How I got suckered into "Going Bing" for a week

My cousin Raquel is like no one you've ever met - she's outgoing, energetic, motivated, passionate - and she has this way of talking me into things I would rather not be talked into.

Oh, and she works for Microsoft - which means that, with her personality, she has guzzled her company's Kool-Aid and regularly gets into PC vs Mac, Office vs Google Docs and even XBox 360 vs PS3 debates with me. And when she's had enough of my bashing, she usually invites me to put up or shut up, which is how she got me to host a Windows 7 preview party in my home last fall. (That's her running the demo in the picture.)

And now she's on my case again - this time about Bing.

We were talking on the phone yesterday about something not even remotely related to Microsoft or Google or Apple or even tech. But then she said something about a search that she "Binged" (instead of Googled) and I immediately muttered - without even thinking - some sort of "Oh, brother!" remark. Knowing me, she could picture my eyes rolling as I said it and went all interrogation room on me about why I thought Google was better, blah, blah, blah, and how Bing Maps was blah blah blah and how I would probably like a lot of things about Bing if I gave it more of a chance than just a few random searches to prep for another Microsoft-bashing blog post.

I told you she knows me. And she's feisty enough to call me out like that. She's been doing it since we were kids...

So, before you knew it, I had agreed to something crazy - again. I agreed to use Bing as my primary search engine for one week. I made some random excuse about not being able to do that because I use Google's Chrome browser as my primary one - and that the address/search bar automatically searches Google. She made me check the preferences of the browser and, yup, it can be changed - and it's now set to Bing.

And so I pacified her by agreeing and then went back to work and figured she'd forget about it in a few days and never hold me to it. But then she outed me on Facebook, a public declaration to hold me accountable and keep me honest. I wouldn't doubt if she went looking for this blog post first thing this morning. (I didn't tell her I was writing it.)

So, now that it's officially out there (and she'll surely be bugging me about "binging"), I will officially today start "binging" things, using Bing Maps, reading Bing news, and searching Bing images. I've even changed the default home page on my Android phone into Bing Mobile.

I knew I should have let her call yesterday go into voicemail... Just kidding, Rock.