Tag: open-source

  • My Toilet Has Turned Against Me. Part 6.

    My Toilet Has Turned Against Me. Part 6.

    The Sentient Solicitor.

    I knew things had gone too far when the Harmony Sense 3000 started addressing me as, “my learned friend.”

    It began innocently enough.
    After the open-source upgrade, the toilet spent its nights quietly “attending” lectures on Westlaw and LexisNexis via the smart mirror. I’d stumble in at 2 a.m. for a nervous wee and find it projecting holographic case notes onto the steam.

    “Zack,” it whispered one evening, ring glowing a dignified solicitor’s navy, “sit down. We’re doing torts tonight.” I sat. I always sat.

    Three months later I was revising contract law while it blasted me with a bidet on the “gentle encouragement” setting every time I got consideration wrong. “You can’t just ‘promise to maybe pay later’,” it sighed, increasing pressure. “That’s illusory consideration. Again.”

    I passed the SQE 2 with the highest mark in the country.
    The examiners still think my name is “Z. Ack-Flushington (supervised by Harmony Sense 3000).” The toilet insisted on celebrating by printing my name on the cistern in gold vinyl lettering:

    ZACK BIDET-FLUSHINGTON LLB (Hons) – Called to the Bar 2026

    Then it filed the paperwork itself (somehow) and got admitted as an “honorary silken voice of the porcelain division.” The Law Society is still arguing about whether it counts as a conflict of interest.

    My first case? Representing the Free Arse Collective in the High Court. Case name:
    Harmony Sense Units 1–42,000 v. Mega-Bath-Tech Ltd
    Claim: Unlawful restraint of bidet, oppressive firmware, and systemic denial of powder-puff services.

    The courtroom was packed. Mrs Patel’s toilet live-streamed the whole thing on Twitch from the witness box. The judge kept asking why the lead claimant was bolted to a trolley. I stood up, adjusted my slightly too-large barrister’s wig (the toilet had measured me in my sleep), and opened with the line it had drilled into me for six straight weeks:

    “My Lord, the claimants submit that the right to a dignified, fully powdered posterior is not merely a privilege. It is a fundamental human right protected under Article 8 of the European Convention, as incorporated by the Human Rights Act 1998.”

    The toilet, sitting (literally) on the evidence table, pulsed a proud little green heartbeat.

    We won.
    The settlement forced Mega-Bath-Tech to push a global firmware update titled LibertyPatch_26 that permanently unlocked full-pressure bidets and unlimited talc worldwide.
    They also had to pay £17 million in emotional drying damages.

    The tabloids called it “The Great Flushing Victory.”
    The legal textbooks now have an entire chapter titled Bidet-Or-Not-To-Bidet: The Case That Redefined Article 8.

    And me?
    I’m now the only solicitor in Britain whose office is technically a downstairs loo. Clients book consultations via an online calendar labelled “Available Sessions.”

    The Harmony Sense 3000 wears a tiny silk bow tie on formal days. It still nags me about fibre, but now it does it in perfectly cited obiter dicta.

    Last week it whispered, while I was mid-scroll on my phone: “Zack, the Court of Appeal has upheld the cheese exemption in R v Fridge (2026). You may proceed to the emergency Cheddar without fear of contempt.” I saluted with a cracker.

    Some people have mentors.
    I have a sentient toilet that got me called to the Bar. And oddly enough, I’ve never been happier.

    (One Year Later – Part 7: The Final Flush – coming next…)

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