Dear LPG, 

Do you remember that Christmas when Alexa was the most popular present bought?  I remember first hearing about them in 2017 and like most of us oldies I decided that I did not want to know.    I think that the thought of a little bit of technology listening all the time was somehow worrying to me and a lot of other older people too, but despite that they have sidled their way into our lives over the past four or so years.

Many of us have got used to them and I have even been known to apologise to mine from time to time.   I don’t even check the time on my watch anymore, I just talk, and it answers.  My children bought me my first one back in 2019 and reluctantly I left it in the corner, but it is really convenient to be able to just ask about the weather as you are getting ready to go out.  I find myself asking those little questions that can settle a dispute about how to spell something or if a certain local shop is open.

Those of us who have had one or two at home just take them for granted for the most part but, after more than three years of taking it for granted that the light will go off when I tell it to, I have noticed that I am beginning to have to ask more than once on occasion.   I have noticed that one of my two has started ignoring me or answering me with, ‘Sorry, I’m not sure.’  a bit more often and I just thought it was getting old, but there is more to it than that.  

I have learned to plug it out and then in again and that worked for a while, but when it started to ignore me a bit more I phoned Alexa, and they sorted out the problem for me.  After a bit of a telephone wait, they showed me how to reset it, but I have since realised that there are quite a lot of videos on YouTube which could have saved me the wait.

I still draw the line at having one that can see what is going on in my home, but just in case your Alexa is becoming annoyingly good at ignoring you, or you find yourself seeing red when you look at the ring of light, I would like to share the information learned from the internet and, if that fails or is too hard to follow, their telephone number is 0800 279 7234 although I think that you might need to know your password when you phone and have a degree of control over the app.  I hope it helps… 

SC, Honor Oak 

SC shares what she found… 

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