Daily(ish)

Part 2: My friend, Dave Rupert, wrote a short story back in 2018 called The Mammoth. I’ve long thought it would make a great audio play of some sort. And so I figured as a first attempt, I’d do a reading of it on my podcast for you. This is part 2.

Links Mentioned in This Episode:
Topics:
00:00 Dailyish Intro
00:14 Birthday Shoutout
00:20 Story Setup Part Two
00:35 Mammoth Faces And Ads
01:08 Job Site Commands
01:43 Accident In The Halo
02:19 Compliance Repealed
03:09 Machine Review Courtroom
03:56 Shame And Regret
04:20 Credits And Subscribe

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Creators and Guests

Host
Chris
I edit podcasts so you don't have to. I live in Saskatchewan so you don't have to?

What is Daily(ish)?

Challenging myself to record a podcast episode a day for my 50th year on this planet.

Hello and welcome to Dailyish
for September 21st, 2026.

I'm recording an episode every day
for this, my 50th year on the planet.

First, a shout-out to my youngest sister.

I don't know if she listens
to this, but happy birthday

So this is part two of my recording, my
reading of The Mammoth by Dave Rupert.

You can go back to the previous episode
if you didn't listen, uh, to get

part one, or the link to the actual
story is in the show notes, of course

creepy is also the reason they
put faces on the mammoths.

User experience researchers determined
that each mammoth, when activated, should

have a rudimentary electronic face like
a Japanese cartoon that blinks and cycles

through a series of random emotions

It can even emote vague
responses to questions.

This minimum viable sense of life
makes them seem less like monsters.

The gaudy lights didn't stop there.

Because these hulking beasts are the
size of billboards, advertising companies

figured out how to project display ads
on the sides of each mammoth when raised.

Construction companies, always eager to
make an extra buck, saw this as a win-win.

I escorted the walker up the
garage ramps to the second level

we were rehabbing that day.

It lowered itself about half
a meter to make the clearance.

Once at the P2 site, I
barked my next command.

Sit.

The sit routine takes a
good half minute to execute.

Again, some researchers believed it
was a better user experience to add an

animation sequence to make the mammoth
circle and wag its back end a bit to

make it look like a puppy laying down.

was pointless and wasted time, but
the billionaires and their gilded

wives who owned the buildings loved
to come to the job site and make

them perform over and over and over.

Borderline bot abuse, but whatever
pays the bills I made a critical

mistake during the sit routine.

The novelty of the routine is lost on me.

I've seen it a thousand times, so
maybe I was bored, but I simply lost

focus of what the mammoth was doing.

I was standing inside the warning halo
I felt the breath leave my body and my

jaw snap instantly as I was caught by
the whipping tail end of the mammoth.

I fell to the ground and rolled in pain.

Through blurred vision, I vaguely saw
the underside of the mammoth directly

above me complete its first circle,
then another I was unable to yell with

detached jaw and no air in my lungs.

If I could have yelled, I could
have stopped the animation cycle.

All mechanoids were originally required
by law to meet Access and Inclusion

Act compliance so that the deaf and
nonverbal could also operate the machines.

But as time went on, big businesses and
tech companies lobbied conservatives

to repeal the overregulation
citing costs and legal fees.

I remember briefly thinking I
could have used those requirements.

walkers also required sensors to always
know the position of their herder, but

due to the foggy weather interfering
with a 3D camera and a known firmware

bug with under-mounted proximity
sensors, hotfixed in the 14.0573.9873

patch later that day, there
was no way to cancel the order.

the mammoth realizing its herder no
longer had a pulse pinged the authorities

who arrived shortly thereafter.

My coworkers learned of my passing at
7:52 AM, the optimal time determined

by the algorithm where all our
employees could arrive simultaneously

to the job site by auto cab.

All job site accidents are
issued an immediate postmortem

called machine review.

Machine review is almost
like an AI courtroom.

It builds a forensic model
from all the available data

sensors and 3D job site footage.

Using the model and mountains of
historical workplace lawsuits, the

AI issues a liability judgment.

In fact, this judgment process
finished a few minutes after the

Mammoth lost track of my heartbeat.

It could have been delivered to my
family before my body was even found.

But again, researchers found that this
was considered too insensitive and

contributed to a bad user experience.

You can contest the postmortem, but
most don't out of embarrassment.

Cases involving mechanoids tend to
be high-profile, sensational news

stories that put man against machine
only to reveal the deceased doing

something embarrassingly stupid
or sexual at the time of death.

Families are smart to opt
for the settlement instead.

I worry that my family and friends
will somehow get copies of the video

scene assembled by the postmortem.

I worry about the gruesomeness,
the sadness of death, and the

effect that will have on my kids.

But what I fear most is that
they'll see me do nothing.

They'll see me standing in the
warning halo of the mammoth and

do nothing as I get sideswiped.

They'll see me do nothing.

That's the shame I bear.

Thanks again to Dave Rupert for giving
me the opportunity to record this

and publish this on the podcast feed.

Please be sure to visit the link to
his webpage to read the story in full.

Save it, archive it, share
it with your friends.

And as always, you can feel free to
reply to this post on social media where

I told you about this episode with any
questions, comments, concerns, et cetera.

Or you can email me at
chris.enns@gmail.com.

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visit daily.chrisenns.com/subscribe

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wherever you get your podcasts.

And I hope you'll be back tomorrow.

Thanks for listening.

Have a great day.

Bye.