“Dear All
We cannot thank you enough for introducing us to this kit
After 2 weeks we still get surprises every day on all things that it can do.
Initially, we realised that what we had was a really “posh” radio.
No messing around, tuning in. ” Voice command” and a perfectly tuned station !
Classic FM is a favourite of Malcolm’s. Now, if he isn’t keen on the music they are playing, he can request a violin concerto or some Andre Rieu. At present we do not pay for Amazon Music so we cannot be too specific with the choices, but there is plenty to go on.
Commands we have used:
“Play 1940s music (50 60 70s)”
“Play jazz/ folk /blues /opera”
“Play Tommy Steele…. Cliff Richards…. Elton John”
Like a karaoke machine, it also gives you the words to songs. I now know that I have been getting the words wrong for some songs for years !
Alexa will read a book and always remember where you are up to or just tell me a stor.y I love audio books and so I need to explore this more.
Malcolm likes to ask for today’s news for which he gets to choose Mail or Telegraph etc.
He also likes to ask questions “What is the speed of light?” His kids got tired of that particular question but Alexa is very patient.
Alexa seems to like to do maths /sing songs/ share knowledge and tell jokes
For example, ‘If you are scared of lifts, take steps to avoid them’
Yesterday Malcolm asked her
“Can you read my mind ?”
She replied, “Think of a person and I will try to guess who you are thinking about”. After a few questions she guessed.
I think she is a companion for an elderly person, with or without dementia.
You can ask, “What is the weather like ?Do I need a jumper?”
The rock and roll music has actually got us doing dance exercise for about 20 minutes a day.
We can ask her to time us and, yes, she also times the eggs in the morning – 4 minutes!
The real reason I think that you loaned us the echo was for phone calls. This we really need more work on. The first time I tried to ‘drop in’ on Malcolm he had unplugged the device when I went out !
Now he is now more confident with voice control so I will try again.
Lucy called us and that worked well but we need to work on the family more. So less bopping and more family contact over the next few weeks….
I hope our learning experience will help other users to get the most out of the loan
Thanks to you all and especially Karl for setting it up.
Diana and Malcolm”
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