2018 Was so Long We Forgot These Things Happened

Is it just me, or did 2018 feel like it was three years long? Seriously, there was such an insane amount of stuff going on, not just in the news cycle, but also in my personal life, that I feel like I've been through a heck of a lot in just 12 months. It's not a feeling that's particular to just me, because I know everyone else here on the Distractify staff feels the exact same way.

As a result, it's easy to forget some stories and trends that were kind of a big deal during these past 12 months. If you feel like taking a trip down memory lane to see what you definitely forgot about in 2018, take a look at this list.

Netflix's Lost in Space show was trending, not because it was a TV masterpiece, but because people were seriously hot-to-trot for the show's robot.

The "forbidden food" craze of Tide Pods started off as a joke that became a viral sensation when people thought teens were actually eating them, then teens actually started eating them as a result of the coverage. It wasn't long before people began vaping tide pod juice and the whole thing just became a ginormous mess.

I don't know about you, but it seems like it was five years ago when Justin Bieber was wearing this Beach Bum inspired romper and hanging out with Yodeling Kid at Coachella. He's already had a courtship and wedding since then!

I thought I really loved Hot Cheetos, but apparently not as much as the other Cyrus' ex-boyfriend.

A fake emergency notification sounded off on people's phones and state residents thought that there was a Pearl Harbor redux on their hands. There wasn't: just someone who messed up big time.

2018 is probably definitive proof that we're living in one of the bizarro dimension versions of earth, because I don't think there's a single person in the world who would have ever foreseeing Grimes — the deliciously weird indie-synth-art-pop musician who lived on a sinking boat at one point in her life — dating billionaire tech genius and Tesla creator Elon Musk.

Facebook's founder was looking super robotic at his congressional hearing and the memes were absolutely relentless.

Olympic athletes are amazing human specimens who dedicate their lives to breaking the boundaries of what our species can do. That being said, I think I, along with millions of other people, completely forgot the games took place this year.

The sexual misconduct allegations against Aziz Ansari highlighted by an article on Babe.net were a sore topic of discussion for many. Critics of the piece said that it "pushed" a narrative to paint Ansari in a bad light and detracted from the #MeToo movement.

2018's version of The Dress posed a simple question for netizens: do you hear "Laurel" or "Yanny" in this audio clip?

Rick & Morty's Szechuan Sauce inside joke sparked a ton of searches and media pieces online. And the once limited-release sauce that debuted to mark the arrival of Disney's Mulan in theaters returned to select McDonald's locations.

2018 has been an absolute turd-factory when it comes to film releases devoid of Marvel characters. Can you believe a third Fifty Shades movie and the Death Wish remake came out this year?

While it certainly doesn't belong anywhere on a list with the likes of Mute, Black Panther also came out this year. Doesn't it feel like you watched it two years ago? Too much Marvel. I'm telling you, they need to start spacing these films out.

No, the title of the graphic novel that this movie is based on isn't metaphoric at all: it pretty much sums up the entire plot of the movie. Furries around the world have never been happier.

A liquor store robber was a dead ringer for David Schwimmer. Schwimmer then got in on the joke, making even die-hard Ross-hater to chuckle. I'm sure it's kept the Friends star up at night, worrying if he had my approval all of these years.

The Flyers got themselves a new mascot and a viral meme-a-saurus was born, especially when Pittsburgh Penguins decided to Photoshop the terrifying, hairy being into random stock images. What they created was truly chilling, thanks for the nightmares, Benstonium.

Kim and Kanye welcomed a third amalgamation of their reproductive cells this year: Chicago West. Her "bounce-back body" from the pregnancy was so swift, I guess it was easy to ever forget she was pregnant in the first place. (She wasn't — she used a surrogate.)

Some of them were on point, others, were not.

Retailers Sears, Claire's, and Toys R' Us all filed for bankruptcy. Some of these closures hit people harder than others. 

Seems they forgot the fact she came from a super rich family who initially helped fund her launch into super stardom. Oh and people were even donating money to her at one point to make her the youngest female billionaire ever. Wow.

After calling it quits with Jennifer Garner, Ben Affleck did what lots of people do after getting out of a longtime relationship: he got a tattoo. It was one the internet delighted in roasting and, for some, enjoying without irony.

When I was a kid and extremely religious, there was one thing I prayed for every single day, for years, without fail: for God to kill all of the world's mosquitos without disrupting the global ecosystem. Scientists are now closer to that goal, so it looks like I should dust off that Quran again.

Remember the massive dumpster fire that was the Fyre Festival? Yeah it turns out the man who defrauded a bunch of people received his prison sentence back in October of this year: six years in prison. Let's hope he's not shacked up with any inmates who are big time EDM fans.