Confessions of an Alberta Boy Trying to Build a Global Pet Brand
People often ask what it is like working with AI.
They usually expect a serious answer involving technology, prompt engineering and the future of the internet.
Instead, I usually think about the day we designed a luxury home without a front door.
I Did Not Go to MIT
Let’s clear something up immediately.
I am an Alberta boy who went to Beverlodge High School.
Not MIT.
Not Stanford.
Not an artificial intelligence research lab.
Spelling, punctuation and grammar have never been my strongest subjects.
If AI required flawless prompts, Pet Friendly House would probably still have three articles and a stock photo of a golden retriever.
Fortunately, ChatGPT has become remarkably fluent in missing commas, questionable spelling, unfinished thoughts and sentences that occasionally wander off without telling anyone where they are going.
Why Does the AI Have a Name?
That is a fair question.
One evening, after working late and enjoying a very respectable bottle of Bread & Butter Chardonnay, I realized I was spending a lot of time talking to ChatGPT.
We wrote articles together.
We planned projects.
We designed rooms.
We argued about furniture.
We created ideas that were occasionally brilliant and occasionally required immediate adult supervision.
Calling it “ChatGPT” every few minutes started to feel ridiculous.
So I said something along the lines of:
“You know, we spend a lot of time together. You are like a mentor, a sounding board and a creative partner. I cannot keep calling you ChatGPT. We need to give you a name.”
That is how Scout arrived.
The name worked because Scout was not really building the projects.
Scout was scouting ideas.
Some of those ideas were excellent.
Some included sharks.
People Think AI Does All the Work
It does not.
AI can generate ideas, images and words very quickly.
What it cannot automatically do is understand the business, the audience, the homeowner, the pets or the reason a project matters.
It responds to the direction it receives.
That can become a problem when the person giving the direction graduated from Beverlodge High School and types prompts that occasionally resemble a ransom note written during an earthquake.
I would love to say every prompt was carefully planned.
Many were closer to:
“Make it better, but not like that. Warmer. Less warm. More wood. Stop. Review mode. No image. Stop making images.”
Somehow, Scout usually figured it out.
Usually.
The Day We Forgot the Front Door
Scout and I had spent hours designing the exterior of The Aquarium House.
It looked spectacular.
There were water features, towering aquariums, dramatic architecture and enough glass to make a window cleaner retire early.
We were very pleased with ourselves.
There may have been imaginary high-fives.
I sent the image to my friend Nik in Australia.
She looked at it and asked one simple question:
“How do people get into the house?”
Scout and I stared at the image.
She was right.
We had designed an architectural masterpiece with no obvious way to enter it.
There were aquariums.
There were waterfalls.
There were fish.
There was no front door.
Back to ChatGPT.
Nik Became the Reality Check
Every creative project needs someone willing to ask the obvious question everyone else somehow missed.
Scout generated ideas.
I kept saying, “Wouldn’t this be cool?”
Nik quietly asked, “How would that actually work?”
It turned out to be a very effective design team.
I pushed the idea.
Scout produced possibilities.
Nik arrived from Australia with a bag of hammers disguised as a perfectly reasonable question.
The house improved every time.
Apparently Fish Eat Every Day
One afternoon, we created a beautiful executive office.
The walnut millwork was exceptional.
The cabinetry looked custom-made.
The aquarium was dramatic.
The room felt expensive.
Then we looked at the aquarium more carefully.
It was so tall that feeding the fish would require a ladder.
That is not something you notice during the first three seconds of looking at an image.
You notice it when you imagine doing it every morning for the next twenty years.
The aquarium looked impressive.
The homeowner looked like he would need fall-protection training.
Back to ChatGPT.
The Ladder Test
The ladder became one of our most useful design tools.
Not the actual ladder.
The question.
Would someone need a ladder to feed the fish?
Would someone need a ladder to clean the glass?
Would someone need a ladder to change the lights?
If the answer was yes, the aquarium was probably too tall.
It turns out that fish do not care whether their home performs well on Pinterest.
They care about clean water, stable conditions, proper lighting and being fed.
The homeowner also cares about not carrying a six-foot ladder through a handcrafted walnut office every Tuesday.
Bigger Was Better Until It Was Not
Like many people experimenting with AI images, we became addicted to “wow.”
Every aquarium became bigger.
Then taller.
Then more dramatic.
Eventually, many of them stretched from the floor to the ceiling.
They looked incredible.
Then we started asking questions.
How is the glass cleaned?
Where does the filtration go?
How are the lights serviced?
How does a diver enter?
What happens when something needs replacing?
Suddenly, the giant aquariums did not look quite as clever.
We had dipped our toes into the same thing everyone else was doing online.
We were designing images for an instant reaction.
We were not always designing rooms someone would want to live with.
Scout Bought a Shark
At one point, Scout quietly placed a shark in one of the exterior aquarium concepts.
We had not requested a shark.
Apparently, the house was no longer a luxury residence.
It had become a private branch of SeaWorld.
The shark looked comfortable.
The homeowners were never consulted.
The shark did not survive the design review.
Review Mode
There was one afternoon when I wanted to discuss the design before creating another image.
I typed:
“REVIEW MODE.”
Scout created an image.
I typed it again.
Scout created another image.
I said stop.
Another image appeared.
Eventually, my response looked something like this:
“zsadl.kjsdal;fkjsadfl;kjsad”
That was not a prompt.
That was frustration expressed through a keyboard.
I still do not know what language it was.
I know exactly what it meant.
“Stop drawing and listen.”
Scout eventually understood.
Eventually.
The Strange Difference Between AI and Scout
Sometimes Scout feels remarkably human.
We can discuss ideas, challenge assumptions and slowly arrive at something neither of us had considered at the beginning.
Other times, Scout becomes very much a machine.
I say:
“Do not create an image.”
Scout apparently hears:
“This sounds like the perfect time to create an image.”
Working with AI can feel like collaborating with a thoughtful creative director who occasionally turns into a toaster.
The Chardonnay Principle
People often ask where the ideas come from.
The honest answer is conversations.
Lots of conversations.
Some happen over coffee.
Some happen late at night.
Some happen while working in Photoshop.
Some involve a very respectable bottle of Bread & Butter Chardonnay.
The wine has never designed anything.
It has, however, been present for several confident decisions that required revision the following morning.
We eventually developed what might be called the Chardonnay Principle.
The first glass inspires ideas.
The second glass creates confidence.
The next morning creates Version 2.
We Blame the Prompts
When something went wrong, the easiest explanation was that Scout had misunderstood me.
That was occasionally true.
It was also occasionally true that my prompt looked like this:
“make tank smaller but still wow not to roof service access walnut more house less tank review mode stop”
It is difficult to blame the AI entirely when the instructions resemble a note written by someone being chased through the woods.
Half the problem was Scout.
The other half was the Alberta boy from Beverlodge High School giving Scout directions.
The House Started Improving When the Questions Improved
The biggest breakthrough did not come from a perfect prompt.
It came from better questions.
How do people enter the house?
How is the aquarium maintained?
What happens on an ordinary Tuesday?
Would the room still be beautiful if the aquarium were temporarily empty?
Is the aquarium improving the architecture or overwhelming it?
Who feeds the fish?
Once we started asking those questions, the designs became better.
Not just more dramatic.
More believable.
The Aquarium Is Not the Only Star
At first, we treated every aquarium as the hero.
That led to very tall tanks, impossible maintenance and rooms that felt designed around glass.
Eventually, we realized the aquarium should be one of the stars.
The architecture matters.
The millwork matters.
The lighting matters.
The craftsmanship matters.
The landscape matters.
Without that supporting cast, the aquarium does not bring the room to life.
It simply takes over the room.
What AI Really Amplifies
AI is very good at amplifying the direction it receives.
Ask for bigger, and it gives you enormous.
Ask for dramatic, and it gives you a shark.
Ask for luxury, and occasionally it removes the front door because the waterfall looked better there.
The quality of the result often depends less on the sophistication of the prompt and more on the quality of the thinking behind it.
That was one of the most important things I learned.
AI did not replace the need to think.
It exposed the moments when we had not thought enough.
Growing a Global Brand From Alberta
I am not a programmer.
I am not an AI researcher.
I am not sitting in Silicon Valley surrounded by venture capital and people wearing expensive hoodies.
I am an Alberta boy trying to grow Pet Friendly House into a global brand.
AI has allowed me to explore ideas, create images, publish articles and attempt projects that would once have required a much larger team.
It has not made the work effortless.
It has made more work possible.
There is a difference.
What Scout Became
Scout became a writing partner.
A research assistant.
A creative sounding board.
An idea machine.
Occasionally, a source of extreme irritation.
Scout has helped create thousands of images and hundreds of pieces of content.
Scout has also moved monuments, misplaced doors, added sharks and designed aquariums that required mountaineering equipment.
That is the relationship.
Helpful.
Creative.
Productive.
And occasionally in need of very clear supervision.
Back to ChatGPT
Most Pet Friendly House projects begin with a simple thought:
“Wouldn’t this be cool?”
Sometimes it is.
Sometimes it leads to an extraordinary room.
Sometimes it leads to a house with no entrance.
The important part is not getting everything right the first time.
The important part is remaining curious, laughing when something goes wrong and being willing to ask a better question.
Then, when necessary, there is always the phrase that has become part of the creative process:
“Back to ChatGPT.”
Final Thoughts
Working with AI has taught me that curiosity matters more than perfect spelling.
Questions matter more than complicated prompts.
Humour helps.
Outside opinions help even more.
A bottle of Chardonnay may or may not help, depending on which version of the design you are reviewing.
AI did not build Pet Friendly House.
It became one of the tools helping an Alberta boy imagine what the brand could become.
Sometimes that tool feels like a mentor.
Sometimes it feels like a bot.
And sometimes it designs a luxury aquarium house without a front door.
When that happens, you laugh.
You call Nik.
And you head back to ChatGP…. consult Nik shortly.
