In a move that has to make Elon proud, Dan and Katy now own their very own AI robot. Sort of. Technically speaking. I googled it. It’s probably true.
All while my own primitive version of the same robot sits in a corner of my house, sulking and gathering dust. Proof again that she has character issues.
You may recall that my little robotic floor sucker was
not programmed to follow rules, obey orders, or even speak English. My little Roomba
thinks she’s in charge, yelling at me in Spanish from somewhere deep inside the
drapes she’s just swallowed or within the echo chamber under my bed anytime she
gets into trouble, like it’s my fault.
Seldom does she have a coughing spasm in the middle of
the kitchen floor where I can plainly see her and rush to her aid. Nope, she
thrives on drama. She sabotages herself in places that camouflage her
so well she can claim both abandonment and unemployment while she gets away
with taking a long, winter nap.
Like I said. Primitive.
But the new and improved version, which is so awesome
it should have an upgrade to its name, would never think of playing dead under
my daughter’s sofa. Katy's Roomba, which she named Janet, has her own garage right
in the center of the house, which makes her a member of the family. She came
equipped with an app that actually mapped out Katy’s entire home, sorting it
all into work zones. Now, anytime my daughter wants the hallway vacuumed, for example, she just
opens the app on her phone and Janet quietly gets to work.
Quietly. What a profound concept. I’ll have to wake up my
Roomba and mention that to her. I don’t think that'll be a pleasant
conversation.
I was inspired by Katy’s decision to give her Roomba a lovely name like Janet. It’s pleasant and makes me think of spring breezes and a tranquil, English garden. So, now I’ve named my Roomba, too. I call her El Diablo. Turns out I do speak a little bit of Spanish. El Diablo makes me think of chaos and frustration. It’s appropriate.
I don’t think El Diablo grew up in a home where
cleaning was a priority. She vacuums in a pattern I’ve previously described as
Two-Year-Old Scribble, creating random pathways across my floor, bouncing
off the walls and randomly shooting herself into another room like she has ADD.
While Janet, on the other hand, exhibits a bit more finesse.
She hums a happy tune while she vacuums in a straight line, the way decent human beings should. When Janet reaches the
far end of the work zone, she pivots slightly, makes a 180-degree turn, and
vacuums all the way back to the beginning. Back and to, back and to. It has a
nice little rhythm to it. Back and to until the room is methodically and
entirely cleaned. She sticks to a logical plan.
And here’s the kicker. Janet, unlike El Diablo, even mops.
Yes, you read that right. Janet.Mops.The.Floor. And should the inconceivable
happen, let’s say she were to misread her internal map and accidentally suck up
a drape, shutting down her motor, Janet has manners. She’s also
multi-lingual. She speaks German and Italian and Portuguese and Japanese and Spanish and probably even Swahili. But my daughter wisely requested that Janet speak to her in a
language she could understand.
English.
The Queen’s English.
When Janet has technical issues, she doesn’t throw a
temper tantrum like her inferior cousin from south of the border. Nor does she
blame my daughter in Swahili, because Katy doesn’t speak Swahili. Here's the
way Janet describes her predicaments.
Please, mum. It appears I have swallowed a
drape. Canst thou release me forthwith from my unfortunate dilemma that I
might serve thee better, and continue to sucketh up dirt and muddy
messes from thine floors?
Verily, verily, doth she speak thusly to her mistress,
the fair Lady Kathryn.
I watched this magnificent creature at work in my daughter’s house for the first time last month and, I'll admit, it left me with a meager amount of empathy for poor El Diablo. You probably saw this coming.
I, too, am now jealous of my
daughter’s robot.
But, I have a confession to make. The last time I asked El Diablo to spend two hours bouncing around my living area like a teenager wearing headphones, she sucked up all the fringe on my rug. In plain sight. At least this time I knew where she was when she took her lunch break. You gotta find the glimmers where you can.
While I was untangling the fringe from one of her
little brushes, she suffered a debilitating injury. I broke off one of her
feet. She is now an amputee and, I assume, limps when she cleans. I don’t know
for sure because I’ve never turned her back on since that terrible day. I’m afraid of
her temper.
So that’s the truth. That’s the real reason she’s
sitting in a corner of my house gathering dust. And also this. I'm two-timing her.
I have a new house cleaner. She’s not AI. I think she’s from California. She’s friendly and cleans my entire house, top to bottom, in ninety minutes, far more efficiently than El Diablo ever did. And just before she gets in her little blue car to drive home, she rolls my trash can up from the street, just because she’s nice.
El Diablo
never did that for me.
I call my new house cleaner Susan. Because that’s her name. And
the best part is, Susan never yells at me in Spanish. Or English either. Also, she never swallows my drapes.
So, Sayonara, El Diablo. It’s been real.
