It started innocently enough. My good friend, the ever-anonymous Washwords, sent me an IM through Gmail chat. I missed it because I had logged out for a nanosecond half an hour, but it showed up in my Gmail, because Google is cool that way, and here is what it said:
hey… i can’t remember. were we supposed to have lunch today? i can’t. argh. how about NEXT week (m or w)?
I replied to her via Gmail.
Me either, that’s OK though… Next week should be good - is Mon OK? Where do you wanna meet? Let me know.
An uncharacteristically brief communication for both of us. And really, what more needed to be said.
But then I glanced over to the right, to Gmail’s sponsored links. Gmail provides their users with these helpful links, which are generated based on message content (they call it “context-sensitive”), with the hope that you will click on through to the other side. Sometimes, they actually seem relevant, and you think to yourself, those crazy kids over at Google are sure some kind of geniuses, but other times? Raise your hands, Gmail users, if you’ve experienced shock and dismay at what you see over there.
Context is, as they say, everything. From our unusually quick exchange about a possible lunch date next week, the almighty algorithms apparently gleaned quite enough about me, making some mighty big assumptions that generated these four text ads:
5 Tips to Lose Belly Fat
Stop making these 5 mistakes & you will finally lose your belly fat!
Trouble Losing Belly Fat?
6 Shocking Facts You Need to Know About Losing Belly Fat…
1 Trick to Lose Belly Fat
I struggled for years with a fat belly, until I found this 1 secret.
Start a Lunch Truck Bus.
Plan, Start and Operate a Lunch Truck Business
Waidaminnit. Seventy-five percent of the ads about my BELLY FAT? How do they know I have belly fat, and how dare they assume I want to get rid of it? True, I have never loved my belly fat, but that’s none of their bidness. Are they serious? They need to recalibrate their algorithm.
“Start a Lunch Truck Bus” – perhaps this was a helpful suggestion for where my friend and I should rendezvous for lunch? Because I was kind of thinking of Baja Fresh, or maybe Moby Dick’s. You know, something with, oh, I dunno, SEATS. But on the other hand? A lunch truck hot dog with a little bag of chips and a can of soda? Mmmm, that sounds tasty. Belly Fat, be damned.
That was all amusing enough, but here’s where Google went out on the proverbial limb and took a huge leap, for this is what appeared below the four text ads:
More about…
Supposed to Make You Happy »
Where Im Supposed to Be »
Not Supposed to Break Down »
Speed Racer Lunch Box »
I suppose “supposed” is a Money Word. Supposed to Make You Happy? Well, yes, lunch always makes me happy. Where Im [sic] Supposed to Be? At noon, I’m supposed to be at lunch, preferably with friends. Not Supposed to Break Down? DUH. Speed Racer Lunch Box?
[Wait. Did she say Speed Racer Lunch Box?]
And just that quickly, I was transported back to elementary school, when my classmate Becky1 would carry her lunch every single day to school in a shiny metal Scooby Doo lunchbox. For like all fifteen years of elementary school. (It’s funny what you remember, isn’t it?) You had your packers and your buyers. I was usually a buyer, but I did not love the cafeteria food. Some of it was OK, like pizza Thursdays, but the reconstituted mashed potatoes? The gristle ham patties? Not so much. But Becky1 had a baloney sandwich with a piece of fruit and some cookies, every single day, thanks to her cool lunchbox.
Maybe if they had been serving up some Baja Fresh in my cafeteria, or perhaps cuisine from a Lunch Truck, I would have been more enthusiastic. Of course, Baja Fresh, not a Lunch Truck, is most likely responsible for at least some of my belly fat. Still, Baja Fresh is Supposed to Make [Me] Happy, because it’s Where Im Supposed to Be.
1 Not not her real name.