Is Your "Google Finger" Broken?

Greetings and welcome to 2010. We're living in a technological wonderland where you can look up anything from a wide array of different devices.  Knowing that, maybe it's about time we stop asking other people questions that we can answer ourselves much faster.

Now when I register my complaint about needless questioning, I'm not picking on people who are in the middle of some remote desert and just want directions to the nearest cactus.  I'm aiming squarely at colleagues who are sitting in front of the computer on the same high-speed network as I am with the same access to the internet.  That doesn't stop them from asking me, as an example, the name of that actor in some movie.   Sure, they'll "assist me" by providing some ridiculously vague information along the way as I fire up another browser tab.  They can't translate the "brain-pattern gibberish" in their heads into English, so it turns into a game of monotonous elimination (just like that game, "Guess Who?") until we figure out the answer.  What none of these offenders realize is that they can just get the answers themselves in a fraction of the time, with the added bonus of not interrupting my work-flow and not turning me into a wildly-firing cannon of sarcasm.

As bad as that is, I just love people who ask me for the time at work.   We're all quietly tooling away on our Windows-based computers until someone asks, "Hey, anyone know what time it is?"  Ummm....

That's what time it is, freak!

Another great technical achievement the entire world seems to ignore is built-in spell check.  The versatile tool isn't limited to fancy word processors anymore.  Almost every program that requires text-input (including email) has a little feature that underlines your spelling boners in shameful red.  Right-click and viola!  You have a list of likely replacements, usually including the one you want (unless you really spazzed out on the spelling).  Yet, people still feel the need to ask others how to spell fairly common words.  I left grade-school relieved, knowing I no longer had to be pressured into impromptu spelling bees.  Don't make me relive that horror, people. 

There are two arguments to discredit my rant that I will try to address right now.   The first one: "Maybe they aren't computer savvy."   Bull!  The needless questioning often occurs at work.   The job requires you to know how to use an internet browser.  If you can open up your work programs, you can easily cue up a search window and leave everyone else the hell alone with your inane, trivial curiosity.

Second: "Maybe they just want to make conversation."   Well, find something better to talk about!  It starts with someone asking about the weather.  Then I have to pull it up (because, again, their "Google Finger" is broken) and suddenly it turns into a discussion about how it ALWAYS rains (even though, in our area, it doesn't) and the funny things their cat does to sunbeams.  I wouldn't mind so much if I were allowed to slit my wrists at work while I'm hearing this crap, but the company frowns upon it. 

Am I being harsh?  No.  My mission in life is to help others help themselves through condescending ridicule. It's mean, I know, but it works.  I once got someone to stop using "you're" and "your" interchangeably with this award-winning method.  Now shes a success in life, slightly more attractive and her farts don't smell half as bad as they used to.

Unfortunately, with both my busy lifestyle and lazy lifestyle gobbling up my most of my free time, I no longer have time to educate and/or make others cry.  That's why I'm eternally grateful someone created an online tool that sums up the point I was trying to make much quicker and way better.

On an unrelated announcement: I am glad I was finally able to work the phrase "spelling boners" into a post.  My bucket list is one step closer to completion.