This spring, many entities will be emerging: vaccinated people beginning a slow return to something like normalcy, and literally billions of cicadas. They’re called Brood X and they’ve been underground since 2004, and now it is their time to emerge and sing, then cover the ground with their carcasses.
I know you are wondering: Which group do I belong to? This handy quiz will help.
Check all that apply:
- You haven’t had any contact with friends or other members of your generation in what feels like 17 years.
- You have lost all sense of how to interact with others, if indeed you ever possessed it.
- You are no longer a prisoner to conventional beauty standards, if indeed you ever were.
- You are not wearing pants and resent the implication that you will ever be asked to wear hard pants again, unsure how the geometry of that would even work.
- A scientist quoted in the New York Times has described you, unprompted, as “really big and awkward.”
- Your singing has been described as “cacophonous” and “shrill."
- You have never successfully made sourdough.
- You would be stressed if asked to send a complicated email.
- You are truly uncertain what year it is.
- 2004′s pop icons feel very present to you.
- A stranger saw you shuffling along the sidewalk making noises to yourself and took their dog to the other side of the street to avoid you.
- You are excited to come out from your comfortable burrow when the weather gets into the low 80s.
- You have bulging, red eyes.
- Your entire dating strategy is that you are going to put yourself out there and make some loud noises and you hope someone who comes along will like it.
- When you get together with the guys, your volume can reach 105 decibels, louder than a lawn mower!
- If you somehow got into an office, you’d be upset and confused and would want to get out immediately.
- You look forward to mating at some point before you die.
Answer key: Your guess is as good as mine! Good luck out there!
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