Aber wenn man versucht manchmal...

It was a sunny and unseasonably warm Thursday morning in March and the birds were singing. After crawling out from beneath the embers of the inferno that very nearly took his life, the man spent much of the following several months in insurance and law offices trying to piece together the left-over smoking, smouldering pieces of his life. While he hadn't had the forethought to purchase any kind of flood or fire insurance, he managed to be chased down by a lawyer who had trained in the American tradition of tort law and had convinced him to sue the #$%& out of Amazon and their useless paper weight of an "intelligent" assistant. While Amazon put up quite a fight in defending the good name of their baby Alexa, it wasn't long before the man's lawyer (some writer has-been named John Grisham) convinced the powers that be at Amazon LLC GmbH Inc Corp that they had better settle this particular claim if for nothing else than to preserve Alexa's good name (you do what you gotta do for your daughter). When the cheque for fifty million EUR arrived and he settled the bill with Mr. Grisham, ESQ, he had 37 million left over to buy a brand new apartment and perhaps put a little away for his retirement. He had had his eye on a modest 3-bedroom in the Lehel district overlooking the English Garden, however, and it's not like they were just going to give it away. With the thirty-seven million Euros he now had, he only needed to take out a small mortgage of nineteen million, seven hundred and eighty thousand Euros to be able to afford the place. With the paperwork signed, his possessions deposited in the top-floor dwelling, and the first 17,000 EUR Hausgeld monthly payment taken care of, he stepped out on to the balcony and took a sip of his espresso. It tasted a little cold.

Du kannst nicht immer bekommen was du willst

Early evening on a cold Sunday in November. The streets are wet and the rain-filled humid air leaves everything with a faint dampness and a not-as-faint hint of a sad smell. The windows weep and their tears drip down to the cold dirty floor below. An impotent fan roars with thunderous noise yet the dank air remains sodden while the thick black mould that is the window sill's only friend accumulates a further layer onto its putrid self. Expanding its miserable self is its only reason for being. A tired man sinks deeply into his tired damp couch. The coils of the rusty springs have long since given way and a jagged metallic discomfort urgently converses with the man's back. His state of exhaustion prevents him from neutralizing the uncompromising pain in his back and he simply grimaces in an exaggerated look of discomfiture as his squalid feet from the sordid floor settle over the dilapidated arm of the old piece of furniture. A lunatic freezing in the streets screams incessantly, carrying his chilling horrifying voice over the smog-filled chaos of the nearby motorway. The closed window, preserving the suffocating air inside, provides less than a broken-down weak muffler to keep the nightmarish howling from one of society's forgotten at bay. Wires dangerously dangle from above where illumination was once extant. The clock suddenly strikes six and the wind bashes and bangs the cheap broken-down metal shutters. Despite the noise, the smell, the dampness, and his extreme physical discomfort, the man begins to nod off to sleep. A hypnagogic jerk jolts him up from the despicable couch and he makes his way to the broken-down kitchen. As he's making a coffee a power surge from the brewing storm disables the coffee machine mid-pour. When the electricity reengages it causes a spark that starts a roaring electrical fire on the mid-century deeply-worn stovetop. The flames spread quickly and soon he is surrounded by bright blue, yellow, and red fire. He is quickly enveloped by thick black smoke. Luckily he has recently purchased an Amazon Echo Dot, the "intelligent speaker" powered by an artificial "intelligence" called Alexa. The man says "Alexa, what do I do?". The speaker says "I'm sorry, I didn't get that." He says, again, "Alexa, what do I do?". The speaker says "Please remember to invoke the skill that you're interested in by name." The man is now on the floor gasping for air and is surrounded by what's amounting to a deadly inferno. He pleads, "Alexa, call the fire department!". The speaker replies, "I'm sorry, 'fire department' is not in your address book." The man is now flat on his back. He is breathing is short, pathetic gasps. Through his final dying breath he whispers "Alexa, why did I buy you? Goodbye, cruel world...". The speaker says, "Your Amazon order for two audio books of Elvis Costello's 'Goodbye Cruel World' is confirmed. Your preferred payment method..." before the speaker finally gives out and the entire previously wet apartment is fully engulfed in flames.