.com”>photopin</a&gt; <a href=”http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/2.0/”>cc</a&gt;