Go Google Yourself

published November 4, 2010

in the Stockton Sentinel, 

Stockton, Kansas

     Sometime, just for giggles, google your name and see what you come up with. You're probably thinking I've got way too much time on my hands. I really did have a legitimate reason for beginning this little experiment, but I quickly forgot what the reason was as I got lost in all the gaggle.

     First of all, in 0.27 seconds, Google (which is a proper noun that evolved to a verb) found 358,000 results for "Nancy Becker." According to names.whitepages.com, there are 443 people in the United States who share my name.

     The collection of Nancy Beckers includes some colorful and prestigious individuals. While I didn't find a butcher, a baker or a candlestick maker, I did find doctors, lawyers, teachers and preachers. I found an artist who owns the website nancyebecker.com (she is even a Nancy E. Becker, like me, and writes her initials "NB" hooked together in one pen stroke, like I do!)

     Nancy Becker is a Nevada Supreme Court Justice, a dentist, a plastic surgeon, college professor, glass blower, dietician and an architect. Obviously the list would go on and on; I only scanned the first several pages of "hits" on Google.

     Then, as if I hadn't wasted enough time, I searched for "Nancy Becker" on Facebook, and found there are 358 other Nancy Beckers who are registered in the social network. That makes me think there must be more than 443 people in the United States who share the same name. I was tempted to invite them all to be my friends, just to see if I could get a collection of Nancy Beckers, but I was afraid it might cause an overload in the Facebook system and blow a fuse when someone would search for one of us.

     One interesting discovery was the Nancy Becker who is mentioned in Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. This colorful person is an American professional wrestler out of Pennsylvania who uses the ring name, "Annie Social." She regularly performs for Shimmer Women Athletes and Women Superstars Uncensored, and debuted in the Naked Women's Wrestling League in 2006. Say no more. 

     After about twenty minutes, I felt even better about who and where I am in life: Nancy Becker, the Stockton public housing director, and Nancy Becker, staff member of the Stockton Sentinel.