I thought that I would begin this Muse by reflecting on a long-time problem which sometimes can have some unanticipated effects – and it is all due to manufacturers.
I have no earthly idea of the reasoning used by manufacturers of women’s blouses, nightgowns and other items in placing the information notice on the back of the blouse etc. so close to the top. Half the time it sticks up, and woe betide the spouse who doesn’t notice that it is sticking up and pushes it back down. This is especially true if she doesn’t discover it until the party is over. The notice in that spot also causes folding problems in putting clean laundry away. OK, so I fold laundry occasionally. My worst folding problem was a nightgown because there was no way that I could tell from the top whether it was inside or not. It was compounded by the problem that The Blond in The House believes in turning clothes inside out before washing them. I finally used some male logic and looked further down the nightgown until I came to a pocket. Then, I could tell. However, that is a long way to go just to fold a long nightgown. I am certain that most of you have noticed that the informational notices on men’s clothes are further down where they bother no one and all is good. Oh, why can’t a woman’s clothes be more like a man’s?
I will now continue on the clothes angle, although it could apply to men as well. However, in this case it involved a woman. We were attempting to order a gift card at one of the stores that one of our lovely daughters-in-law likes. We were working on an iPad. We soon discovered that all of the stores we were interested in no longer handled their gift cards. They all had the same company through which you had to work. Boy, did you have to work! After searching we found what we wanted, but couldn’t find how to go to the checkout. I asked their chat AI, but it had no idea! It came up with a slew of useless suggestions. I went back to the site I had left, and while there I hit something that went to an area where I could get to checkout. The difficulty was that it had added something that we didn’t want. There was no way that you could delete the unwanted item. I did some more checking and found that the sending agency has a secret phone number you can call which I did. Once an AI answered the phone, I was given a long spiel that if I actually did get in touch with a live person, they couldn’t place an order for me anyway. Therefore, I started over with another store and found that it brought up the same information that existed with the first store including the item we didn’t want, and still no way to amend our order. I despise AIs.
I decided enough is enough, and went to the computer room to try to order there. Since I was a little exasperated, I decided to take a break before using the computer. Besides, the dryer had just given its peculiar wail indicating that the laundry was dry! I hustled in and worked on getting them folded and put in the proper place. It wasn’t too bad as most of them were my polo shirts which had not been turned inside out!! When I returned to the computer, I found that the same stores used a different company for ordering. It was most likely because the computer uses Microsoft and the iPad uses Apple. I went in, indicated what I wanted and zoom everything went right through. I was amazed as I used an AI the whole time. Perhaps, I was too rough on AIs, and there may be a few good AIs! Not many, but a few!!
Barry Evans is a columnist for Villages-News.com