If you’re like most folks, at some point you’ve gotten a Google Home or Alexa with the promise it will make your life soooo much better.
Yes, if you join the smart home revolution, it will teleport you into the next generation of technology wizardry where machines do all the work! Well, make my brain rattle around like a BB in a boxcar.
We don’t have a Google home. We have four Google Homes. And 4 Alexas. Yes, we have built ourselves a genuine smart home. It can turn on and off lights, give us light shows, and control our heating at the bark of a command. It protects, senses, beeps, chirps, and even talks.
My wife is skeptical. I’m in love. That is until it needs care and feeding. Where was that part on the box? It poops out, dies, and comes back to life in the worst possible times. It needs constant upgrades, locks us out, consumes copious amounts of batteries, listens to everything, butts into conversations, and has become our merry mistress of mischief.
Okay, it’s not all that bad, and some of it is just downright funny. Like when I was teaching my son Eric how to turn on and off the lights in his room.
“Hey Google, Turn on Eric’s room lights,” I said merrily. And she did. “Wow!” Said Eric, wonderstruck by my awesome Dad superpowers. “Now, son, you try turning off the lights.”
So, in typical six-year-old pronunciation, “Hey Google, turn off Erwwwic’s lights!” “Sure thing,” she replied. “Turning off EVERY light.” The whole house went dark. My wife was not impressed. I, on the other hand, was wonderstruck by his genius. I had been schooled once again in how the young learn so fast by innocently pushing buttons and saying stuff. Now, if you drive by our house and everything is flashing like a disco party, it is Eric’s fault.
All silliness aside, something much more interesting is growing in our relationship with Google Home. If you’re a science fiction fan, you’re probably familiar with Neal Stephenson’s 1995 book “The Diamond Age: Or, A Young Lady’s Illustrated Primer.” The premise is that the wealthy can afford a highly sophisticated interactive iPad-like book to help steer their children intellectually towards a more interesting life. In other words, it intelligently and patiently answers the persistent stream of “why’s” emanating from inquiring young minds.
The other day I was talking with Eric about electricity in relation to Minecraft Redstone circuitry, and he asked me something I didn’t know. Without missing a beat, he asked Google. And she knew the answer.
Amazed, I asked him how he knew how to do that. “Oh, Dad,” he says with a serious helping of eye-rolling, “I talk a lot with Google every night before I go to bed.” Mind blown. Because Eric has trouble reading, he simply found his own way to satisfy his intellectual itch. And thus begins our care and feeding of an artificial intelligent entity living in our house. Hey Google, turn off the lights and go to bed!
In another muse, my boys and I have a game when we find money. If it’s heads, we keep it and shout wildly, “Woohoo! Money’s coming our way!” If it’s tails, we flip it over and leave it for the next person to do the same.
Since we take our fun seriously, and Eric and I have math competitions together, the game was on. If there are 3,600 seconds in an hour, and it took one second to pick up the penny, is it worth picking up that penny? One penny per second is $36 per hour. My boys make $5/week. Eric’s mind whirled, whizzed and clicked. Ka’ching! Dad, I just won the lottery! Good man.
Kudos this week to those who make the world a better place goes to Lyn Brody, Josh Polan and Tag Galyean from the nonprofit Lewisburg Foundation. Since 1980 they have been making Lewisburg a beautiful small town with projects including the Center Green in downtown Lewisburg, the post office landscaping and Academy Park at the college. They’ve been graciously managing and beautifying the newspaper building’s landscaping at the corner of Court and Foster without any fee or grumble, for many, many years. If you see them around town, thank them for their service. Heck, go big. Make their day with a donation.
Until next week, I’d love to hear your smart home anecdotes and hints on good folks doing awesome things for our community. I can be reached at drnews@wvdn.com.
