Culturebox: Like a Boss

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technology Like a Boss The joy of having a virtual assistant. By Farhad Manjoo Posted Tuesday, Nov. 9, 2010, at 5:38 PM ET Two months ago, before my wife and I had our first child, we enjoyed what seems now to have been all the free time in the world. The house was in order, and my e-mail was under control. We'd managed to plant a lovely garden, and our Netflix queue was full of long, dour, highbrow movies with subtitles. Things have changed. Now dishes pile up, we forget to take out the garbage, and I'm several weeks behind on e-mail. Weeds have overrun the garden. Our taste in movies, meanwhile, has gone down market--last week we tried to rewatch Airplane, but it proved a bit too complex, and we had to stretch it out over three nights. True, we've lately managed to get into a pretty good routine with the baby, but the slightest disturbance sends everything into a panic. The other day our newish electric kettle broke, and I became paralyzed with indecision. I didn't have the box or the receipt--should I bother waiting on hold with customer service to see whether I could return it? Should I just suck it up and buy a new kettle? For a week, I deliberated the pros and cons. To continue reading, click here. Farhad Manjoo is Slate's technology columnist and the author of True Enough: Learning To Live in a Post-Fact Society. You can e-mail him at farhad.manjoo@slate.com and follow him on Twitter. Join the Fray: our reader discussion forum What did you think of this article? POST A MESSAGE | READ MESSAGES Also In Slate Thought Experiment: What Would Happen if We Returned to the Gold Standard? Hey, SCOTUS: Strike Down the Old Citizenship Law That Discriminates Against Dads Weigel: The Bizarre, Anti-Deficit Campaign Starring the Imaginary Candidate Hugh Jidette	Advertisement
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