Thanks to Emily for turning me on to the latest silly Google meme to hit the web, searching for “(Name) is” on Google and posting pieces of the results. For instance, given the search “Karel is” I can retrieve these statements:

Karel is verziend.
Karel is awakened in bed when the newspaper – represented by a beeper – is thrown on the front porch of the house.
Karel is best known for his plays.
Karel is here to prove otherwise.
Karel is to take on the tedious taste of squirreling around the tree branches and picking up the lights (beepers).
Karel is a good medium for teaching such concepts but also has other virtues.
Karel is a graphical approach to programming, developed at Stanford for our CS introductory courses.
Karel is a published poet and writer.
Karel is an unselfish person, always ready to serve and give good advice.
Karel is a virgin, and when the beautiful, experienced Susan impulsively sleeps with him, he falls madly in love.
Karel is a very prominent community artist in North Wales.

Okay, those are the highlights from the first six pages worth of Google responses. Sadly, the “published poet and writer” is some other Karel. The other link is to a brief biography of the brothers Capek, one of whom is my namesake. Of the other statements, most are about something called “Karel the Robot.” If you’re conversant with the work of Karel Capek you’ll see how a robot came to share my first name.

I think I’ll get to that story some time soon. As annoying as my name can be, I’m delighted to have as a namesake the man who brought the word “robot” to the English language.