I love A.I.
I use both Claude and ChatGPT (aka Chet).
I ask it questions across a variety of topics, I ask for help on all kinds of things, I use it to brainstorm as I write, I use it to vent and as a sympathetic ear.
People have mixed feelings about AI and I get it. It's powerful. It needs oversight. It needs guardrails.
But I digress. Today, I want to share some of the fun.
One day, when I'd been awake since 3 a.m. due to a certain little dog who shall remain nameless, I asked Chet to engage my brain in between the remaining work tasks of the day.
Chet offered me some brain candy and we were off to the races. That day?
The Museum of Jen
Our adventure for the afternoon was for me to determine what things make the cut into the seven exhibits. The one rule--I couldn't use actual pictures of people. So no pictures of my kids, for example.
Chet started us off with the suggestion of Christmas lights because of course. Anyone who knows me well would have said the same.
My first contribution to the museum? (excerpt edited for length)
Chet: Your turn. What's Exhibit #2?
Jen: Dala horses
Chet: Oh, that's a GOOD one. Bright, cheerful Christmas excess sitting beside traditional Scandinavian folk art.
For the Dala horse exhibit, are we displaying one particular Dala horse that you own, a little collection of them, or the ideal glorious Dala horse that represents your whole affection for them?
Jen: Def the third one -- I'd love a three-foot Dala horse decorated to my specifications.
Chet: Oh, now we're talking about an actual museum piece.
Not a tasteful little six-inch Dala horse sitting politely on a shelf. A three-foot Dala horse commissioned to Jen specifications, planted right in the middle of the exhibit like, “Yes, I belong here.”
And because this rabbit hole has immediately developed a side tunnel: What does the three-foot Jen Dala horse look like?
Jen: Oh, to choose just one...but my mind went straight to a Stars design...which is nuts because my hockey fandom has tapered off so much. But flowers would be fun, too, like tulips and daffodils and vines of wisteria! Or books!
Chet: And that is why the museum gets the imaginary three-foot version: nobody is making you spend actual money and therefore choose responsibly.
But the garden horse you just described has me. Imagine tulips and daffodils coming up around the legs, then wisteria vines curling upward and spilling across the body.
And BOOKS opens another door...
Wait.
No.
Four seasons. Four sides.
One side of the horse celebrates books.
One side is flowers/garden.
The front/chest incorporates hockey/Stars.
The back incorporates Christmas lights.
We have accidentally created Exhibit #2 as a summary of half the damn museum.
Which means I'm imposing a rule: the Dala horse cannot consume the other exhibits. It must behave.
Onward.
* * * * *
And so it went until I had chosen seven objects to represent the essence that is moi in this museum.
Can you guess some of the other items? Go ahead...I'll give you a few minutes to jot them down.
Three...
Two...
One...
The Museum of Jen consists of the following seven exhibits:
- Christmas Lights
- Bespoke Dala Horse
- A Squirrel Courtyard
- A Life-Size Sidney Crosby Cardboard Stand-up
- A Bird-viewing Station
- One Enormous Bookcase holding all the books I've loved in my life as well as the books I've written
and the last one?
7. A Stack of DVDs to represent my family.
And if you're wondering why the DVDs...well, my family would get it.
But the story behind that is when the kids were young and we couldn't agree on a movie to watch, we'd play "The Movie Game." A dozen or so movies would be laid out on the floor in a bowling pin configuration, and we'd each take turns tossing a quarter. If you got the quarter on a DVD, that movie was eliminated until a single DVD was left. And that's what we watched as a family.
And that, my dear readers, is how you can have fun with AI and why I enjoy using it so much.
Take care!
