Thursday, October 17, 2013

Googlewhack

I’m always searching for something.  We all are, but it happens to be my job.  With a world of information out there, finding what you want can be more difficult than finding a needle in a haystack.   (Use a strong magnet, be prepared to find many, tiny bits of bailing wire.)  It’s a life skill.  You have to know what subject headings to use, when to narrow your search, and when to broaden your search.  That’s why I was intrigued when my searching came across the word “Googlewhack”. 

A Googlewhack is a search consisting of two ordinary words without quotation marks, that returns exactly one hit.  I have never had a Googlewhack on Google, but when I looked at some of the subject headings in our Staff Picks books for kids and teens (Wood lice (Crustaceans) -- Juvenile fiction), I thought it could be a fun exercise to try in our catalog.  Go ahead, give it a shot.  Here are some word pairs to get you started.  Each will return one title in our catalog.

• movable papa
• snakebites orphans
• tundras blessings
• ex-convicts authorship
• rootless degradation

Mary Kretsch
Information Specialist

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