“I am not Ms. Amazing!” I shouted into the phone.
It was Sunday morning, and I was worked into a
frustrated fury.
“Stop calling me that!” I shouted again.
No, I wasn’t trying to be modest. No, I didn’t have
a person on the other end of the line arguing about how great I was. I was
talking to Siri.
You know her well by now, I’m sure. She’s the
sarcastic voice that lives in the iphone, a device that reminds me every day –
despite what Siri calls me – that I am not Ms. Amazing. In fact, smart
technology reminds me every day that I just might be an idiot.
I had upgraded my work phone to the new IOS 7 and
had gotten several emails that morning, all addressed to, you guessed it, Ms.
Amazing.
“Arggggh,” I screamed into the phone, sounding like
Charlie Brown when he is tricked by Lucy again as he is about to kick the
football. “Kids, you did this!”
“What?” they asked as they looked up from their
weekend homework.
“You told Siri I was Ms. Amazing two years, and now
everyone in my contacts knows!”
They both looked confused - and amused.
I remember it well. I had first gotten my phone, and
they wanted to talk to Siri, and I allowed them to ask her a few questions
until she seemed to get annoyed and finally said, “I don’t know who you are.”
My daughter had responded by saying, “Call me Ms.
Amazing.”
Siri, in all her brilliance, had added the title to
my name and given the kids a big laugh in the process. I had forgotten about it
until the upgrade when, suddenly, my nickname was back, showing up in the to
field of my email.
“I’m trying to get people to take me seriously at
work,” I said. “I don’t want them to know I’m Ms. Amazing!”
My son asked, “Do you want them to think you’re
ordinary?” and he shouted in jest, “I’m just like everybody else!”
I had to admit that was pretty funny. His comment calmed
me down and allowed me to see the humor in the situation. It was Sunday morning
after all.
In the end, my rant took longer than it did to
actually fix the problem on the phone. The kids got a lecture about never
touching it again and an apology from their not-so-amazing mom for
overreacting.
Lesson learned, Sir, lesson learned.
