2026 Yearly Forecast

The clever people at Merriam-Webster made a gif, perhaps you've seen it, where a bunch of words flash on the screen for an nth of a second, and you press pause at random, thereby choosing your Word for 2026. I saw words like joyful fly by, and content and revolutionary, but the word selected for me was mid, a sharp Gen Z word defined by M-W as "neither very good nor very bad: so-so, meh." Because my hope is unteachable, I was disappointed, yet, in my fear's opinion, mid is a wildly optimistic bar.

If we arrive at the end of 2026 saying, "all in all, that year was mid," it will be a champagne event. 1993 was a mid year, I would say. 2012 was mid. If 2026 can come anywhere near that standard, I'll dance on the roof.

So that's our goal. As individuals, the full gamut is available—you're allowed to have an excellent year! Truly! It's encouraged, even. But as a nation we're aiming for mid, and God help us.

As for the forecasty stuff:

• The groundhog will see its shadow.
• Tomatoes and peppers will go crazy, provided you have water.
• Ashton Kutcher will be back in the news.
• By the end of the year you'll own a pair of fur-lined clogs. (Faux fur, real wood)
• Inflation, you say?
• Cigarettes are back, baby!
• "The Love Boat" gets a gritty reboot.
• Invasive species won't be a problem, or not the problem.
• Separate theaters for Dems and Reps will show the same movies with different titles.
• Colonoscopy time for the 1981 crowd, who are still technically children.
• A big year for FM radio. You think I'm kidding.
• Green Bay Packers are the new Green Bay Packers.
• Nora's the new Rona.
• The tyranny of nutrition labels will finally end.
• Bill Gates disappears; maybe in hiding, maybe in prison, maybe on a desperate time-travel mission.
• The nation's eight remaining History majors will all win Nobels for the stuff they write this year.