The Death of Enunciation

          Well, it has finally happened.  Clear speech is being trained out of us by the dictation feature of our cell phones. We already know that no matter how distinctly you speak into that device, it will come out, “You are the breast!” and worse (see my blog about St. Bob’s blunder here).

          But now we have to slur what we’re saying just to get the correct words to appear on our screen.  If I say “question mark” it does not place a ? at the end of my sentence.  It spells out question mark.  If I want it to actually use the ? symbol, I have to hurry along and say, “Queshamark.”

          And if I want it not to write out exclamation mark, but to print ! I must say, “exlamashamark.” And if I want extra ones it sounds like I’m drunk, cursing, and hacking up a hairball. Make that hairball !!!

Elocution teachers must be turning in their graves.  And then, when you don’t want a punctuation symbol, it gives you one, anyway.  As a substitute high school teacher I dictated, “I’m teaching first period” and it came out, “I’m teaching first.”  And when I wanted to commiserate with a friend who couldn’t get a response from HR I said, “It’s like they’re in a coma,” but it came out, “It’s like there in a ,” with “they’re” misspelled as well.

What if you’re making a list and you want to say, “Here’s what to pack:”?  It will say, “Here’s what to pack colon”.

If you say, “Quotation mark” it will write that out.  You have to say, “Quote” to actually get a quotation mark.  But then how can you say, “I’d like to quote you”? It comes out, “I’d like to “ you.”

And all this extra back-spacing and correcting is eating up our time! So, no offense, but I have to --.

Have you ever scrolled through my blog posts?  Give it a try; hilarity has been happening for years.  

Dear Santa, Here’s What I Need

          It isn’t often you discover a cool gift when you’re at a doctor appointment, but that’s what happened just last week.

          St. Bob had a check-up on his knee replacement, and since Bob is up on all matters tech, he noticed the doctor was wearing a Google Glass thingy on his eyeglasses.

          Turns out this gizmo will make dictation a thing of a past.  For decades doctors have had to summarize their patient visits into a mike after each exam, transcribed later by an assistant.

          But now they’re starting to wear these phenomenal spectacles that connect them to a remote scribe so they can keep notes as they go, right while you’re sitting there talking to them.  Our guy’s scribe is in India.

          Augmedix says they are rehumanizing doctor/patient relations this way, and are investing millions to do it.

          Can you imagine the ways I could use such a device?  “Wait—didn’t you just buy celery two days ago?” it could ask as I’m losing my mind in the produce department.  Or it could prompt me with impressive trivia when in a conversation with a Brainiac at a party.  And I could keep it busy all day, telling me why I just went upstairs, or into the family room, where I now stand wondering what I came in for.

          Like a little assistant sitting on my shoulder--but an angel instead of a devil-- it could tell me to slow my driving down (which I would ignore), or remind me to put the laundry in the dryer.  It could catch spelling mistakes as I write along, it could remind me that I wore the red blouse at the last meeting, and it could even tell me about sudden sales, better traffic routes, or how to fix the microwave without calling a repairman.

          You could suddenly go on the speaking circuit, using this thing as your personal teleprompter.  You could ask for a raise, propose to your girlfriend, apologize profusely—win a zillion friends.

          On the other hand, knowing our budget, Bob could buy me a bargain one and I could get an idiot on the other end, giving me all the wrong answers.

          “Turn left,” he would say.  And then as I’m careening down a cliff, “Oops.”  

           Or my scribe could forget to make the list I said I needed, and leave me to wander aimlessly with a shopping cart, finally picking up his favorite pickled herring and jalapeno mustard.

          No, this thing has to be done right.  Which is where you come in.  Be a lamb and buy a few of my books here.  Seriously, there’s something for everyone and royalties for me.  That’s  how I’ll finally get the brain I need.