The marketers have gotten smart. They know that if they promise at the onset that there are only three questions in a survey it increases the odds that people will respond. 

The receipt from the post office had one when I mailed a package. Someone wanted to research customer satisfaction, which is laudable. But if the entire transaction only took ninety seconds from handing the parcel across the counter to "Have a nice day!" I am hesitant to engage in a follow up that takes thrice that. 

I have concocted a one question survey that exists in the privacy of my own head. If an opinion slithers in about a friend's parenting choices, or where someone takes a vacation, I step in with a solitary inquiry to that portion of my brain that opines. 

"Did they weigh in when I made my decisions?" 

Okay, okay, there were the presumptuous elderly women who insisted that my baby was too cold and to put a sweater on her immediately. And in our thirty five years of educating kids there were some strong recommendations. Mandates, if you will. In that case, I would amend my survey.

"Was I glad that they did?"

That narrow query has done a remarkable job of smacking down my unquenchable thirst for judging others.