Connecting a Dot

I’m buying a six-pack of Amazon Echo Dots today. If you are unfamiliar with them, allow me: You plug these hockey puck things into a stereo or a lamp or whatever you like that’s got a plug and then you can tell the Dot to perform that thing's function. Like a Clapper that understands words. You can make your house listen to you. In my case, that means at least something is listening to me.

The wife and kids hear slightly less than a third of what I say, regardless of volume or topic. Which can be very unproductive. I make an announcement like, "I’m going to the store for milk and eggs" and hear back "What the hell is a milk egg? And why do you store them?" Now this could mean I’m terribly boring two out of three times, but that’s no excuse. There could just as easily be a real pearl in there amongst the bivalve, if you get through the goo. I want someone – something, at least – to listen. Always.

So I’m putting a Dot in every room. When I say things like, "Maybe the press is wrong about vampires, too?" or "I'm going to write a short-story about a meatloaf that runs for an open Senate seat" I’ll know, on some level, I’ve been heard.