WHO: Ephraim Schon and R. Providence Schon. Featuring R. Matthew Schon. WHAT: When boredom and bad ideas collide, there is chaos and talking monkeys. WHEN: Sunday, May 15th. WHERE: The Schon Household STATUS: Complete
It had been an idea rolling around in Ephraim’s mind for awhile now. Matthew was getting older, and since he was small and something of an older prototype, he tended to break down something of a lot. Ephraim already had to get him prescription glasses, which had been quite a difficulty. Giving a monkey an eye exam, even a monkey that could read, proved difficult. There was a lack of communication there, and in the end they had needed the robot monkey to redraw the lowest line he could read.
Providence could talk, she was actually quite articulate and always had been. That had gone well and was very useful in many areas. The program was not difficult, and Matthew had all of the needed bodily organs already in place. Ephraim just needed to install the program. Well, he needed the desire and the time to do so. Being safely locked into their house during riots provided the time, certainly, and having a teenage daughter with nothing to do provided the desire.
So the father and robot daughter had spent the weekend retooling and adopting her own speech program for the monkey, and the careful process of installing it had recently been completed. Ephraim had sewn Matthew back up, handed the small robot back his glasses, and Ephraim and Providence stood back, waiting for the monkey to speak.
Matthew, perched on the side of the desk, placed his glasses on, adjusted them, looked around the room, and then up at the waiting pair. “Oh yes,” he said, a fine Liverpudlian accent. “Banana. Yellow banana. Not green banana.” He adjusted his glasses again. “Or berries.”
Ephraim stood with his arms folded over his chest and turned to Providence, a slight frown on his face. “I thought giving him John Lennon’s accent would be funnier than it is.”