In the past two months, our youngest moved out, our dog died, and now the house is very, very quiet. Shhhhhhh… If you listen closely you can hear the sound of my fingers on the keyboard.

During this changing season of my life, I’m still committed to my personal transformation journey from technophobe to occasional AI user. The future is here, unfolding all around us, and I don’t want to fall behind like those people who refused to use email when it first came out.

So every day I try to learn something new about AI, not only for my own professional growth, but also so that I can have conversations with my husband Brad about it. An overwhelmingly large percentage of Brad’s workday now involves real world AI deployment. Dinner conversations can become quite technical around here.

To keep myself updated, I listen to AI news podcasts on Spotify and try to stay up with AI trends. For research, scheduling, and brainstorming, I’ve used CoPilot, Gemini, ChatGPT, Claude, and now I’ve added Perplexity for deeper research.

Of these, Claude is still by far my favorite. I use the free version, so there are some limitations. But it’s my go-to when I’m looking for an AI assistant to help schedule my writing and editing workdays.

What about you? What’s your favorite AI?

Here are some other things I’m thinking about this week…

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Something New:

• Anthropic’s Claude Mythos comes with a dire warning. Seeing as how Claude is my AI bestie, I must tread lightly here in fear of angering the robot overlords. But Anthropic has another new AI named Mythos that is so powerful, only an elite number of companies can use it. Calling it “a hacker’s superweapon,” cybersecurity experts worry that Mythos will fall into the wrong hands and result in some kind of massive cyberattack involving banks or other critical infrastructure. Is this just some kind of PR stunt? Only time will tell.

Something Old:

• Mental health stigma. Times have changed, thank God. It is now cool to be open and transparent about struggles with mental health. Record numbers of people are even turning to AI chatbots to help with their mental health. According to a study just published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, the practice is so prevalent that researchers now recommend that clinicians and therapists should ask patients how they are using AI, just like they ask questions about sleep, lifestyle, and alcohol use. Anything that gets people talking about mental health is a win.

Something Inspiring:

• Robotic exoskeleton helps heart patient heal faster. My husband and I were eating dinner the other night when I saw this story on our local evening news. Heart patients often take a long time to regain physical mobility after surgery. But this North Texas heart transplant patient now uses a robotic exoskeleton to move around. While exoskeletons have long helped people with spinal cord injuries, this is new for heart-related immobility. Kinda cool. 

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Okay, that’s all for now. Join me here next week for more.