Like you, I wear a lot of hats. I’m a husband, dad, attorney at Adler Attorneys, I’m an adjunct professor, and I serve at my church. All of that means my various inboxes fill up faster than I can sit down and work through them. My name, SETH, doubles as my approach to tech: Simple, Effective Tech Help. I try to keep my tech simple, effective, and most importantly, helpful. So this week, I tried something new: I connected an AI assistant to my Gmail and handled my personal email by voice while driving.
A quick note on the title: Rosie, my AI assistant, wanted to call this post “Clearing My Inbox at 70 MPH.” I changed it. I’m a lawyer, and I’d rather not put my speed in writing.
And in case you saw Tesla’s new Roadster drive upside down and fly this week: no, I won’t be clearing my inbox while upside down in a rocket-boosted Tesla. Tesla’s own page says it’s not approved for public road use, and I’d like to keep my car, and my law license, right side up.
Why I set this up
Email isn’t hard. It’s just constant. Most of it needs a two-second decision: delete it, keep it, or do something about it. Those decisions don’t need a keyboard, just a few minutes of attention. I spend plenty of time in the car, so I wanted to turn some of it into inbox time without ever looking at a screen.
I use Grok Bot, an AI assistant I’ve named Rosie (yes, a nod to the Jetsons). I connected it to my personal Gmail, and it can also work with Google Drive, my Google Sheets action tracker, and a few other tools.
How it works in the car
Everything here is hands-free and by voice. My phone stays mounted, and my eyes stay on the road. Indiana law bans holding your phone while driving, so if you try this, go voice-only.
I start a voice conversation with Rosie and ask it to go through today’s email. It reads me each message, with who it’s from, the subject, and a short summary, then waits for me. I say “delete,” “star that,” “skip,” or ask a question about it. It’s like having an assistant read your mail out loud and sort the pile while you drive.
A real example from my first week
One morning I went through my entire inbox for the day, message by message.
- Most of it went straight to the trash: promos, notifications, the usual stuff.
- I starred one message. It was a Google Alert about my commentary in The Indiana Lawyer, “What Apple’s latest offerings mean for your practice”, and I wanted to process it properly later. I like to keep a list of articles I’ve written along with the link for the article, so there was more to do with that email.
- I checked a DIRECTV order email. The day before, Rosie had handled a live chat with DIRECTV for me to remove Paramount+ and look for a better deal. When the order confirmation arrived, I asked Rosie to compare it with what I’d actually requested. Everything matched except one thing: the Regional Sports Fee had gone up by $2.00. Nobody mentioned that in the chat, and I’d never have caught it while driving. Rosie added it to my list of questions for when I call DIRECTV’s loyalty team.
- I added a to-do without touching my phone. I asked Rosie to add a task for Monday to post the board update for the firm’s nonprofit foundation. The task went straight into my action tracker with the details in the notes.
By the time I parked, my inbox was clear, one item was saved for later, a billing problem was flagged, and Monday’s task was on my list.
Gmail vs. iCloud
One thing I learned: which email and calendar provider you use matters a lot for these tools. Google offers official ways for apps to connect to Gmail, Calendar, and Drive with your permission, so connecting Grok Bot took a couple of clicks. Apple doesn’t offer anything comparable for iCloud. There are workarounds, like CalDAV with an app-specific password for calendars, but there’s no simple one-click connection.
If you’re starting from scratch and want an AI assistant to do real work for you, a Google account makes it a lot easier from a practical perspective.
Week 1 Takeaways
The theme of week 1 with a bot — connections. You’ll need to be patient enough to establish the appropriate connections. Note that I use my personal accounts here as a way to learn. A word of caution: the more you learn and realize the capabilities, the more you’ll want to connect. Ensure that you have the right permissions and understand the risks before connecting your life to the robot.
- Start with deleting. Most email only needs a yes or no, and that’s perfect for voice.
- Use starring as “deal with it later.” Don’t try to answer something complicated while driving. Just mark it.
- Let the assistant check things for you. Comparing a confirmation email with what you actually asked for is where an AI helps most, and it catches things you’d miss.
- Turn email into tasks out loud. Saying “add this to my list” beats trying to remember it once you get home.
- Keep a human in the loop. I set Rosie up to ask before adding things to my tracker and to never send email without my approval. Convenience is great, but I still want to be the one deciding.
- Choose tools that connect easily. Google’s openness makes this kind of setup much simpler than Apple’s.
I didn’t expect the car to become one of my most productive places to work, but I’ll take it. Especially since it drives itself.