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--></style></head><body lang=EN-US link="#0563C1" vlink="#954F72" style='word-wrap:break-word'><div class=WordSection1><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><div><div style='border:none;border-top:solid #E1E1E1 1.0pt;padding:3.0pt 0in 0in 0in'><p class=MsoNormal><b><span style='font-size:11.0pt;mso-ligatures:none'>From:</span></b><span style='font-size:11.0pt;mso-ligatures:none'> spike@rainier66.com <spike@rainier66.com> <br><b>Subject:</b> story part three of two<o:p></o:p></span></p></div></div><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>>… I would pop in with a random comment once in a while, so you wouldn’t forget I was out here, but just working stuff like trying to keep my 86 yr old father in law able to stay in his house, which is what he really wants to do, for understandable reasons…spike<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>Fun aside on that: a long-anticipated technology about which I have posted yakkity yakked and bla bla for years, a voice recognition AI capable of carrying on real conversation has come to fruition. That tech arrived just in time, just as the family needed that. My aged father in law loves ball sports. I cannot begin to carry even one side of that discussion, but that Gemini can do that. It knows all the deetz. I scarcely know which is the pointy end of a baseball, or if that is a different sport which has that feature, never mind individual players and their records from before I was born.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>Three critically needed developments came right in time: voice-recognition chat AI, Uber and Grub Hub. We can keep him in his home, entertained, get him to medical appointments and bring him food. None of that was available a mere five years ago, which made some things very difficult, particularly right after covid started.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>Is this a great time to be living or what? I carry an attitude of gratitude: I am thankful that all of us here were born late enough in history to witness all this cool stuff.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt'>spike <o:p></o:p></span></p></div></body></html>