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Responding to Google searches

Saturday, March 31st, 2007

I’m sure anyone with a Web site that has stats attached to it watches them with interest. I know I do.

I get a lot of hits from Google searches, and sometimes they make me laugh. And sometimes they seriously creep me out. Oftentimes people are searching for answers that I wish I could give them in real time.

Searches that creep me out include…

  • people searching for my name, first and last. I Google other people all the time as a part of my job and out of curiousity. But it never fails to kind of make me freak out when I realize other people are searching for information about me. Luckily, I suppose, this domain is the top hit.

  • the person who searched for “video of someone hanging themselves” this afternoon and landed here because of my comments on the Saddam video. This is not the first time people searching for the Saddam clip have landed here, but this is the first time someone just wanted to see someone die. Seriously, this thought made my stomach flip.
  • the many people who’ve been searching for “funny stereotypes” or its even worse cousin “funny racial stereotypes” and land at my post titled, ironically enough, Racial stereotypes ≠ funny.
  • whoever it was looking for “whole world should blow up audible voice quote” and landed here. I hope that was what they were looking for, and not something sinister sounding.

Searches that make me laugh include…

  • the poor guy looking for the answers to his relationship woes in Google by searching for “why cant meranda and i be together”

  • the hundred or so people who’ve searched for “stupid infomercials” and landed here.
  • ditto on the MXZ saw searches, which hit the same post.
  • the legions of teens who’ve been searching for guidance passing the manuverability portion of their driver’s test, which I blogged about in my discussion of parallel parking.
  • the person who searched for “dont go into journalism.” The post they hit was actually not about that at all. This is an example of a time where I wish I could directly respond to the person who was looking for serious career advice at the temple of Google. I’ll balance it out with the person who searched for “good things about journalist” and found me.
  • all the searches by people in pain looking for solace in my musings about the worst toothache ever. Usually these take the form of “toothache hurts brain” or “toothache worst pain.”
  • the person who could be my editor, for all he makes fun of my vocabulary, searching for “Like, you know, whatever” and landing on the post aptly named that. (And as an update, I am getting better at the like usage. But “whatever” is a hard word to quit. ;)

Random searches that keep popping up include…

  • people trying to translate bad language in Spanish, who hit the post where my sister replied with an explanation of a whole litany of Spanish insults for my knowledge.

  • people interested in “neat handwriting” or “beautiful handwriting” or some combination of those, which go back to my post about the world handwriting championship.
  • people looking for specific quotes by typing in the part they remember. I’d say this, by far, accounts for the most Google refers to my site. There isn’t one quote that outpaces any other, but there isn’t a day that goes by that at least one quote isn’t hit.

And now that I’ve brought all these topics back to the forefront, they’ll probably bring even more creepy, weird or funny searches my way. Whatever, it keeps me laughing. But seriously, who’s searching for information about me? That’s always going to freak me out.

MerandaWrites is blocked in China?

Monday, March 12th, 2007

So, I saw this post on E-Media Tidbits. Being curious, I decided to test the Great Firewall of China to see if my blog was blocked. To my surprise, apparently it is.

chinacensor.png

I’m not quite sure I did to offend the government, but I suspect maybe they just blanket block everything until it’s been approved? Or (look at the disclaimer on bottom) it could be a fluke. Either way, it’s kind of odd. I don’t know.

Want to know if you should feel censored as well? Type in your URL to see if you’re blocked as well.

QOTD: … educate our children in what no one knew yesterday …

Thursday, March 8th, 2007

“We are now at a point where we must educate our children in what no one knew yesterday, and prepare our schools for what no one knows yet.”
— Margaret Mead

Ding dong the paper clip’s dead

Sunday, February 18th, 2007

ding dong the paperclip's dead

Perhaps the most annoying feature of Microsoft Office was that stupid paper clip. Although I realize the little Einstein guy and the dog were essentially the same program, somehow it was less annoyingly helpful when it wasn’t “clippy.”

A few weeks ago, I was in a computer lab where the teacher was attempting to teach the kids to compose a letter. The little paper clip kept popping up on them, and you could hear her frustration when she tried to explain to the fourth graders: “If a little paper clip comes up, just ignore him.” Haha.

The comic is from userfriendly.org, but I saw it linked from Journalistopia.

Internship season!

Thursday, February 1st, 2007

It’s that time of year again. As spring semester starts rolling, the internship offers start trickling in.

No, not offers for me. (The one spring internship offer I did have came a day after I accepted my job. Though, it was an amazing offer, and I’m almost glad I didn’t have to choose between the job or that internship. I don’t know if I could have made the right decision.)

The offers are for my friends at Kent State. And I’m genuinely excited for each of them. (Genuinely jealous of a few, too.) A quick tally of those I know so far:

  • Ryan is coming to Indy this summer. (Yay for more Stater alums in Central Indiana!)
  • Abbey is interning at the J&C with me! (Even better than being in Indianapolis is being in Lafayette!)
  • Seth is headed to Lansing. (I’m sure I’ll be up for a few visits.)
  • Bryan is following Ryan’s footsteps and heading to Columbus. (Columbus isn’t that far from here.)
  • Brian got the Dow Jones copyediting internship. (As long as he stays away from “WTF” in headlines he’ll do well.)

There are others who know already, I’m sure. But those are just the ones I know of so far. I could probably Facebook sleuth and find out a few more, but even so not too bad a list. (Particularly since it brings almost all of them closer to me.)

Overheard in the office amusement

Thursday, January 11th, 2007

As some of you know, I keep a blog Overheard at KSU to track the crazy things people say at Kent State. I’ll continue taking submissions, but obviously as I will no longer be in Kent to hear random conversations, I’ll probably pass it on. Kali is already one of the posters, but I’ll probably solicit a few more Stater kin to keep it up.

The idea was based on Overheard in the Office, which is what this post is about. I just wanted to share some hilarious comments I saw on there for your amusement:

Receptionist #1: How could we have known what happened 10 thousand years ago if Jesus lived only two thousand years ago?
Receptionist #2: Because people before Jesus wrote things down in the Bible.
Receptionist #1: There were people before Jesus?

Young ad executive #1: Anybody want a Jamba Juice? Sam the intern is going to make a run.
Young ad executive #2: Yeah, but why are you getting a Jamba Juice? You just ate lunch.
Young ad executive #1: I don’t really want one, I just feel bad the intern has nothing to do.

Head trainer: Let’s face it, if you could be all that you could be, you wouldn’t be working here…
Class: [Silence.]
Trainee #1: [Applause.]
Trainees #2 and #3: [Applause.]

Managing editor on speakerphone: Do you know how to adjust columns in Excel?
Assistant: No…
Managing editor: What do you know?
Assistant: Um… I know that when a man and a woman get together, they —
Managing editor: —Come to my office.

Yeah. That’s my amusement for the day.

It would be kind of fun to start one of these collections of “Overheard in the Newsroom” because some funny stuff gets said. :) Maybe when I have some free time, I’ll do that.

A blah week…

Wednesday, January 10th, 2007

As I have nothing substantial to offer because my head is swirling… this will be a very random post with bullets of thoughts swarming my head:

  • HOW DID I MISS the annoucement of the long-awaited Apple iPhone?! I’m cell phone hunting and I practically have an Apple news feed to my brain. Somehow in my pain-induced seclusion this week, I missed hearing all about this. I definitely need to investigate.
  • Is it really that uncommon for a 21-year-old to have her wisdom teeth intact? I don’t know why everyone seems shocked to learn that I have my wisdom teeth. I have a big mouth. Plenty of room for more teeth to join the party. The first words of the dentist I saw today — not my normal dentist, who couldn’t see me until Friday, which um wasn’t going to work for me — were, “Oh, you still have your wisdom teeth?” Yes. But let’s stay on task. I know to join the Peace Corps you have to have them removed. But short of that or some major problem, I don’t plan to remove any more teeth for a good long time.
  • My face is swollen. And I can’t talk without pain. That’s probably the worst part. Not being able to talk to me is like not being able to breathe. It’s a vital part of who I am. Plus, it meant postponing dinner with my friends an extra day.
  • I just realized that my diploma will come a few days after I leave. So, it will probably be at least a few months before I see the $60,000+ piece of paper that doesn’t begin to sum up the fruits of my three and a half years at Kent State.
  • I should probably tell my biological father I am moving out of the state.
  • I’ve had an ongoing email exchange with a kid who has been thinking of transferring to Kent State for journalism. Today he said he’s made up his mind and will transfer next fall. I’m excited. Although I won’t be around when he arrives or probably ever meet him, judging by his drive already, I think he’ll enjoy the j-school and get a lot out of it.
  • Garrison Keillor is pretty funny. I bought his book Homegrown Democrat a few months ago, but I haven’t had time to read it. Here’s his Seven Rules for reading the paper. As he says of my generation hunched over laptops, “It is so lumpen, so sad that nobody has shown them that opening up a newspaper is the key to looking classy and smart.” Well, there you have it.
  • For those who recall my lamenting that it hasn’t snowed much this year, IT SNOWED last night/this morning. Although it was really just a dusting here, it was still snow. And yes, that excites me far more than it should. Unforunately, with the snow comes the cold…
  • My attempts to keep my inbox clean have failed. Already I have more than 50 unread e-mails. I try to keep them up. I just can’t read them as fast as they come in. I shall try a new tactic. I have put all the daily headlines e-mails into one filter. At the end of the day, if I haven’t read them I can just select that filter and delete, right? It’s not like I’m going to go back and read old headlines. If I missed it, I missed it. This will hopefully help keep my inbox slightly more tidy.

All right, that’s enough random babble. I’ll think of something more substantial to write about.