Just a guess based on "covid" and "candles", a ton of people negatively reviewed candles for not smelling good/right/at all, not realizing they had lost their sense of smell from covid at the time.
I know my spouse had the realization our cold was covid because we couldn't smell the candles we had bought (and smelled) the week before.
I had been a bit sick and I had the realization when I went to sniff some weed and I couldn't smell it. I'd been able to smell earlier in the day and it was a weird realization. I went around and sniffed everything I could hoping to get a whiff
It was extremely bizarre. I've had muted sense of smell and taste because of a sickness but never an absence of the sense
Conversely I woke up in the middle of the night with a cold and couldn't smell Vick's VapoRub, which usually has an extremely strong menthol scent.
I got tested, talked to a doctor, and didn't have COVID. It's possible we lose our sense of smell sometimes with other types of colds too, but we never noticed because we didn't panic about it.
The weird thing is also what happens to taste of you lose your sense of smell. You can still feel the texture of the food, but it doesn't taste like much. One of the weirdest things I have experienced as a result of a virus.
For some reason vinegar, something I normally love, turned into this nasty acrid chemically taste and smell I can't even begin to explain. It's happened two times that I've lost my smell from covid.
I now give some ketchup a sniff as my early litmus test when I'm starting to get sick to check for covid lol.
I experimented with a bunch of foods and food-safe strong smelling/tasting things. Even spicy was knocked out which surprised me. I would have thought that would have remained unaffected
That was one of the few times in life I've really been concerned about my quality of life if the effects were permanent
Like, I've thought about "what if I lost my sight/hearing/limbs" but taste and smell never really occurred to me. But it was truly life altering and I really considered what I'd do if I didn't get those senses back
Oh yeah that was absolutely affected as well. I couldn't taste anything for a few days. I don't remember specifically how long I couldn't taste or smell, this was 4.5 years ago. That was the first time, early 2021. Subsequent bouts have not done that to me (unfortunately I work in an environment where people come in sick and pass it along. I've gotten covid many times and it makes me upset every time)
But yeah, eating became an even more unpleasant task. I pretty much do it because I have to but I try to make it enjoyable; but when you only have texture to work with then that becomes very difficult
Yankee candle rating dropped sharply (or at least statistically significant) during covid with reviews of them being negative because they had little to no smell.
Loss of smell being a covid symptom.
Edit: oh and yeah it would go up and down based on larger outbreaks. So it followed the early waves of mass outbreaks basically 1:1
Don't give us too much credit just yet. Dinosaurs were around for about 180 million years.
Our earliest ancestors are about 2 million years ago, our closest ancestors are about 300,000 years and our actual ancestors who are like us are only about 50,000 years.
We're still just a tiny blip in earth's history and if we wipe ourselves out, it'll be pretty hard for any future archaeologist to figure out who we were and what we did, or even to know that we were even here.
Sure, but forget 50 kiloyears. Just considering the events of the last century is sufficient to make me marvel that we haven't sterilized ourselves -- and the rest of the planet. But, as you say, it's early days yet. I'm sure we'll manage to irrevocably cock it up any moment now.
That too, yeah. There's plenty of options. It's like once humanity heard of the Great Filter concept, the response was to collectively go: "Yes, but are we absolutely sure we've discovered all the anthropogenic causes? Maybe we should explore that some more. The best learning is by doing, you know?"
What about our megafauna extinctions, nuclear tests, mass biosphere degradation and destruction, the Anthropocene extinction event, the fish bones of 2-6 trillion fish we torture to death every year, the bones of trillions of monstrous chickens, anthropogenic climate change, plastic... and soon the upcoming anthropogenic climate-change cascade and the Anthropocene mass-extinction event?
The sheer volume of microplastics that will be in our respective layer of rock stratigraphy will be unmistakable evidence that some rather stupid species was here.
man what ever species rises next will be stoked to find out what kind of super fossil fuels you get when you lay down a bed of petrochemicals, then lay literally all our organic matter on top, then cover with more petrochemicals and bake at runnaway global warming temps for 200million years.
Thanks. I guess there's nothing for it but to venture deep into the woods at night, alone and carrying only a high-power laser pointer and a large sign reading "for the love of everything pure and good, abduct me!"
This is a bit misleading, I would bet most of the searches where something like "How to watch the eclipse without getting your eyes hurt". Notice that the search data started days before the eclipse.
I had like 5 seconds of panic because there was a gray spot in my vision after I accidentally looked at a baileys bead completely unfiltered through my telescope the second the eclipse ended. Turns out I just had a smudge on my glasses :P
I definitely held on to the very last dazzle, maybe one dazzle more than I should have, and I had to get reading glasses within 8 months. But I also just hit 42 so I'm guessing it's that.
To my understanding, as you age, the lenses become less flexible and harder to focus, making it more difficult to see text up close. Retinal damage from the sun, on the other hand, would burn spots in your retina that would leave little blind spots that are uncorrectable by glasses.
You can rest assured you probably don't have significant damage from the eclipse, but instead, your body, like all of our bodies, is slowly deteriorating with the ever marching passage of time.
Never a day goes by that I don’t feel thankful for your kindness. Grateful beyond words for the warmth you bring into my life. Giving your time and care means more than I can say. Your presence reminds me how beautiful life can be. Under every circumstance, I’m thankful for you.
To be clear all, while funny this is a meme. For both medical reasons “eye pan isn’t a thing for this”, and Google own public search data availability. This isn’t real.
Also correlates roughly to people going "totality bro, absolutely life change. Totality. Wow. Totality." In every conversation for an entire fucking month before never bringing it up again.
I looked at it with no regret bc I'm just old enough to know some experiences are worth whatever happens bc of them, and just young enough to not be clutching my pearls about the state of my body.
It was gorgeous. The sky was cloudy, but a ring of clouds opened up around it lit up by a rainbow ring. I'll never forget it even if I go blind bc of it. I was in the perfect spot.
I don’t buy it. The sun is dangerous because you don’t feel pain when it damages your retina. So if people actually googled it, they suffered from nocebo.
But looking at bright light still hurts your eyes. When I go from my dark bedroom to my bathroom with an Eastward facing window with the sun coming in full blast it hurts my eyes. Also nothing about the search says anything about retina damage specifically.
There's a difference between immediate feedback and delayed, not to mention that pain doesn't actually need existing neurons, it can fire solely on the CNS not receiving signals it was expecting like in phantom limb
Tldr meh, maybe
Go look at the sun and tell us if you get a headache
The people who live there are members of humanity. As you can see, the humans not on the totality line mostly didn't hurt their eyes. that probably is true for the rest of humanity. this post is about the humans on the line though
Would you prefer the post be entitled "Humanity that stares at the sun during totality never cease to amaze me" and kill what tiny semblance of a joke is there?
People from other countries also know how eclipses work, not just people from the US. In any case, it's not a good metric to use when deciding what country someone is from.
What's the story about that?
Just a guess based on "covid" and "candles", a ton of people negatively reviewed candles for not smelling good/right/at all, not realizing they had lost their sense of smell from covid at the time.
I know my spouse had the realization our cold was covid because we couldn't smell the candles we had bought (and smelled) the week before.
I had been a bit sick and I had the realization when I went to sniff some weed and I couldn't smell it. I'd been able to smell earlier in the day and it was a weird realization. I went around and sniffed everything I could hoping to get a whiff
It was extremely bizarre. I've had muted sense of smell and taste because of a sickness but never an absence of the sense
Conversely I woke up in the middle of the night with a cold and couldn't smell Vick's VapoRub, which usually has an extremely strong menthol scent.
I got tested, talked to a doctor, and didn't have COVID. It's possible we lose our sense of smell sometimes with other types of colds too, but we never noticed because we didn't panic about it.
When was this? For the first year and a half or so, the more commonly used test kits had something like a 40% false negative rate.
I don't recall. But I took the pharmacy test too, the more accurate one.
I had this twice, the first time was at least 25 years ago.
The weird thing is also what happens to taste of you lose your sense of smell. You can still feel the texture of the food, but it doesn't taste like much. One of the weirdest things I have experienced as a result of a virus.
I tried tasting vinegar to check if I still could, but nothing.
For some reason vinegar, something I normally love, turned into this nasty acrid chemically taste and smell I can't even begin to explain. It's happened two times that I've lost my smell from covid.
I now give some ketchup a sniff as my early litmus test when I'm starting to get sick to check for covid lol.
I experimented with a bunch of foods and food-safe strong smelling/tasting things. Even spicy was knocked out which surprised me. I would have thought that would have remained unaffected
That was one of the few times in life I've really been concerned about my quality of life if the effects were permanent
Like, I've thought about "what if I lost my sight/hearing/limbs" but taste and smell never really occurred to me. But it was truly life altering and I really considered what I'd do if I didn't get those senses back
Oh yeah that was absolutely affected as well. I couldn't taste anything for a few days. I don't remember specifically how long I couldn't taste or smell, this was 4.5 years ago. That was the first time, early 2021. Subsequent bouts have not done that to me (unfortunately I work in an environment where people come in sick and pass it along. I've gotten covid many times and it makes me upset every time)
But yeah, eating became an even more unpleasant task. I pretty much do it because I have to but I try to make it enjoyable; but when you only have texture to work with then that becomes very difficult
I realised I had it when I tried to drink my morning coffee and it tasted rancid because I had no smell
Yankee candle rating dropped sharply (or at least statistically significant) during covid with reviews of them being negative because they had little to no smell.
Loss of smell being a covid symptom.
Edit: oh and yeah it would go up and down based on larger outbreaks. So it followed the early waves of mass outbreaks basically 1:1
Which is wild in retrospect because holy shit they smell SO strongly.
What's more surprising to me is that there's a big enough stream of reviews for a candle to see this effect.
People are extremely opinionated on scented candles it seems.
I tend to wake up every morning amazed that: A) We're generally still here and B) I'm specifically still here. Then the disappointment hits.
Don't give us too much credit just yet. Dinosaurs were around for about 180 million years.
Our earliest ancestors are about 2 million years ago, our closest ancestors are about 300,000 years and our actual ancestors who are like us are only about 50,000 years.
We're still just a tiny blip in earth's history and if we wipe ourselves out, it'll be pretty hard for any future archaeologist to figure out who we were and what we did, or even to know that we were even here.
Sure, but forget 50 kiloyears. Just considering the events of the last century is sufficient to make me marvel that we haven't sterilized ourselves -- and the rest of the planet. But, as you say, it's early days yet. I'm sure we'll manage to irrevocably cock it up any moment now.
I mean climate change might've already done it. Just need to wait 500-1000 years for the full effects to all take place.
That too, yeah. There's plenty of options. It's like once humanity heard of the Great Filter concept, the response was to collectively go: "Yes, but are we absolutely sure we've discovered all the anthropogenic causes? Maybe we should explore that some more. The best learning is by doing, you know?"
Dinosaurs is a clade, not a species. Humans belong to the clades hominoids and simians, which have been around for 13 and 42 million years.
What about our megafauna extinctions, nuclear tests, mass biosphere degradation and destruction, the Anthropocene extinction event, the fish bones of 2-6 trillion fish we torture to death every year, the bones of trillions of monstrous chickens, anthropogenic climate change, plastic... and soon the upcoming anthropogenic climate-change cascade and the Anthropocene mass-extinction event?
The sheer volume of microplastics that will be in our respective layer of rock stratigraphy will be unmistakable evidence that some rather stupid species was here.
man what ever species rises next will be stoked to find out what kind of super fossil fuels you get when you lay down a bed of petrochemicals, then lay literally all our organic matter on top, then cover with more petrochemicals and bake at runnaway global warming temps for 200million years.
You find yourself on the planet of half-intelligent disaster hominids.
Ganbatte, xxce2AAb.
Thanks. I guess there's nothing for it but to venture deep into the woods at night, alone and carrying only a high-power laser pointer and a large sign reading "for the love of everything pure and good, abduct me!"
^(I^ ^consent^ ^to^ ^reasonable^ ^amounts^ ^of^ ^probing)^
Relevant song
That's a bop, thanks :)
I was in the path of totality and there were so many glasses available to everyone around its hard to believe this.
Ofc my sun is a pussy....
Okay you had to pick the stupidest person on earth.
Bet you he googled it though. Bet you.
I don't know "eyes" is a difficult word to spell.
This is a bit misleading, I would bet most of the searches where something like "How to watch the eclipse without getting your eyes hurt". Notice that the search data started days before the eclipse.
I had like 5 seconds of panic because there was a gray spot in my vision after I accidentally looked at a baileys bead completely unfiltered through my telescope the second the eclipse ended. Turns out I just had a smudge on my glasses :P
I definitely held on to the very last dazzle, maybe one dazzle more than I should have, and I had to get reading glasses within 8 months. But I also just hit 42 so I'm guessing it's that.
To my understanding, as you age, the lenses become less flexible and harder to focus, making it more difficult to see text up close. Retinal damage from the sun, on the other hand, would burn spots in your retina that would leave little blind spots that are uncorrectable by glasses.
You can rest assured you probably don't have significant damage from the eclipse, but instead, your body, like all of our bodies, is slowly deteriorating with the ever marching passage of time.
Have a nice weekend, stanger!
100% true. Can’t also forget about nearly everyone getting cataracts by the time they’re in their 60’s!
Why does the data for eyes hurt start before the eclipse even happened?
People kept looking at the sun to check if it was eclipsing yet.
You gotta get familiar with what it normally looks like, otherwise you wont understand how different and special it looks when it eclipses
Surely it's just the sum of searches during that period, just to cover the interval. 🤷♂️
People were practicing daily to build up an immunity.
Because in preparation for the eclipse, people were searching for ways to prevent hurting their eyes.
human race = Muricans
ok
Plenty of stupid people everywhere.
Can confirm.
Humans do live in America, you are correct
and this is your leader
Use of the term leader there is a stretch
Yeah. Unfortunately he counts as human too
Couldn't the search be, how do I see the eclipse without hurting my eyes?
That search query would be sent right after looking directly at it
Definitely has to be pretty low in Buffalo NY...
...since it was fucking OVERCAST!
FML
Same in Toronto. I wonder what the results would be like from Sherbrooke, since we had crystal clear skies there.
... I feel like you teased me with a rickroll & then in fact left me hanging all deserted, intentionally.
Well done!
Never a day goes by that I don’t feel thankful for your kindness.
Grateful beyond words for the warmth you bring into my life.
Giving your time and care means more than I can say.
Your presence reminds me how beautiful life can be.
Under every circumstance, I’m thankful for you.
....
What was happening in Yuma back then, though.
smog. prob from wild fires.
Have you ever been to Yuma?
God bless the USA! ?
Worth.
To be clear all, while funny this is a meme. For both medical reasons “eye pan isn’t a thing for this”, and Google own public search data availability. This isn’t real.
But it’s a good chuckle.
I mean if the president looks straight at an eclipse without any eye protection...
Can’t use Americans as a litmus for humanity
That wasn't a problem where I live, it was totally overcast that day. Though I'm sure it would have had the sun been visible.
More like Americans never cease to amaze me
Americans, you mean.
Yes. Last I checked, Americans are also humans
If you look at humans as dumb apes, you will never be amazed, except for the few times we do impressive and intelligent feats.
Also correlates roughly to people going "totality bro, absolutely life change. Totality. Wow. Totality." In every conversation for an entire fucking month before never bringing it up again.
😂
Means we've only got one shot at this. Let's do our best to make it count. I hope you're having an ok day :)
I looked at it with no regret bc I'm just old enough to know some experiences are worth whatever happens bc of them, and just young enough to not be clutching my pearls about the state of my body.
It was gorgeous. The sky was cloudy, but a ring of clouds opened up around it lit up by a rainbow ring. I'll never forget it even if I go blind bc of it. I was in the perfect spot.
I'm sure your grandkids will appreciate that when you tell them why you don't know what they look like
No kids. Had a tubal litigation. Would never adopt.
I don't have to prepare for, or be scared of, the future the same way ppl with kids do thankfully
I don’t buy it. The sun is dangerous because you don’t feel pain when it damages your retina. So if people actually googled it, they suffered from nocebo.
But looking at bright light still hurts your eyes. When I go from my dark bedroom to my bathroom with an Eastward facing window with the sun coming in full blast it hurts my eyes. Also nothing about the search says anything about retina damage specifically.
There's a difference between immediate feedback and delayed, not to mention that pain doesn't actually need existing neurons, it can fire solely on the CNS not receiving signals it was expecting like in phantom limb
Tldr meh, maybe
Go look at the sun and tell us if you get a headache
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e0h67-88k7E
Futurama:
I believe that's because only north America experienced totality for that eclipse (along that line).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_eclipse_of_April_8,_2024
The people who live there are members of humanity. As you can see, the humans not on the totality line mostly didn't hurt their eyes. that probably is true for the rest of humanity. this post is about the humans on the line though
Would you prefer the post be entitled "Humanity that stares at the sun during totality never cease to amaze me" and kill what tiny semblance of a joke is there?
People from other countries also know how eclipses work, not just people from the US. In any case, it's not a good metric to use when deciding what country someone is from.
Thoughtless responses, duly noted.
You're welcome!
We may take #1, but there are stupid people everywhere. Trust me.
This is one of those maps that's just a map of US population density...
Seattle, Portland, Atlanta and Denver famously being uninhabited wasteland right?
Ah yes, correctly highlighting the megalopolises of Yuma and Mexicali, and excluding backwaters such as Los Angeles and Miami