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drewkittyThe very format of this vlog shows that I am a hopeless old timer. I am using voice recognition to convert to flat text -- my old IBM keyboard is in storage, but most people see keyboards only in museums.
I wake to classical music. The biometrics in the room have monitored my sleep and my REM cycles, noted that I have no obligations today that require me to wake early, and not incidentally monitored my health during the night. It is now impossible barring sabotage for a person to be found dead in the morning -- a stroke or heart attack in my sleep could bring medbots and human paramedics in less than five minutes, and no need to break down the door either.
The toilet analyzes my output and flushes without requiring a cue. In a triumph of design over human nature, it is no longer necessary to prop the seat up, nor to put the seat back down again. The first prototype was nicknamed the "Marriage Saver." People being people, couples find other things to fight over.
A cheap efficiency hotel room has better medical support than a early 21st century intensive care unit hospital bed.
Reminded, I reluctantly bring up the dialer on the viewscreen and select "Health Status Report."
The screen lights up with a VR simulation of a doctor in white coat. "Good morning, Mr. Anderson. Routine monitoring continues to show that you are in adequate but not excellent health for a man of your age. I remind you that smart eating is a key to improvement and that inattention to this contributes to greater risk of high blood pressure, heart attack and stroke. Thank you again for exercising, staying hydrated, avoiding alcohol and not using tobacco. Please consider reducing your caffeine intake...
Never, I think to myself. A man must have his vices.
"Your social interaction score is moderate. Your use of VR is minimal and you should take care to avoid VR exposures without adequate preparation to avoid greater risks of addiction. Your cultural interaction score is high and your volunteerism score is very high. Your support of the San San community is appreciated.
"You have registered a protest that prohibits this program from providing psychological health information. For life safety reasons, you are reminded that the choice to carry weapons carries significant health risks and that frequent practice of verbal defensive and physical combative skills is therefore strongly recommended ...
"Mute," I say while running the sonic scrubber over my skin.
The report continues as scrolling text, which I have configured to display as light blue on dark blue ... in other words, unreadable.
I finish scrubbing, spit and mutter, "Unmute."
"... All of these cautions are required by law under the Life Safety Initiative of 2041. As a reserve firefighter, reserve peace officer, reserve search and rescue technician, reserve paramedic, reserve park ranger and reserve correctional officer, you are further reminded that these volunteer duties carry risks and you should stay current in all of the related skill sets. You are current in: policing, SAR, ranger and paramedic. You are not current in: urban firefighting or corrections. You are out of certification in: wildland firefighting."
Given that wildland firefighting is now a function provided mostly by aerial drones, I think I'll take my chances. The last time I cut fire line was a class in 2036, and that was on a simulator. Actual live burns of plant materials are too expensive for training reserves.
"Scheduler: when is the next available and convenient recert class for urban firefighting?"
"A two week course is available in Sacramento six weeks from now. You have a spot reserved. Do you wish to book?"
Reserving a public resource is no big deal. Booking one means that I agree to go, and is a big deal. If I don't show and others want the spot, I might have to pay for it.
In 2045, you mostly pay for things you don't use. Missed reservations cost money; honored reservations are free.
I bring up the visual display of my calendar. I really should keep current on urban firefighting, because bots are all well and good until the bots run low on power, and I go a lot of places where services are not always 100%.
"Book course attendance and related nearby accomodations."
Then I review the day's schedule. Medical appointment at 2 PM for routine dialysis. I'll be in and out in ten minutes on that one. Removal of blood wastes is a major factor in extending lifespan.
Otherwise clear. I glance at the time, which conveniently has a sun and moon indicator. The window analog viewscreen shows sunrise, but I still check. Yes, the sun is coming up. Perfect.
I gather my effects into my backpack -- the old battered smartphone, the kitten robot (my lifestyle would be cruel to a live animal), the 'Cool Mint' mouthwash that is legally classified as an alcoholic beverage, the smartgun that the damned Life Safety Initiative keeps bugging me about. I am always wearing two bracelets -- both are smartware but one is a medical stunner with a self defense mode, and the other is a slammer with a lethal mode. This makes a smartgun overkill, and I have been accused of clanking when I walk.
But I am a firm believer that if I never need a smartgun, I can carry the excess four pounds, and if I really badly need a smartgun, I need it _right then and there_.
I walk out the door and toss over my shoulder, "Cancel further use of this room, I'm going walkabout."
The easy guide to knowing where you are going in any arcology is the size of the corridors. Huge broad corridor sixty feet [*20 meters] -- you are in public. Broad corridor thirty feet [*10 meters] wide - neighborhood. Narrow twenty foot corridor [* 7.5 meters] - private. Just wide enough to get a old style car down [*explain] - restricted.
[Look, you silly software, I'm going to keep using feet instead of meters, so stop arguing with me and trying to flag the distances. Don't make me file a cultural protest! Thank you.]
If you follow the larger and larger corridors, you find a public space and frequent access to mass transit. No need to know actually where you are going for most people. If you want to follow a specific route or meet a person, that is what smartware is for.
Along the way, I see a teenage kid with spray paint tagging the corridor. He is spraypainting something about 'Oldies.' "Frag you, gramps," he snarls as I walk past.
I therefore stop, turn around and smile at him.
He is committing three felonies -- contamination of air with petrocarbons (by far the most serious), felony vandalism (easily pled down to unauthorized public art, a misdemeanor with an art class as the public service penalty), and verbal insult of protected characteristics.
He expects me to be afraid. I'm an old guy, fit for my age but still an old fogie afraid of falling down and hurting something.
Instead, I say loudly "Personal conduct waiver. You have anything else you want to say to me?"
This immediately nullifies one of the felonies. He smiles and starts a long diatribe insulting me, my ethnicity, my age, and a number of characteristics I don't possess. Then he pushes me.
"That... was a big mistake," I say calmly.
"You gonna call the pigs, gramps?" A corner of my vision is flashing "Backup Y/N?" with a countdown in seconds to when the sofware is going to call for backup for me anyway.
"No police," I say to him, but the software notices and grumpily de-pixilates the life safety query.
I murmur to myself, "Slam, low power, hot."
Then I raise my right arm and use the slammer to knock him back.
"What the frak! Help, help!" He runs away from me, into the wall at full tilt. He rebounds with bruises on his face. "Crazy gramps, crazy!"
"Sir, you forgot your spray can!" I offer as he flails away screaming.
I wait patiently as his screams echo down the corridor. Two minutes later, a police bot arrives, blinking obediently as it scans me, the wall, then the can. It takes the contraband item.
"Citizen, you have been accused of felonious personal assault. Do you wish to make any statements at this time?"
"Yes. One: personal self defense from unwarranted attack. Two: personal conduct waiver clearly enunciated. Three: engaged in ad hoc law enforcement. Four: cultural heritage."
"Grounds one, two and three accepted. Ground four preliminary rejection and flag for further review. Do you wish to make counter claims?"
"Standard slander for false accusation of crime, civil only, waive all criminal filing, assign damages if any to ... Police Officer's Activity League, Art Department."
A pause. "Accepted. Courtesy advisory: subject taken into protective custody for attempting to damage a police bot. Have a nice day."
What a stupe. The entire interaction was video recorded from several angles. The expert systems that oversee law enforcement operations are programmed to flag but ignore most property crime that does not endanger persons, unless a marked police bot is present. If the punk had bothered to join a re-enactment group, his vandalism could have become protected cultural heritage activity and he could spray paint to his heart's content in front of as many police bots as he liked. That would of course take both the fun and the danger out of it.
Personal assault however is serious business. By pushing me he took the whole interaction to an entirely new level. In theory his antisocial behavior could have inflicted personal injury. He could pile up hundreds of hours of mandatory community service that way.
I'm a wicked old bastard. I met fire with fire, which the law permits but carefully does not encourage, and then in his own carelessness he hurt himself. Had I bruised his face without good cause, I'd be up against a revocation hearing for my smartgun permit and a disciplinary hearing to determine whether I could keep my reserve peace officer status and under what conditions. But he did it to himself in a confrontation he started and continued.
But attacking a police bot -- that was just dumb. He'd get a civil intelligence hearing out of that one. "Is this citizen too stupid to be allowed to walk around freely?" Perhaps he'd even go on neighborhood restriction, which is more serious than a prison sentence back in the 20th.
The incident had slowed me down ten minutes -- just enough to miss the sunrise I'd had in mind. So instead of boarding a capsule with routing to the Santa Cruz mountains, I picked a random diner and had breakfast.
Robot waiters are free. Human waiters cost money. I dialed a small tip for minimal interaction, gave my thumbprint to authorize my caffeinated iced tea, and ignored the smartware as it counseled toast and honey instead of my chicken fried steak with potatoes, eggs and gravy.
I muted the smartware when it complained about the caffeine again.
A year or so ago, I'd responded to a medical once where a guy in a bar was pummeling the nearest wall over and over again, hurting his hands, screaming "I just want a fragging drink, you stupid piece of software!" Turned out he was in detox and his (human) doctor had turned off his access to alcohol. After he smashed the allegedly shatterproof plastic and his hands started bleeding, I had most reluctantly stunned him and helped the medbots package him for transport.
I don't think I'd done him any favors. The following week he'd gone parasailing and unfastened his harness at altitude. His doctor caught a wrongful death lawsuit for failure to institutionalize.
I mostly wished I'd dialed up a drink and given it to him instead.
There is such a thing as too much monitoring, but that's one of the prices of living in San San.
Breakfast over, I turned to the news.
"MarsCorp announces second mining operation... in unaugmented football-baseball mashup, Raiders beat the Red Sox 72 to 6... controlled burn has Big Bear residents outraged... 'I have to breathe cancer-causing fumes just so the ecological balance can be maintained!' ... last life inmate released from California Department of Corrections under exile provisions of Treaty of Cairo ..."
I punched for more info.
"Multiple life inmate Edward Gutierrez, convicted in 2023 for the torture-murder of seventeen children, was released by order of the World Court from local jurisdictional custody of California. Citing the cruel and unusual punishment provisions of the Treaty of Cairo, World Court representatives took custody of the last life inmate in California custody, over local court rulings. Representatives were escorted by United Nations Marine Corps soldiers in battlesuits as they transported Mr. Gutierrez to a medical facility in Switzerland. Psychsurgeons there plan to interview under hypnosis, coma-sedate, and construct a treatment plan for his prison-related post traumatic stress disorder, homicidal behaviors, sociopathy, narcissism, meglomania and identity disorders.
"'It's the opportunity of a lifetime to work with someone so profoundly damaged,' said psych surgeon Dr. Gunther Mendel of the High Risk Biorehabilitation Center. 'Now that he has been freed from frankly medieval care, we can reasonably hope to achieve results in no more than thirty years of both positive and aversion therapies. He will be of course implanted with a tracker, anti-suicide compulsion and seizure stimulator. If he so much as raises a hand to a child again, he'll be twitching until the bots arrive.'"
"Mr. Gutierrez was born in 1995 and has a projected lifespan of 120 years. Hee's hoping that his last forty years can make up for his crimes."
All that effort could have been saved with one smartgun round, I thought to myself.
I decided to visit the mountains anyway, even though I'd missed sunrise.
I wake to classical music. The biometrics in the room have monitored my sleep and my REM cycles, noted that I have no obligations today that require me to wake early, and not incidentally monitored my health during the night. It is now impossible barring sabotage for a person to be found dead in the morning -- a stroke or heart attack in my sleep could bring medbots and human paramedics in less than five minutes, and no need to break down the door either.
The toilet analyzes my output and flushes without requiring a cue. In a triumph of design over human nature, it is no longer necessary to prop the seat up, nor to put the seat back down again. The first prototype was nicknamed the "Marriage Saver." People being people, couples find other things to fight over.
A cheap efficiency hotel room has better medical support than a early 21st century intensive care unit hospital bed.
Reminded, I reluctantly bring up the dialer on the viewscreen and select "Health Status Report."
The screen lights up with a VR simulation of a doctor in white coat. "Good morning, Mr. Anderson. Routine monitoring continues to show that you are in adequate but not excellent health for a man of your age. I remind you that smart eating is a key to improvement and that inattention to this contributes to greater risk of high blood pressure, heart attack and stroke. Thank you again for exercising, staying hydrated, avoiding alcohol and not using tobacco. Please consider reducing your caffeine intake...
Never, I think to myself. A man must have his vices.
"Your social interaction score is moderate. Your use of VR is minimal and you should take care to avoid VR exposures without adequate preparation to avoid greater risks of addiction. Your cultural interaction score is high and your volunteerism score is very high. Your support of the San San community is appreciated.
"You have registered a protest that prohibits this program from providing psychological health information. For life safety reasons, you are reminded that the choice to carry weapons carries significant health risks and that frequent practice of verbal defensive and physical combative skills is therefore strongly recommended ...
"Mute," I say while running the sonic scrubber over my skin.
The report continues as scrolling text, which I have configured to display as light blue on dark blue ... in other words, unreadable.
I finish scrubbing, spit and mutter, "Unmute."
"... All of these cautions are required by law under the Life Safety Initiative of 2041. As a reserve firefighter, reserve peace officer, reserve search and rescue technician, reserve paramedic, reserve park ranger and reserve correctional officer, you are further reminded that these volunteer duties carry risks and you should stay current in all of the related skill sets. You are current in: policing, SAR, ranger and paramedic. You are not current in: urban firefighting or corrections. You are out of certification in: wildland firefighting."
Given that wildland firefighting is now a function provided mostly by aerial drones, I think I'll take my chances. The last time I cut fire line was a class in 2036, and that was on a simulator. Actual live burns of plant materials are too expensive for training reserves.
"Scheduler: when is the next available and convenient recert class for urban firefighting?"
"A two week course is available in Sacramento six weeks from now. You have a spot reserved. Do you wish to book?"
Reserving a public resource is no big deal. Booking one means that I agree to go, and is a big deal. If I don't show and others want the spot, I might have to pay for it.
In 2045, you mostly pay for things you don't use. Missed reservations cost money; honored reservations are free.
I bring up the visual display of my calendar. I really should keep current on urban firefighting, because bots are all well and good until the bots run low on power, and I go a lot of places where services are not always 100%.
"Book course attendance and related nearby accomodations."
Then I review the day's schedule. Medical appointment at 2 PM for routine dialysis. I'll be in and out in ten minutes on that one. Removal of blood wastes is a major factor in extending lifespan.
Otherwise clear. I glance at the time, which conveniently has a sun and moon indicator. The window analog viewscreen shows sunrise, but I still check. Yes, the sun is coming up. Perfect.
I gather my effects into my backpack -- the old battered smartphone, the kitten robot (my lifestyle would be cruel to a live animal), the 'Cool Mint' mouthwash that is legally classified as an alcoholic beverage, the smartgun that the damned Life Safety Initiative keeps bugging me about. I am always wearing two bracelets -- both are smartware but one is a medical stunner with a self defense mode, and the other is a slammer with a lethal mode. This makes a smartgun overkill, and I have been accused of clanking when I walk.
But I am a firm believer that if I never need a smartgun, I can carry the excess four pounds, and if I really badly need a smartgun, I need it _right then and there_.
I walk out the door and toss over my shoulder, "Cancel further use of this room, I'm going walkabout."
The easy guide to knowing where you are going in any arcology is the size of the corridors. Huge broad corridor sixty feet [*20 meters] -- you are in public. Broad corridor thirty feet [*10 meters] wide - neighborhood. Narrow twenty foot corridor [* 7.5 meters] - private. Just wide enough to get a old style car down [*explain] - restricted.
[Look, you silly software, I'm going to keep using feet instead of meters, so stop arguing with me and trying to flag the distances. Don't make me file a cultural protest! Thank you.]
If you follow the larger and larger corridors, you find a public space and frequent access to mass transit. No need to know actually where you are going for most people. If you want to follow a specific route or meet a person, that is what smartware is for.
Along the way, I see a teenage kid with spray paint tagging the corridor. He is spraypainting something about 'Oldies.' "Frag you, gramps," he snarls as I walk past.
I therefore stop, turn around and smile at him.
He is committing three felonies -- contamination of air with petrocarbons (by far the most serious), felony vandalism (easily pled down to unauthorized public art, a misdemeanor with an art class as the public service penalty), and verbal insult of protected characteristics.
He expects me to be afraid. I'm an old guy, fit for my age but still an old fogie afraid of falling down and hurting something.
Instead, I say loudly "Personal conduct waiver. You have anything else you want to say to me?"
This immediately nullifies one of the felonies. He smiles and starts a long diatribe insulting me, my ethnicity, my age, and a number of characteristics I don't possess. Then he pushes me.
"That... was a big mistake," I say calmly.
"You gonna call the pigs, gramps?" A corner of my vision is flashing "Backup Y/N?" with a countdown in seconds to when the sofware is going to call for backup for me anyway.
"No police," I say to him, but the software notices and grumpily de-pixilates the life safety query.
I murmur to myself, "Slam, low power, hot."
Then I raise my right arm and use the slammer to knock him back.
"What the frak! Help, help!" He runs away from me, into the wall at full tilt. He rebounds with bruises on his face. "Crazy gramps, crazy!"
"Sir, you forgot your spray can!" I offer as he flails away screaming.
I wait patiently as his screams echo down the corridor. Two minutes later, a police bot arrives, blinking obediently as it scans me, the wall, then the can. It takes the contraband item.
"Citizen, you have been accused of felonious personal assault. Do you wish to make any statements at this time?"
"Yes. One: personal self defense from unwarranted attack. Two: personal conduct waiver clearly enunciated. Three: engaged in ad hoc law enforcement. Four: cultural heritage."
"Grounds one, two and three accepted. Ground four preliminary rejection and flag for further review. Do you wish to make counter claims?"
"Standard slander for false accusation of crime, civil only, waive all criminal filing, assign damages if any to ... Police Officer's Activity League, Art Department."
A pause. "Accepted. Courtesy advisory: subject taken into protective custody for attempting to damage a police bot. Have a nice day."
What a stupe. The entire interaction was video recorded from several angles. The expert systems that oversee law enforcement operations are programmed to flag but ignore most property crime that does not endanger persons, unless a marked police bot is present. If the punk had bothered to join a re-enactment group, his vandalism could have become protected cultural heritage activity and he could spray paint to his heart's content in front of as many police bots as he liked. That would of course take both the fun and the danger out of it.
Personal assault however is serious business. By pushing me he took the whole interaction to an entirely new level. In theory his antisocial behavior could have inflicted personal injury. He could pile up hundreds of hours of mandatory community service that way.
I'm a wicked old bastard. I met fire with fire, which the law permits but carefully does not encourage, and then in his own carelessness he hurt himself. Had I bruised his face without good cause, I'd be up against a revocation hearing for my smartgun permit and a disciplinary hearing to determine whether I could keep my reserve peace officer status and under what conditions. But he did it to himself in a confrontation he started and continued.
But attacking a police bot -- that was just dumb. He'd get a civil intelligence hearing out of that one. "Is this citizen too stupid to be allowed to walk around freely?" Perhaps he'd even go on neighborhood restriction, which is more serious than a prison sentence back in the 20th.
The incident had slowed me down ten minutes -- just enough to miss the sunrise I'd had in mind. So instead of boarding a capsule with routing to the Santa Cruz mountains, I picked a random diner and had breakfast.
Robot waiters are free. Human waiters cost money. I dialed a small tip for minimal interaction, gave my thumbprint to authorize my caffeinated iced tea, and ignored the smartware as it counseled toast and honey instead of my chicken fried steak with potatoes, eggs and gravy.
I muted the smartware when it complained about the caffeine again.
A year or so ago, I'd responded to a medical once where a guy in a bar was pummeling the nearest wall over and over again, hurting his hands, screaming "I just want a fragging drink, you stupid piece of software!" Turned out he was in detox and his (human) doctor had turned off his access to alcohol. After he smashed the allegedly shatterproof plastic and his hands started bleeding, I had most reluctantly stunned him and helped the medbots package him for transport.
I don't think I'd done him any favors. The following week he'd gone parasailing and unfastened his harness at altitude. His doctor caught a wrongful death lawsuit for failure to institutionalize.
I mostly wished I'd dialed up a drink and given it to him instead.
There is such a thing as too much monitoring, but that's one of the prices of living in San San.
Breakfast over, I turned to the news.
"MarsCorp announces second mining operation... in unaugmented football-baseball mashup, Raiders beat the Red Sox 72 to 6... controlled burn has Big Bear residents outraged... 'I have to breathe cancer-causing fumes just so the ecological balance can be maintained!' ... last life inmate released from California Department of Corrections under exile provisions of Treaty of Cairo ..."
I punched for more info.
"Multiple life inmate Edward Gutierrez, convicted in 2023 for the torture-murder of seventeen children, was released by order of the World Court from local jurisdictional custody of California. Citing the cruel and unusual punishment provisions of the Treaty of Cairo, World Court representatives took custody of the last life inmate in California custody, over local court rulings. Representatives were escorted by United Nations Marine Corps soldiers in battlesuits as they transported Mr. Gutierrez to a medical facility in Switzerland. Psychsurgeons there plan to interview under hypnosis, coma-sedate, and construct a treatment plan for his prison-related post traumatic stress disorder, homicidal behaviors, sociopathy, narcissism, meglomania and identity disorders.
"'It's the opportunity of a lifetime to work with someone so profoundly damaged,' said psych surgeon Dr. Gunther Mendel of the High Risk Biorehabilitation Center. 'Now that he has been freed from frankly medieval care, we can reasonably hope to achieve results in no more than thirty years of both positive and aversion therapies. He will be of course implanted with a tracker, anti-suicide compulsion and seizure stimulator. If he so much as raises a hand to a child again, he'll be twitching until the bots arrive.'"
"Mr. Gutierrez was born in 1995 and has a projected lifespan of 120 years. Hee's hoping that his last forty years can make up for his crimes."
All that effort could have been saved with one smartgun round, I thought to myself.
I decided to visit the mountains anyway, even though I'd missed sunrise.
