Windows search is unfathomably bad

I have a timesheet in Excel. It wasn’t open. So, I wanted to open it. I hit the Windows key and typed “excel”. Windows struggled mightily and was unable to find anything.

Search Excel returns nothing in Windows Start Menu

I tried again.

This time it found just garbage.

Like, not even close.

Just wildly swinging for the fences.

Sentinel-LDK.zip

WTF. How does that even happen?

Search Excel returns garbage in Windows Start Menu

On a hunch, I tried to limit the search to “Apps”. No dice.

Windows Start Menu refuses to locate Excel

The application is installed.

When I typed the name of my document, it found it immediately and was able to open it with Excel, an app produced by the same company that produced the Windows operating system, the stage on which this whole tragedy takes place, an app that is very definitely installed on my computer, and an app that is very definitely open right now.

Windows can’t find it, though. Tragic.