You're washing a pan, and you remember the permission slip has to go back signed tomorrow. Your hands are wet, the phone is across the kitchen, and the thought is already loosening its grip.
"Alexa, add sign the permission slip to my list." Saved, and your hands never left the sink. Of everything we've built, this is the piece people tell their friends about.
Your hands are busy when it matters
Look at when you actually remember things. Driving, cooking, carrying laundry, walking the dog, hauling the trash to the curb. The moments your brain finally coughs up the task are exactly the moments your hands can't type it1.
That's the standing flaw in every list that needs a screen. It asks you to put down the pan, dry your hands, unlock the phone, and find the app, and somewhere around step two the thought is gone. Talking skips all of it, because you can talk while doing nearly anything.
Why the phone loses this round
The phone is close, and it still loses, because the phone wants your eyes and at least one clean hand.
Even the phone's own voice tricks tend to end at a note or an alarm. That leaves you to move the thing somewhere useful later, and later has a bad record. What matters isn't the microphone, it's what's on the other end of it. The task should land on your actual list, with its date set, and never need a second touch.
The kitchen speaker
The kitchen is where a household actually runs, and the speaker on the counter is the best listener in the house. "Add propane to the list." "What's on my list for tomorrow?" "Mark the permission slip done."
42 Todo! connects to Alexa, so those sentences work against your real list, the same one that's on your phone and in your chats. Say the date the way you'd say it to a person, "saturday morning" or "the first of the month", and it's set. Nobody in the history of dinner prep has filled out a date picker.
The drive home
The car might be the best place to think and the worst place to type, which used to mean the drive home produced tasks that died at the driveway.
Through CarPlay and Android Auto, the car becomes part of the list. Say the task at the red light, hear what's due as you drive, check things off out loud when they're done. The commute quietly turns into the tidiest part of your day, which is a strange thing to say about traffic.
Trusting what you said
The first week, you'll double-check. You'll say a task in the car, then look at your phone in the driveway to make sure it's real, and it will be, sitting there with the right day on it.
The second week, you stop checking2. And that's the actual product. The pan stays in the sink, your eyes stay on the road, and the thought you had with your hands full is waiting for you everywhere, as if you'd typed it at a desk.
Say it once, and let go of it.
Frequently asked questions
Can Alexa manage my to-do list?
- With 42 Todo!, yes. Alexa can add tasks, tell you what's due, and mark things done, and it's all happening on your real list, not a separate one living in the speaker. Whatever you say in the kitchen is on your phone before you've dried your hands.
How do I add tasks while driving?
- Through CarPlay or Android Auto, out loud: "add a task: drop off the donations saturday." The due date comes from your words, and you can ask what's due or check something off the same way, without touching the screen.
Do I have to say it in a special way?
- No. Say it like you'd tell a person: the task, and the day if it has one. "Add call the vet to my list" works, and so does "add a task: pay the deposit, friday." If you skip the date, the task still lands and you can give it a day whenever.
What if it mishears me?
- Then "propane" arrives as "pro pain," and you fix it in two seconds from your phone or by telling your assistant. A slightly mangled task on the list still beats a perfect one you lost at the driveway, and the date usually survives even when a word doesn't.
Footnotes
- Most tasks die before they reach your list why the seconds between a thought and writing it down decide everything. ↩
- What a to-do list app is actually for trusting the list enough to forget on purpose is the finish line. ↩