Things Are Listening

I just asked Siri (my iPhone) "when was Memorial Day in 1996?"

She gave one of these "here are some options, check it out" useless responses so I quickly typed into Google on my PC's browser "Memorial Day" and before I got any farther the first autofill it gave me was "1996."

Is that a coincidence? Of all the years before now it went to 1996? I don't think "Memorial Day 1996" could have been in my browser's history. But I've been writing about some things that went on around then so maybe it was. If not, it seems weird and uncanny and I don't like it, even if I know it was all done without any human intervention and no actual human behind the curtain cares what I was searching for.

POP cp When I Was Born

Just calculated that, when I was born, US population was only 54% of what it is today. 

World population was 38% of today's.

Not really sure why, but these numbers make me kind of nostalgic and kind of sad.

The Greenhouse Effect Strikes Again

From an article about ice fishers in New England having to pull their bobhouses off the ice earlier than in the past:

“I had to help pull out a bob-house out that fell in three years ago,” said Cutter, adding that a friend had built that house with a glass roof, which ended up turning it into a heating greenhouse that melted a hole in the ice beneath it.