A New Addiction
Ok, word-junkies ... don't say you weren't warned. Thanks to David Vincenti, I have become enamored of GoogleWhacking (which is both less obscene and more dangerous than it sounds.) The goal is to enter any two words, sans quotation marks, into Google and get only one result.
Both words must be in Google's dictionary; you can tell if they are by looking in the upper righthand portion of the screen where it says "Results 1 - 1 of 1 for (say) venal bioluminsence"; both "venal" and "bioluminescence" will be blue and underlined (like this). Results from online dictionaries or any other type of word list are ineligible. The GoogleWhack site above has a provision to record your qualifying GoogleWhacks. This is actually a lot of fun, if a pernicious waste of time. I've found two today: "venal bioluminescence", as above, and "trenchant cloudberries".
In addition to forcing the players to reach into the more obscure alleys of their vocabularies, both the process and the results of other users on the official GoogleWhack list have the potential to reveal some intriguing juxtapositions. I'll take my poetry fodder wherever I can find it (she said, in an attempt to rationalize her habit...)
Later the same night ... we cannot stop, my preciousssss ... save us before we seach again. I forgot to say about the scoring method (for those who care about such things). Probably the easiest approach is to multiply the individual google hits for each word. For instance, "numberless pimientos" breaks down thusly: google hits for "numberless" = 198,000; google hits for "pimientos" = 194,000. 198,000 x 194,000 = 38,412,000,000.
Some of the more amusing recent entries from the official GoogleWhack register:
carpetbagger flummeries
evanescing sausages
fandango gristmills
campy persnicketiness
megalomaniacal hibernator
kibitzing wedgies
velvety grunions
Both words must be in Google's dictionary; you can tell if they are by looking in the upper righthand portion of the screen where it says "Results 1 - 1 of 1 for (say) venal bioluminsence"; both "venal" and "bioluminescence" will be blue and underlined (like this). Results from online dictionaries or any other type of word list are ineligible. The GoogleWhack site above has a provision to record your qualifying GoogleWhacks. This is actually a lot of fun, if a pernicious waste of time. I've found two today: "venal bioluminescence", as above, and "trenchant cloudberries".
In addition to forcing the players to reach into the more obscure alleys of their vocabularies, both the process and the results of other users on the official GoogleWhack list have the potential to reveal some intriguing juxtapositions. I'll take my poetry fodder wherever I can find it (she said, in an attempt to rationalize her habit...)
Later the same night ... we cannot stop, my preciousssss ... save us before we seach again. I forgot to say about the scoring method (for those who care about such things). Probably the easiest approach is to multiply the individual google hits for each word. For instance, "numberless pimientos" breaks down thusly: google hits for "numberless" = 198,000; google hits for "pimientos" = 194,000. 198,000 x 194,000 = 38,412,000,000.
Some of the more amusing recent entries from the official GoogleWhack register:
carpetbagger flummeries
evanescing sausages
fandango gristmills
campy persnicketiness
megalomaniacal hibernator
kibitzing wedgies
velvety grunions
posted by Jennifer at 7:20 PM
6 Comments:
Okay, I am more than proud. This is a fluke the likes of which I never expected. I got one on the very first try:
pyrolatrous plover
Now what would be googlewhacking in all the psossible meanings of the word would be getting your blog to come up as the only result.
Good lord, I should have heeded your warning.
Terminal Porcupine
I can't tell whether I should take credit or cover! I hope you're having fun. There is good poem fodder in this exercise, and it stretches your mind like a good logic puzzle.
By the way, can you believe "manatee accordionist" generates 63 hits? Must be a lot of squeezeboxes for armless aquatics out there. ("aquatic squeezeboxes": 3 hits).
Netty, talk about beginner's luck! I've never heard of "pyrolatrous" ... this is a word?
Greg, that would be easy to cheat ... just take one of your "no results" word combos and post them on your blog. Of course, "no results" for legit. words are pretty hard to achieve, too. Actually, I've been surprised how many of the hits on the more obscure word pairings are blogs. Quite a few online litmag archive results, too. I put in "noctilucent shards" just for fun, "shards" being a forbidden word in some poetry circles, and brought up a Josh Corey poem. Go fig.
Rebecca, I did try to warn you; that's a good one.
David, you don't need to leave town and change your name (at least not on my account). I'm limiting myself to three a day max. Like you said, the most amazing thing is how many hits you get on the weirdest words you know. I haven't found anything to go with "trebuchet" yet; it's just out there too much. And who knew there would be 371 hits for "pyrotechnic halibut"?
I found one on my first try too. But now I am hooked because I haven't found another!
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