 It was a confluence of magnificent proportions that led six agents from the joint terrorism task force to knock on my door Wednesday morning. Michele Catalano, who lives in Long Island, New York, said her web searches for pressure cookers, her husband's hunt for backpacks and her "news junkie" son's craving for information on the Boston bombings had combined somewhere in the internet ether to create a "perfect storm of terrorism profiling". In her first post, Catalano, a writer for indie music and politics magazine Death and Taxes wrote: 
 
 What happened was this: At about 9:00 am, my husband, who happened to be home yesterday, was sitting in the living room with our two dogs when he heard a couple of cars pull up outside. He looked out the window and saw three black SUVs in front of our house; two at the curb in front and one pulled up behind my husband’s Jeep in the driveway, as if to block him from leaving. Six gentleman in casual clothes emerged from the vehicles and spread out as they walked toward the house, two toward the backyard on one side, two on the other side, two toward the front door. A million things went through my husband’s head. None of which were right. He walked outside and the men greeted him by flashing badges. He could see they all had guns holstered in their waistbands. “Are you [name redacted]?” one asked while glancing at a clipboard. He affirmed that was indeed him, and was asked if they could come in. Sure, he said. They asked if they could search the house, though it turned out to be just a cursory search. They walked around the living room, studied the books on the shelf (nope, no bomb making books, no Anarchist Cookbook), looked at all our pictures, glanced into our bedroom, pet our dogs. They asked if they could go in my son’s bedroom but when my husband said my son was sleeping in there, they let it be. At this point, Catalano said, the police were "peppering my husband with questions". Where are his parents from? They asked about me, where was I, where do I work, where do my parents live. Do you have any bombs, they asked." The story later took on a different complexion when police finally explained that the investigation was prompted by searches a family member had made for pressure cooker bombs and backpacks made at his former workplace. Catalano said the family member was her husband. Can you make a bomb with that? My husband said no, my wife uses it to make quinoa. What the hell is quinoa, they asked. "By this point they had realised they were not dealing with terrorists," Catalano said. In a statement, the office of the county's police commissioner said: 
 
 Suffolk County criminal intelligence detectives received a tip from a Bay Shore-based computer company regarding suspicious computer searches conducted by a recently released employee. That’s when I felt a sense of creeping dread take over. What else had I looked up? What kind of searches did I do that alone seemed innocent enough but put together could make someone suspicious? Were they judging me because my house was a mess (Oh my god, the joint terrorism task force was in my house and there were dirty dishes in my sink!). Mostly I felt a great sense of anxiety. Where you have no expectation of privacy. Long Island resident said her web search history and 'trying to learn how to cook lentils' prompted a visit from authorities but police say search was prompted by tipoff 
 
 A New York woman says her family's interest in the purchase of pressure cookers and backpacks led to a home visit by six police investigators demanding information about her job, her husband's ancestry and the preparation of quinoa. Where you have to watch every little thing you do because someone else is watching every little thing you do. All I know is if I’m going to buy a pressure cooker in the near future, I’m not doing it online. I’m scared. And not of the right things. In a new post on her Tumblr on Thursday, Catalano said: "We found out through the Suffolk police department that the searches involved also things my husband looked up at his old job. We were not made aware of this at the time of questioning and were led to believe it was solely from searches from within our house."
– So you're interested in learning to cook lentils; your news-junkie son has been reading about the Boston Marathon bombings; and your husband is shopping around for a new backpack. It's the "perfect storm of terrorism profiling," writes Michele Catalano, and it's what got Catalano and her family visited by six police officers with guns (the Long Island woman describes them as "agents from the joint terrorism task force"), she says. Catalano had been researching pressure cookers, so when the officers showed up Wednesday morning, they asked her very confused husband if the family owned a pressure cooker. "My husband said no, but we have a rice cooker. Can you make a bomb with that? My husband said no, my wife uses it to make quinoa. What the hell is quinoa, they asked," Catalano recounts in a Medium.com post picked up by the Guardian. After completing a casual search of the house and determining they were not dealing with terrorists, the officers left. Catalano, not home at the time, was shaken: "This is where we are at. Where you have no expectation of privacy. Where trying to learn how to cook some lentils could possibly land you on a watch list. Where you have to watch every little thing you do because someone else is watching every little thing you do." (In an update posted later, she explained that the suspicious searches also involved things her husband had looked up at his former workplace, but they weren't made aware of that at the time.) Click for her full post.