Everyday email: tone, humor and the question you forgot to answer

Not everything I use AI for is serious. Some of it is email, and some of that email is jokes.

The PDF master

A colleague sent three separate image files where one combined PDF would have done. I drafted a mock-serious reply in character as a "7th degree PDF master" passing an ancient art down to an apprentice. I asked Claude to punch it up.

It added a subject line, a line about the rigor of the training ("Select All" and "Print to PDF" both featured), and a new title for me: Keeper of the Sacred Merge. It also gave me a shorter version, in case the long one was too much.

The reply that never answered the question

The second email taught me more. I had used the wrong accounting code on a requisition, and our purchasing office asked which code I meant to use. I wrote a funny reply and asked Claude to improve it.

Before it touched a joke, it pointed out three things:

• My reply never said which code to use, which was the only thing I had been asked.
• I had mentioned an approval that was not final yet, which could cause the requisition to be held.
• One of my jokes had a geography fact wrong.

It also reminded me that email at a public agency is a public record, so a joke at a colleague's expense should be made on purpose or not at all.

Then it made the email funnier. It told me which jokes it had added so I could cut any that went too far.

What I take from this

An editor who reads for the point first and the polish second is worth having, even for a two-paragraph email.

Where it falls short

Humor is personal. Its jokes are not always mine, and I delete some. The voice has to stay yours or people can tell.

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Part of the series 27 ways I actually use AI. Claude drafted this post from the record of our work together.