Case in point: This tweet from a several minutes back (relative to the time of writing):
She's the professional people-watcher, obviously, but I can't help but channelling Fargo's Margie Gunderson: "Oh, I don't know if I agree 100% with your detective work there..."
After all:
- Your smartphone wouldn't argue about splitting the bill for the appetiser platter because there were an odd number of cheese sticks and you technically had more than half.
- Moreover, you can count on your smartphone's calculator app. to be able to compute the tip. So unless you usually dine out with a math nerd, it's not apples-to-apples there, either.
- And speaking of Apples...Siri knows that you're not really a gluten-free-paleo-vegan..and you're going to order dessert plus an extra glass of wine...because nobody's watching. But Siri isn't going to tell anyone. Siri doesn't judge.
- Yeah, sure, you're still gonna totally Instagram that meal. But there's enough of a stigma about solo dining that you wouldn't be so uncool as to Facebook a selfie, now would you?
- Retina HD vs. standard "tea-light bath in the bat-cave" ambience of most restaurants after dark. 'Nuff said.
But maybe, someday, with the advances of AI or holographic Skype or some bad seed love-child of Google Glass and Google Hangouts, the practical differences between a dining companion with a battery and a dining companion with a pulse will actually be nil. When that happens, I trust that there will also be an app. to automatically cancel your ZipCar and Uber you home when you try to drunk-text your ex.
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* My thanks to Ms. Hall for graciously allowing a random person from Twitter to borrow her work for nefarious purposes. She's a good sport.
