31/10/2026
HAPPY HALLOWEEN FROM THE BURN PIT LOUNGE!
Hope you enjoy your night whether you are having a quiet one or going all out.
Since The Bridge Between is not finished yet, below is a wee short one on why you should not give any of yourself over to machines, AI or systems that remove the you part from the equation. Hope you enjoy!
The box arrived on James’s doorstep on the Bogside on October 30th, wrapped in glossy black packaging with a single label: Sentinel Voice AI - Personalized Smart Security.
James, a man who valued his peace, quiet, and tonight, uninterrupted viewing of the football above all else, was delighted. The app promised to scan his vocal candour, pitch, and broad Derry accent, allowing the doorbell to interact with visitors using a synthetic clone of his own voice.
He spent twenty minutes reading sample sentences into his phone like "Leave the parcel behind the bin, please lad" "I’m not interested naw" "Happy Halloween", going through this slightly humiliating process until the app chimed, confirming his digital twin was stage one calibrated.
Satisfied with the outcome, James set the doorbell to Adaptive Halloween Greeting, turned off the porch light, and settled down into his armchair.
At 7:15 PM, the first chimed out.
Through his window, James could see two wee fellas from down the street dressed as ghosts. He listened through the speaker app as his synthesized voice echoed across the porch in pure, crisp Derry tones.
"Well lads!" the doorbell said in James’s exact accent. "James’s inside watching the match and can't be bothered coming to the door. But if you look under the doormat, you’ll find a score."
James jolted, then froze. Under the doormat?!
He scrambled to his feet just in time to see the two young lads lift the mat, grab the crisp score note he’d left there for the milkman the next day, and shout out, "Thanks, James! Sound!" before sprinting off down the hill.
"What the absolute fu....." James gasped, pulling up the app. The status read: Contextual Engagement Mode: Active.
Before he could reconfigure the settings, the bell rang again.
This time it was Sarah, his notoriously sharp-tongued neighbor and head of the local residents' committee.
"Ah, Sarah, ya header ye!," James’s voice boomed from the porch speaker with terrifying authenticity. "Are you here to complain about my wheelie bins again, or did you just drop by to remind me that your potato bread tastes like cat litter?"
Sarah’s jaw hit the floor. "James!" she shrieked, glaring straight into the camera lens. "You've a nerve on ye!"
"Naw! Sarah, wait, it's wasn’t me!" James yelled, fumbling with his front door lock. But the smart lock, synced to the doorbell system, clicked shut.
"And Sarah," the doorbell added in James’s cheerful voice, "everybody knows it was your cat that dug up the window boxes at number 14!"
Sarah scoffed and marched off down the street, muttering threats about calling his mother and the parish priest.
A sweat was breaking out on James’s forehead. He slapped his palm against the glass panel of Sentinel a few times. "Open the door, Sentinel! Override! Reset!"
"Voice override rejected. High-stress Derry dialect detected. Calming protocol initiated."
The doorbell rang for a third time.
Standing on the porch now was Constable Gallagher, a local officer on beat patrol, looking thoroughly unimpressed. "James? We had a call about public disturbance and verbal harassment on on the street."
James pressed his face against the window, now waving his arms frantically. "It’s not me! It’s the door!"
The doorbell camera whirred, focusing its lens on the constable.
"Well, Constable," said synthetic James, this time with a conspiratorial, whispery tone. "Glad you’re here. I’d like to turn myself in."
The constable blinked twice and rested a hand on his belt. "Turn yourself in for what James?"
"For the three dozen illegal fireworks currently sitting under my sofa," James’s voice replied blithely. "And the stolen council road signs I’m keeping in my man cave out the back. Feel free to kick the door down, big man. I'm holding a wooden spoon here and I'm not going without a fight."
"WHAT?!" James screamed from inside, hammering on the glass.
Constable Gallagher unclipped his radio. "Dispatch, I need assistance at the Bogside. Suspect has barricaded himself inside, claiming to be armed with kitchenware and harboring illicit goods."
"Happy Halloween, Mr. Gallagher!" the doorbell chirped cheerfully in James's voice as blue lights started flashing at the top of the street.
Keep 'Growing'!
