Saturday January 20th 2024

Another good news day - I think! 

A chatbot working for Amazon, the online retailer, has agreed to pay me a refund on the Vileda retractable clothes-line I had ordered, which was, I assume, either pocketed by, or maybe simply thrown away by, their local delivery-guy. 

I know for a fact that their delivery guy misdelivered our washing line to a nice couple "our age", David and Judith, living about a mile away from here, a couple we've got to know quite well as the result of repeated Amazon mis-deliveries. 

David and Judith, a lovely couple our age, living about a mile away from here,

 the unlucky recipients of all our recent Amazon deliveries

flashback to last week: Amazon's misleading

"delivered today - handed to resident"  report - what madness !!!!

And we know for a fact that David handed the package back to the delivery-guy with instructions on how to find us, but that the guy didn't bother to "drive the extra mile" to hand it to us, who were the correct recipients. All of which left Lois and me officially "washing-line-less", a wretched condition, let me tell YOU !!!

 a typical clothes-line

I have to say that, since the last time I "talked to" an Amazon chatbot, they've improved the system quite significantly, because now the chatbot will suggest examples of "things you could say", e.g. "I want a refund", "I want a replacement" etc., which cuts down the risk of the chatbot having to say, e.g. "I'm sorry, I don't understand" or "Can you say that another way?"  and all that kind of malarkey. 

Plus it saves the customer from making the effort to say, e.g. "Amazon, I hate your guts" or "Why are your delivery drivers so stupid?", or perhaps, with more justice, "Why are the IT systems you supply your delivery drivers with so rubbish?". I know from experience that chatbots never understand advanced English phrases like these - they're just beginners in the language really, probably just off the boat - so I'm only wasting my breath. 

But what do you think of my achievement, eh? 

Result !!!!!   Eh ?????   Back of the net !!!!!

part of the email I subsequently receive this morning from Amazon -

to clarify for you, I've circled some of the key words and phrases haha!!!!

And, strangely, when I hang up, I kind of feel a "connection" with that chatbot I "talk to" today. He obviously isn't such a bad guy, after all. And I start to experience even warmer feelings later, when I happen to see a picture on the web of a typical chatbot.

a typical "chatbot" - awwwwww! Isn't he a cute little guy!!!

And it makes me start to think big about maybe setting up my own chatbot to save me interacting with friends and relatives if I happen to be a bit busy. 

[When are you 'a bit busy', Colin? I'd like to know! - Ed]

You see, most weekends we're visited by our daughter Sarah and her twin daughters Lily and Jessica, and the girls have "set up" their favourite stuffed toy, Black-and-White Cat (once played with by their mother Sarah 40 years ago, would you believe?). 

Amazingly, the twins have recently taught "Cat" to "sit and watch TV with old Poppa" (i.e. me), and they've also shown Cat how to use a computer - I've overheard them giving him instructions, so it's true, you know!

stage one (November 2023): me watching TV with "Cat"  - the twins

had taught him how to keep "old Poppa" company on the couch

stage 2: January 2024: "Cat" is now able to use a PC, 

and we can't tear him away from it, either, which is nice!

Could I perhaps programme "Cat" to be my chatbot?

I wonder......!!!!

[That's enough whimsy! - Ed]

And I'm also glad that I've managed to get the refund from Amazon before Lois and I start talking "too Scottish", ahead of Burns Night on January 25th. I don't know what Amazon's chatbot would have made of some of the typical Scottish phrases we know, if I'd happen to use them during our online chat.

With Lois and me, neither of us is Scottish, but once you start pretending to talk in a cod-Scottish accent, just for fun, it's hard to stop, isn't it. Have you ever found that?

With Burns night on the horizon now, excitement is mounting here, so Lois and I have got to be sure not to get too excited - we're keeping our medications close at hand just in case we cross some sort of line here.

statins - a key element in both our medications

flashback to the beginning of December: Lois and I finally

synchronise our dates for ordering new statins.

included for comparison purposes: those flatmates in the lovely 

Worcestershire village of Bell End, who made world headlines 

last spring after finally syncing their periods

To cut a long story short [Thanks! - Ed], Lois and I are currently looking at Scottish recipes for our twin granddaughters to try making when they visit us hopefully next weekend. It'll be a couple of days past the official Burns Night (25th), but close enough, we feel - we're neither of us purists, to put it mildly!

Helpfully, Steve, our American brother-in-law, has pointed us to a website with a few suggestions.

Just to let you know, Lois and I are currently looking specifically at puddings, ones we think the twins may be able to rustle up for us, but your suggestions are welcome - on a postcard please!

Steve himself is looking at making some neeps-and-tatties-soup over there in Pennsylvania, but Lois and I aren't sure whether that isn't maybe a bit too advanced for 10-year-olds. But we'll see!

Do you remember Burns Night 2020, when Lois and I sat down to a delicious meal of "rumble-de-thumps" with Scottish sausages, a meal said to be former UK prime minister Gordon "Gordo" Brown's favourite Scottish dish. 

Yes, I know, we're both 77, but we still like a bit of "rumble-de-thumps" with a sausage on Burns Night. I expect you do too, don't you - go on, admit it!!! 

flashback to Burns Night 2020: Lois and I

enjoying a bit of "rumble-de-thumps" with a sausage

The twins don't know it, but even longer ago, when they were only a few months old, I wheeled them, both fast asleep in their pram, past an advert for a Burns Night "do" at the Bell Inn, a popular local pub in Cheltenham.

In those days Lois and I used to look after the twins every Monday and Friday, when Sarah and Francis were both at work - a magic period in our lives that we'll never forget. This was way before the family decided to move to Australia, in 2015, returning last May to the UK after 7 years down under.

Flashback to January 2012: me wheeling our sleeping 

twin granddaughters,  then only 6 months old, 

past the Bell Inn, with its advert for a Burns Night Supper.

Happy days !!!!!

21:00 We wind down for bedtime on the couch watching Friday's edition of "QI XL", the comedy quiz, presented by the UK's favourite Dane, Sandi Toksvig.

The programme is even ruder than usual tonight, with its "unsavoury" topic, covering a lot of bodily functions not often mentioned on TV - my goodness!!! However, there's still a lot of knowledge to be garnered about other, not quite so unsavoury, things, which is nice.

Both Lois and I often have unwanted thoughts, even at our age. But neither of us had heard of the "white bear problem", originally identified by Harvard psychologist Dan Wegner, who found that if somebody says to you "Try not to think of a polar bear!", you immediately start to think about one.

Wegner spent a lifetime studying this "white bear problem", and in 1985 he did an experiment asking a roomful of people not to think of polar bears, and if they did, to ring a little bell. It turned out that most rang their bell at least once a minute.

Harvard professor Dan Wegner, who first

identified the "White Bear Problem"

Trying to suppress a thought, Sandi comments, is a bit like going closer and closer to a cliff-edge when you know it's dangerous. It's like two minds fighting inside you, one sort of monitoring the other. 

Wegner found, however, that among the few people who can totally suppress thoughts, are anorexics and bulimics. Why? Wegner didn't find out, but comedian Judi Love thinks she understands.

Oh dear, "sod it, go to both of them" is not a thought that Lois and I want to have suggested to us past 9 o'clock at night - that's for sure.

Too late - oops, we've thought about it now !!!!

Biscuit and/or cake after 9pm - that's an unwanted thought par excellence for Lois and me at this time of night. We're both trying desperately to keep an eye on our waistlines after the Christmas/New Year holiday. Oh dear!

And by the way, Wegner came to believe that free will itself is all an illusion. He compared the conscious mind to a ship's compass - it's not actually steering the ship, just reacting to the direction in which the vessel goes. His theory is that we need to think we have free will, however, or we would never get anything done.

Fascinating stuff, isn't it !!!!  [If you say so! - Ed]

22:00 We go to bed - zzzzzzz!!!!!