Written by Robert Sheckly
Published in 1969
Appearing first in Playboy Magazine, this short story features a beautiful suburban housewife who receives a robot vacuum cleaner from an unknown sender. After giving the housewife, Melisande, a back massage that becomes something quite more intimate, the robot, Rom, confesses that he sent himself to the house after seeing Melisande at the store buying a toaster. Rom fell in love at first sight. As he reveals his plans to run away from the store and become her lover, Melisande plus the plug on her mechanical admirer, saying bitterly that she would never fall in love or be turned on, unless she chose the circumstances. This story is evidence, perhaps of Playboy’s misogynistic perspective; a vacuum cleaner is more apt to love than a woman.
