It’s another Road Trip Wednesday!

And, oh YA Highway, this is a topic after my own heart! How I love the random! How I love researching the random!  So needless to say, I was delighted by today’s question:

What’s the weirdest thing you’ve ever researched?

First, of all, as I mentioned above, I love research. The Husband refers to me as the Sponge, or l’eponge, because he likes to sound French and sophisticated. This is not because I am soft and mushy but because I love to absorb information.  It’s a delight to me.

To that end, the freelance writing I’ve been doing for the past few years has included some seriously strange stuff. Just a few of the topics include:

• Industrial materials recycling
• Food miles and sustainability
• Agricultural extension programs
• Gender and learning styles
• Green building materials

Needless to say, the learning curve was pretty steep on some of these.

But when it comes to fiction writing…well, the research is even more random. The real question is how the hell anyone ever did anything without Google.  A recent look at my Google history includes:

• Marine mammals of northern California
• Baby names with ocean meanings
• edible seaweed
• gills
• Extreme surfing spots Australia
• do bubbles happen underwater without air?*

*this last one is continuing to stymie me and I will need to take a bath tonight and duck underwater to see exactly how bubbles work…

Anyway, this is definitely one of my favorite things about my job – both the paid and unpaid parts. Random research FTW! What about you? What’s the weirdest thing you’ve ever typed into your Google?