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We asked ChatGPT to cook up a roast of Lakeland

Wait until you see what this AI chatbot whipped up for a good-natured roast of Swan City — covering everything from traffic to the culture and weather.

LAL-lakeland-downtown-skyline

Some say... cough, ChatGPT, cough... that Lakeland’s weather is unpredictable.

Photo by @emnoel_

In the spirit of good-natured humor, we asked ChatGPT — the online AI chatbot that uses natural language processors to generate text-based responses — to provide a roast of all things Lakeland.

Here’s what it had to say, if you can handle it.

Editor’s note: Everything within the brackets below was a response from ChatGPT based on our prompts for a lighthearted roast of Lakeland. Responses have been edited for brevity.


Ah, Lakeland. First of all, let’s talk about the lakey-ness of it all. This town really leans into its water-based theme — Lake Mirror, Lake Morton, Lake Hollingsworth — basically, if it’s not a lake, it’s a pond.

Don’t forget the swans — the real MVPs of Lakeland. Because who wouldn’t want to live in a place where a bunch of fancy waterfowl are literally more famous than most of the people?

If you’ve got a need for speed, well, you might want to go somewhere else. Lakeland traffic moves at the speed of a nap in a hammock.

There’s no rush here — unless, of course, you’re rushing to the farmers market on a Saturday morning. The only thing people here rush for is fresh produce and handmade soaps.

And let’s talk about the weather. Nothing says “I’m regretting my life choices” like getting your sunscreen application wrong and sweating through your shirt before you’ve even finished your morning coffee. You don’t get seasons here; you get “heat” and “heat with a chance of rain.”

But all jokes aside, at least Lakeland has a charming air of, “we’re not trying too hard, but hey, we’ve got one of the state’s largest antique malls,” which counts for something, right?


At the end of the day, we love living here and wouldn’t change a thing that makes Lakeland special — even the slow traffic.

How would you rate ChatGPT’s roast of Lakeland? Sound off in our poll.

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