More people will be taking calls made by Google Assistant soon, as the company begins public tests of the Duplex technology. Only a select group of users and restaurants across the US will be involved in the initial wave, though. It might be awhile before you can punch in a few parameters (number of people, time range) and have Assistant book reservations on the phone for you.

If you're one of the lucky few, you might find the entire experience a little surreal, as I did. To be fair, most testers won't be in the same situation I was -- in a relatively quiet restaurant on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, carefully watched by an audience of about five people (including fellow tech reporters and Google's product lead and engineers). I felt a little self-conscious as I picked up the phone and spoke with Assistant, but I think the AI should have been more worried.

"Hello, this is Thep Thai restaurant," I yelled down the phone. I knew in advance it'd be Assistant on the line, thanks to the caller ID and the fact that this was a demo setup. To be clear, this was the real Duplex system we were invited to test, and we weren't talking with prerecorded clips. It was altogether possible to trip up the system by being unintelligible or even unreasonable, and we were given free rein to confuse Assistant. So I tried to come up with common scenarios I could see being problematic.

After it identified itself and informed me the call would be recorded, Assistant asked, in a friendly male voice, to make a reservation for Friday, June 30th. "Sure, for how many people?" I asked.

"For four?" The Assistant replied with an upward inflection.

"I'm sorry, we don't take reservations for parties smaller than five," I immediately shut Assistant down. After all, if I did indeed run a restaurant in New York, it would certainly be an exclusive establishment. Plus, I'd been on the receiving end of such requirements many times.

"Oh, OK. What's the wait time like then?"

I was surprised by the follow-up. I was expecting Assistant to simply give up, but like a meticulous helper, it knew to ask for more information.

"It's about an hour's wait, we're really busy on Fridays," I riffed.

"OK, thank you," the Assistant said. I had one last chance to throw Duplex off, so I went for it.

"Just so you know, on Fridays, we have an all-day brunch menu, so come prepared to eat just breakfast foods," I quickly tacked on.

No response.

Assistant was either very confused or gone. I hung up, feeling slightly relieved that I had survived, but also exhilarated at having possibly tripped up the AI.