Alexa and Me

 I often come late to the table technologically. Sometimes...not at all.
And sometimes I'm dragged there by a well-meaning and generous parent.

Take for instance Christmas of 2016. I'm given a medium size square box with a red-ribbon. My mother watches me with a barely repressed gleam in her eye as I peel off the wrappings and find myself the possessor of a brand new Amazon Alexa Dot.

Frankly at first, I'm not entirely sure what it is...
My mom fills in the gaps,

"You will love this, it's an Alexa...all you have to do is talk to it, and it will play you any song that you can think of! This morning, I listened to the whole Phantom of the Opera soundtrack! Just because I could!"

"You can ask her about the news, the weather...anything, just say 'Alexa what's up?'"

It's clear that my mother is about one step away from getting on Jeff Bezos Christmas Card list. But I'm still a bit skeptical.

 After all, I'm the one who has electrical tape over the camera on the lid of my laptop (c'mon Mark Zuckerberg does that!), I turn off the location finder on my phone, because frankly it's none of Google's damn business if I enjoyed my trip to Bed, Bath and Beyond. By the way, I totally did. I love BB & B, it's a wonderland of kitchen supplies, spanking new comforters and it smells like those scented sachets you hang in your closets. Pretty sure heaven is similar to BB & B. Or maybe Lowe's which is also up there...

Anyhow...back to Alexa and I.
I take her home with me, plug her in and watch the colored light ring change from orange to blue as she processes all the mundane details of my life, my skimpy calendar entries, Amazon lists, my music (way more impressive). Watching the light rings, all I can think about is well, first of all Tron, because...hello...and then I start thinking about Close Encounters...and then for some reason...Close Encounters always makes me think of E.T., and then Alexa interrupts my geekout to announce "Connected to Internet"

Then, we have our first conversation.

 I think, I bet this is exactly how Alexander Graham Bell felt when he first contacted Watson...

But then, I kind of freeze, not knowing exactly what to ask her, tell a joke, no wait, maybe the news...yeah the news is important!  Or maybe a song, but which song, should it be classic, contemporary, Beatles...ummm...Duran Duran, ummm, BRUNO MARS??? The endless choices...I mean she can play ANYTHING!!!

I think in the end, I blurt out "Fancy" by Reba McEntire.
Still have no idea why...I mean I love Reba...but a seminal moment like this...

For several months, I'm drawn to the novelty of her. I ask her jokes, I wake up every morning and yell, "Alexa, Good Morning". She wishes me a good morning in return, tells me my schedule, what the weather is, what kind of traffic problems I'll be encountering, etc.

We get along well, until that fateful day when it's discovered that she can also support Dot to Dot conversations. In setting this up, I find to my chagrin that my cell phone is too dated and not up to the task. So, I upgrade to a new cell phone, then spend 3-4 hours (not kidding) with some Amazon burn out who tries to set it up. All so that I can call my Mom on her Dot. Have a flashback to an early Beverly Hillbillies episode in which Jethro, hearing the voice of Ms. Hathaway on the speaker at the gate, thinks she is actually trapped in the wall, instead of outside in her sporty red convertible and hurling an axe attempts to break into the wall to let her out. Luckily, my Mom and Stepdad, Glen aren't too 'creeped out' hearing my voice over the Dot and no walls are harmed in the process.

It starts to occur to me that technology is taking over my life...something I swore I would never let happen. Weird things began to occur...Sometimes for no reason at all, Alexa would start up and say, "I don't know the answer to that" when I'd not asked her a question.  The other morning at 3 a.m, she must have had a "Rosie Moment" (Jetsons' beloved maid robot) and short-circuited because she woke me out of a sound sleep giving navigation to a town in what I believe was the state of Minnesota.

She refused to tell me what the secret ingredient was in Big Mac Sauce. I don't like Big Macs, I just wanted to know. She wouldn't explain the meaning of life, or why my cat Jamie likes to sleep on my head sometimes.

So for the last few months, she's sat on a pile of index cards on my desk. Sturdy cardboard index cards ready for all of the worldly wisdom of my research and study. And if you must know, so I can keep all of my books and DVD/Blu-Rays indexed and on cards. Because, at the heart of things, I'm still analog. I admit it, I like pens (actually border on OCD over the type of pen I use), hardback books, and the sound of my own thoughts in my head.

Yet, the other night as I washed dishes, I called out to the downstairs Echo,

"Alexa, play "Moonglow by Artie Shaw and his Orchestra".

She did and for one brief moment my tech side and my analog side were perfectly in sync.