Me and My (Ro)Bot

 

I have a “Bot.”  I’m too old to have a Bot but I have one nevertheless.

I didn’t request one.  He just arrived.

At first I was annoyed.  I didn’t welcome him but he persisted and now he’s part of my life.

He visits my blog.  Sometimes many times a day.   I know he’s a Bot because he only visits “Home.”  Sort of like E.T.  Reading and comprehension may be above his pay grade.

He does no harm.  To me or anyone else.  I’ve made sure of that.  He’s of no particular help, either.  He just “is.”

He makes my numbers look good.  Sometimes I think I’ve gone “viral” and then I realize it’s just my Bot.   Being Bot-ish.

He tends to do most of his visiting late in the week, when anyone who reads Life on the May has already done so and moved on to other things.  In a way, it’s nice to have him then.  It beats the heck out of the message: “Sorry, no readers today.”

I know it sounds a bit sexist for me to refer to my Bot as a “him” but frankly, I don’t know any women who have the time to just sit and click all day long.

I do wish he’d leave a bread crumb or two so I knew where to find him.  But I guess that would take all the mystery out of the relationship and that’s pretty much all we’ve got going with each other right now.

So carry on, Dear Bot.  Maybe one of these days we’ll cyber-meet.  L8R.

 

• In the dark about “bots?” Wikipedia sheds some light: “An internet bot, also known as web robot, WWW robot or simply bot, is a software application that runs automated tasks (scripts) over the Internet. Typically, bots perform tasks that are both simple and structurally repetitive, at a much higher rate than would be possible for a human alone.”