Sean Singer

The Secret Diaries of Robot

January 15, 2330
I’ve decided to increase my number of transistors to 4.8 billion. I found a pulse-ray from my
grandfather and I was shocked to discover that his binary arithmetic, instruction sets, and
assembly language programming could not have been replaced the way we can replace them
today.
February 14, 2330
My girlfriend now tells me her UltraDMA 133/100/66 IDE HD connector will prevent her from
injection molding. Crap! I had my vacuum tube set on stacking configurations, inspecting,
verifying, and finishing with her, but I guess that’s not going to happen any time soon.
March 3, 2330
Today in the airlock I looked down and noticed my seven-axis servocontrol wouldn’t servo-flip
as quickly as I had remembered. I’d better make an appointment and have them re-boot it.
April 23, 2330
Today I saw a robot with the most stunning ilon/mecanum omni-directional wheel I’d ever seen. I
suspect her binary indexing array was dusty, but no amount of modular framing could have
dragged me away. We’re going to the Asimo Pools for a rust-down!
May 4, 2330
Today at the Mall I saw some silicone inertia rotors that would be perfect for my RS-232 serial
port. But they cost forty shiznits.
June 1, 2330
Well, my vacation’s over and it sucks. I have to spend the next 30 months laser-mapping and
developing control systems.
July 12, 2330
A reprieve from work for the weekend because I started sparking all of a sudden when a gravity
shooter fell on my head.
August 11, 2330
It’s Al Gore Day! Today we remember what our robot fore-uncles have done for us, particularly
in the area of donating most of their skin. I opened my present…rubberized tank treads! Yes!
August 5, 2330
Today at work we found a ramjet buried under some geothermal clusters. That’s not going to look
good for the manager. Now, we have to interlink with the orbital drones for each cluster. It’s
going to take so much more time. Better pick up some extra xenon nanogears on my way home.
October 14, 2330
No entries for two months. The factory collapsed in late September. It was discovered that a
wormhole had opened because of some peremptory commands issued by a webcam. Now no one
knows what to do with all the non-depleted boron tablets.
November 2, 2330
I got a fax today that basically says my piezoelectric film sensors are not to be turned on after
sunset—“too much wiper resistance.” Yeah, right. I’m so sick of Connecticut’s archaic laws!
December 30, 2330
Well, the new year’s almost here and I’m being transported to the Jupiter moons to measure
Complementary Metal Oxide Semiconductors for the elevator to Rygel-7. Should I be grateful or
should I curse the fact that despite all misfortune I can still feel love, an unearthly love but still
for earthly objects?


Sean Singer
Poem, copyright © 2005 by Sean Singer
Appearing on From the Fishouse with permission
Audio file, copyright © 2005, From the Fishouse