Newsflash; Today and One Hundred Years Ago

I spend a lot of time reading the news on the web, reading US, UK and Canadian sources(the sensible ones) so I thought I’d check out the Google News ‘favorite search’ list for today, 20th of August – to see what the hoi polloi is interested in.



I started with the letter A for Canada (English). Amy Winehouse is first, then Ayano Tokumasu,the poor girl who fell over fence at the Niagara Falls, apple, air canada and aecl which is a story related to Fukishuma, some rod provided by Canada, whereas in the UK, although Amy Winehouse is top search subject and comes up once or twice more in the top ten, Arsenal comes in second, Andy Murray, Amir Khan, aston villa, Amy Childs are also on the list. Hmm. Arsenal is a soccer team. I’ve read Fever Pitch. Andy Murray, wasn’t he on one of those Extras episodes?





Hmm. I spend a lot of time on the Guardian website, but I know none of these names. Wait, Andy Murray is a tennis player. (I didn’t watch the Rogers Canadian Open last week; too busy watching my savings go down, down down, up, down, UP UP, down down down. Who needed tennis? (Soon my cat will be watching CNBC.) Amy Childs is a person on Big Brother. So entertainment issues were tops here in the UK. I guess they need a break from the week or two of heavy duty news they just endured.



( In the US for the letter Amy Winehouse, apple, Anderson Cooper, android, Amanda Knox,Antoinette Stephen, amateur radio,amazon and yes, Arsenal. Was the team bought by US concern? I wonder….. No. Hmm. Well, I know who Anderson Cooper is, and I know amazon, but why amateur radio? Checked, can’t see why it comes up so high. Amanda Knox is involved in a murder trial. and Anoinette Stephen is another murder story. Very taboid interests!



Oh, and since I live in French Canada, I checked their 10 ten news searches. Yes, Amy Winehouse first. Algerie, apple, ashton kutcher (who according to headline, forgets the details of his investments, and angelina jolie who is buying a house with Brad Pitt in England. At least they can afford it but how is this news? So what? Like I fed the cat this morning.



The fact that I just had to check the spelling of these two pretty folks’s names, says something about me. Then Android. What is Android? I ask, sounding like one of the bubble-headed beauties in the first Star Trek..Oh, something to to with Google.



burundi, bombardier, barak obama,bute, bell, bourse, black keys, britney spears, beyonce.. (I’m using this as a memory exercise, since I can’t keep both windows open together. I am NOT good at this. I can keep three items in my brain at best. I keep having to go back. Scary, since I think this is similar to a test they give for Alzheimer’s. Note to self: Must practice more memory games!)



That’s the B’s for French Canada. Bourse is the Stock Market. It's also the word for purse, as in "je n'ai rien dans ma bourse." I bet that’s been one the the favourites in all Western Countries all week.



English Canada: blue jays, big brother Blackberry, brad richards.bluesfest, brad griffith, bombardier



UK: big brother, bbc sport, big brother 2011, bbc, bbcnews, (and they want to cut back on BBC funding?) beyonce, beckham, british open, borders, black ops, boeing.beyonce bachman, breaking bad then, funny enough, betty ford, brett favre



US: bank of america, booton shooting, burger king



and a random letter for fun: (I close my eyes and touch the keyboard)…mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.
memphis 3, murdoch, machbook air, mumbai, mexico, memphis three, mobile, that’s the US for M.



The UK..man utd, that’s Manchester United for cool people, mata, manchester united ,for boring people, madeline mccann (another alleged sighting) murdoch, metsut ozil, man city, modric (whaaa?)Manchester City, Michael Jackson



Canada Anglais: Montreal, Maple Leafs, Murdoch, mac book air, Mayor Rob Ford, Mumbai.. why Montreal? Did something happen here? OH, our major cities all show up tops in their letter.
Canada French:maroc, martine obry, monaco, meteo, mylene farmer, messi, marseilles, mercato,mesut ozil (who is a footballer.)



Oh, and I noticed, these ‘favorites’ change pretty fast.



I don’t know what this proves… a sliver of a sample…..My top news searches would not fall into any of these catagories.. but that’s because I am an English Canadian living in Quebec. We just don’t fit in anywhere.



I guess I’ll get back to living in the past, 100 years ago as I write Edith’s Story, about a young woman and the suffragettes in 1910, which is a follow up to Threshold Girl www.tighsolas.ca/page10.pdf.pdf about a college student in 1910. L. P. Hartley wrote that the Past in a Foreign Country, but he’s wrong, I think. It’s familiar territory as human nature is very predictable.



I’ve spent a lot of time reading era newspapers, especially the Montreal Gazette. People’s interests, when it comes to the news, has really not changed much. The big difference, Minister’s Sermons and lectures aren’t reported on in the newspaper any more. (I’m glad they were, for this is very useful to me as I write this book about Presybeterian women, after all.



The Home Secretary, in 1910, (I think it was Winston Churchill) sure came down on the suffragettes, in much the same way Prime Minister David Cameron (who was No. 4 on the news list, after David Haye, David Tennant, and NO. 1 the Duchess of Cambridge, has come down on this year’s rioters in England, the education-fee protesters and the unemployed youth looters of last week.



I think Mr. Churchill used the same confrontation rhetoric against any threat: women who rallied for the vote and broke a window or two; skinny Indians who promoted peaceful resistance; and the Third Reich. Churchill’s tone was appropriate for the war years, at least, and he was voted The Greatest Briton of the Century for it.



Yes, no reporter has to sit through a sermon anymore, thank GOODNESS..The clergy has no clout today… but then, with Perry prayer vigils and the Tea Party people, maybe it’s deja vu all over again..