Pollyism of the week

I’m thinking of starting a blog or a podcast called Generation Stretched. In fact, I’ll start it today while my brain is slightly focused. Or I’ll put it on a to-do list, then lose the list, forget I wrote one and find it a month from now. Generation Stretched – that’s us, baby!

It’s the same for so many of us. We have kids at home and elderly parents. We also have a job and a partner or ex-partner, or both, and it seems that most of our days are spent driving someone somewhere or picking up something for someone.

Everyone needs our attention. Last week, I found myself with three different shopping lists – one from my daughter, one from my son and a text message from another son wanting about 300kg of chicken breasts – plus, I had a trip planned to see my mother at her new digs to show her how to use the microwave I’d bought her.

As I got in the car after a work meeting, a text appeared from my gorgeous and patient editor at Woman’s Day: “Hello, lovely, looking forward to your column!”

I looked at my phone. It was Wednesday. I thought it was Tuesday and I had an hour to write a column. Somewhere between looking for my dog who’d escaped under the fence, making a meatloaf and trying to get Mum to put in her hearing aids, I had lost one whole day. I was up poop creek without a paddle.

Then it came to me in a flash: “There must be an app for that!”

Eureka! Of course there would be an app. There would be a dictation app designed for every kind of accent and I’d be able to dictate my column handsfree as I drove the 20 minutes to Mum’s place.

I looked in the app store and sure enough, there was a free app and it recognised the Kiwi accent.

I downloaded it, briefly scanned how to use it (huge mistake), then started my drive while dictating the column. It was good. I mean, it was really good. Perhaps the greatest piece of literature ever written – or rather spoken.

I arrived at Mum’s village and took a look at my fabulous dictated column. Hmm. Now it seemed I hadn’t read the instructions properly. Not only was there no grammar (apparently, one needs to say “full stop”), but my accent also must not be standard Kiwi because my column appeared to be typed by a small child playing on her mother’s laptop or by someone who’d taken too much Ambien and typed instead of going to sleep.

I sat in front of Mum’s village for an hour, adding grammar and trying to understand my own ramblings. I could have written it and it would have taken way less time. Dictation is not my gift. It’s not even in my top 20. It comes just above motorbike repair. Never again.

Now I’m left wondering what accent I have!