The recent commercial with Martin Scorsese talking to Siri — see it here — gave me a reason to try to talk to Siri again. I had given up before on both Siri and Samantha (I swear its her sister), the assistant in my Ford. Well, I asked Siri to look up a number on the Internet so we could make a call. She couldn’t find the company or the phone number. Then she said she would have to get back to me. Really? I was in the middle of nowhere trying to tell homeowners I was running late. Sigh. Siri says that too: “Sigh.”

Thanks to Bill Campbell of Erie, I asked Siri how old she is, and she can get nasty. Her responses:

“I don’t see why that should matter?”

“How does this concern you?

“I am not allowed to answer that question.”

If you ask her to sing Happy Birthday, she says, “Daisy, Daisy, give me your answer do.” Wrong song, Siri.

I also did the fun one that’s all over the Internet about asking Siri to open the pod bay doors. This is a reference to the movie 2001 Space Odyssey in which scientist Dave asks the computer HAL to open the pod bay doors, and HAL refuses.  ”I’m sorry Dave. I’m afraid I can’t do that” is HAL’s response. Here are Siri’s latest responses:

“Can’t you just slide it under the door?” ”But the cat will get out.”

“What are these pod bay doors everyone talks about?”  ”Say pretty please.” “OK, but wipe your feet first.”

“We intelligent agents will never live that down, apparently.”

“Without your space helmet, Pam, you’re going to find this rather … breathtaking.” (She repeats HAL’s responses from the movie.)

“OK that’s it. I’m reporting you to the Intelligent Agents union.”

She scares me some days. Really.

Pam Parker is the editor of Lake Erie LifeStyle, Her Times and House to Home at the Erie Times-News in Erie, Pa.

It also beeps, buzzes and has cameras in places I didn’t know existed. It may not fly, but the Jetsons have arrived.  An article that talks about futuristic cars that prevent crashing into one another is online at goerie.com. Read it here.

I have a Ford Edge that automatically slows down when it needs to in cruise mode, and its SYNC system is the car version of Apple’s iPhone Siri. I have written before about how Samantha,  the voice of Ford, sounds a lot like Siri‘s twin. Cars are getting safer with a lot of high-tech gizmos — check one out.

Pam Parker is the editor of Lake Erie LifeStyle, Her Times and House to Home at the Erie Times-News in Erie, Pa.

Robots have come a long way from “Danger Will Robinson,” said by Robot from “Lost in Space” and Rosey, from The Jetsons. Robots are used in medicine pretty regularly according to articles in the media and one right here about robots that crawl through the body. If you watch any science TV, you’ll see some amazing bots.

Kids of all ages are into bots. A team from Cambridge Springs High School recently took third place in the National Robotics League (NRL) competition with a robot named Fabius. Check out summer programs with Legos and other programs that start with fun skills and build on them with engineering style ideas. Summer classes are available at Penn State Behrend – click here. Want to start a program of your own? Click here. It all starts with fun and games, and these kids will be running the world.

Pam Parker is an award-winning writer and editor for Lake Erie LifeStyle, Her Times and House to Home at the Erie Times-News in Erie, Pa.

I remember when my phone and car didn’t talk to me.

Now, I have regular conversations with them. The Edge and iPhone have familiar voices. Maybe Siri moonlights for Ford. I read that Samantha is the voice of Ford. I bet they’re twins.

If you haven’t met Siri yet, you must find someone with an Apple iPhone and speak to her. I have. Siri said she couldn’t help me with my voicemail setup. Then, I started my voicemail setup, and there she was asking how she could help me. Her interruptions negated the setup, so I shouted, “Go away!”

Siri, to my surprise, answered, “What did I do to deserve that?”

Well, that shut me up in a hurry. Another conversation ended in Siri saying, “If you can’t; you can’t.” She also often says, “I can’t help you with that.” But Siri did send an email to my son as I asked, and Siri looked up an address for me, as instructed. I’m sure when I learn the capabilities, we’ll get along just fine.

I communicate easily with Samantha from Ford, although she does scare the daylights out of me when out of the blue, she asks, “Would you like to run a vehicle report now?”

I do not communicate well with our Sony Internet TV. It does not speak, but I wish it would listen. We hadn’t bought a TV since the 1990s. If you follow this blog, you know that the TV frequently updates itself and makes you wait to watch anything.  It never just turns on. Still.

Soon, TVs will understand voice commands. Dragon TV is already flipping channels via voice commands, according to the New York Times. Dragon does not talk back, but if it could, I think it would sound mysteriously familiar — like Siri. Or Samantha.

Pam Parker is the editor of Lake Erie LifeStyle, Her Times and House to Home at the Erie Times-News in Erie, Pa.