I Used Muse to Plan My Wife’s Birthday Weekend. It Did Something Sneaky but Fixed It Fast

Just two days before my wife's birthday, I had only managed to buy her one present. She often feels sad because her birthday coincides with Halloween, when everyone is hungover from the festivities. For this year, we decided to brave the city's parade and visit a restaurant she's always wanted to try. With just one gift and a meal planned, I wanted to see if Meta's Muse personal AI agent could help plan the rest of our weekend.

I had previously used Muse successfully for finding items on Facebook Marketplace, and given its connectors like Ticketmaster and OpenTable, I hoped it could surface some fun weekend events. I wondered if it could even order a cake delivery for me or create wrapping paper. Could I do all of this with just one agent? Let's find out.

When I shared my plans with Muse, I asked what free events were happening in Manhattan on Saturday and in our local neighborhood on Sunday. The AI produced some interesting options, such as the Halloween parade, which we would attend before dinner. I requested a map showing the parade route with time stamps, focusing on what we could see around 7:30 p.m. as we walked from the East Village to the West Village.

Muse also provided some directions to ensure we could see all the costumes while still getting home to New Jersey without issue. With the night's plans set, I turned my attention to finalizing her gift. I fed Muse a few photos from our year and asked it to create printable gift wrap for the shoes I had bought her. While Muse seemed to struggle with this task, it did provide some helpful suggestions on the ideal print size to cover the shoebox without looking pixelated.

Meanwhile, I turned to ChatGPT to create the wrapping paper for her gift and took care of ordering the candy. My wife loves Good & Plenty licorice candy, but we don't have a store nearby that sells it. Muse searched various sites, but I eventually had to take control of the browser to get it logged in. Muse told me the price, which I was happy with, but it sneakily signed me up for Instacart Plus, even though I had instructed it not to.

Despite this hiccup, it did manage to order the candy for me. However, Muse charged me $23.35 instead of the expected $22.75, including a sign-on discount. After questioning Muse about it, I received a confirmation email stating that my subscription had been canceled successfully.

While Muse proved handy for Marketplace, event planning, and placing online orders, it didn't offer anything I couldn't find or do myself. It struggled with creative tasks like designing wrapping paper or ordering a cake. I decided that my sentimental wife would prefer a handmade cake or fro-yo treat instead. Muse's assistance may not be 100% autonomous, especially when handling payments, but it is still fun to have it run in the background, taking care of some personal tasks. Always stay on top of the situation, as AI agents are not perfect yet.