Petunia & Dre by Allison Garwood for January 25, 2024

So there really is a bot?

This is so great!

Truth is stranger (and a lot funnier) than fiction. How far ahead of us are you, Big Al? Did this happen a week, a month, a year ago? I understand if I’m asking for secrets and you ignore me.

When my Dad tested an early version of Alexa (in the 1980s) it answered queries with “yes, Master?” I told him that the 13th Amendment to the Constitution was supposed to prevent that. We reprogrammed the speech chip so it answered in the persona of Marvin the Paranoid Android from the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. Either way, it never did what you asked it to do.

This was really quick. Just yesterday I saw the question on Instagram and seconded Dre’s joke. I’m happy to see this page.

Nanna?

War of the Maxims: Honesty is the best policy vs. Discretion is the better part of valor.

Very cool way of keeping it real, nice redo!

You’re right. It’s way funnier. And your algorithm is gonna have a cow, dude.

I taught for 24 years in a school with a majority black student body. They used the N-word often talking to each other. I finally figured out the reason why. They used it with each other because I couldn’t. They took a term of exclusion invented by whites and used it as a term of include from which I was, linguistically speaking, excluded. This has been done with groups many time. For example, I am from Oklahoma. During the Dust Bowl, people from my state who left Oklahoma (and from other states) were called “Okies” as a belittling name of exclusion. Now, many of us, me included, call ourselves Okies as a term we Okies use between us. Now if a Texan (aka “Baja Oklahoma”) calls me an Okie, there is going to be a fight. I would probably lose, but there will be a fight.

Also, I’m happy to see Petunia smile for a change.

“Bot N-word” does indeed crack me up.

Allison, this would be a good graphic novel.