I had worried about getting home before dark throughout the entire movie because since I don't drive and Phil has absolutely no sense of direction going new places is a challenge.
I somewhat confidently punched in HOME on the system and we set out. It was 4:30 PM. Just as we passed what I thought was the freeway we needed to take I noticed the GPS had an estimated time of arrival of 8:45 AM. God knows where the sucker was taking us but that was sixteen hours in the future. Portland? Seattle? Who knows? Did the gadget want a road trip we had never planned? Had someone made it in Vancouver?
We did get home but the anxiety level in that car was high.
Do you fear getting lost? What was the most lost you ever got? I can tell stories to make your hair curl. Like going around a roundabout in England twelve times.
21 comments:
Our GPS (we call him Bob) hates Baltimore. (Conversely, he may love Baltimore and simply be doing his best to ensure that we take two or three days to drive through the Charm City.)
Getting lost has never worried me because I know that sooner or later I will get un-lost. I doubt many men worry about getting lost; otherwise, we'd ask for directions -- and you know that won't happen!
Sorry Patti, but that made me laugh, especially the part about Phil having no sense of direction and the roundabout thing. That latter part I can easily see happening.
I kept picturing the GPS heading you to Detroit but then I realized it wasn't your car so that was unlikely.
In general, I have an excellent sense of direction, which I probably inherited from my father. If I've been somewhere once I can generally find my way there again without problem. (I'm pretty sure I could get us to that bookstore in Ontario a lot easier the second time.)
There are a few places that give me trouble: one is the Crystal City area of Arlington where I always make mistakes. ANother, for some reason, is getting into and out of Roosevelt Field on Long Island.
England is pretty much a piece of cake at this time. The second time we went to Rome I was able to direct my friend directly to the street of the hotel we wanted without a map.
This is good because not only does Jackie not drive but she is almost totally incompetent at map reading.
Jeff M.
I agree with Jerry about not worrying. I knew I was heading north to Niagara on the Lake and knew if I kept heading that way I'd run into the road I wanted eventually.
Jeff M.
I actually have a pretty good sense of direction but we brought the thing with us for backup and then just let it take over. So maybe it was Detroit she was headed for. But I think driving to Detroit would take more than 16 hours. I am thinking Tuscon from last January.
I am utterly directionally-challenged. I have actually asked my husband to drive me somewhere on the weekend that I have to go (by myself) later in the week. GPS is of no help to me--it just increases my anxiety. Oddly enough, I rarely get completely lost, but I've had some hair-raising vehicle mishaps, like the time my car broke down on the 710 Freeway during rush hour and I had to walk off the closest exit ramp in East L.A. to find a phone (these were pre-cell phone days and no one who has ever driven in L.A. will be surprised that none of the emergency call phones were working!).
Scary, Deb! That once happened to my wife. She and a friend were coming home from upstate and were almost through New Jersey when the friend's engine died right on the highway. Fortunately she was able to just slide it over to the shoulder safely.
Patti, you didn't say what the movie was and if you liked it. We have a free DVD player in our room at the hotel so are renting movies we missed last year. First was BOURNE SUPREMACY. It was not very coherent IMHO.
Jeff M.
I've been lost only in the sense that I didn't know exactly how to get where I was going, but I have a good sense of direction and have always known where I was and which way I needed to go in order to reach my destination sooner or later. I'm also one of those people who will say "Turn north when you get to the red light" when giving directions, which always causes my daughter to say, "No, tell me whether to turn right or left, not north!"
A firend did me a great service once when he told me never to worry about getting lost, as it teaches you new, and possibly better, ways to get places. That doesn't help much when traveling (as you were), but it removed a lot of stress for me, which made me less likely to get lost in the first place.
I'm amazed that you (and Jackie) don't drive. I've driven since I was 15 and can't imagine not doing so!
Like Jeff, I have a good general sense of direction, so if I can turn the map to the correct NSEW orientation, and take a look before I start out, I'm fine. We don't have, nor did we want, a GPS in our cars. Barbara has it on her iPhone, but it's rarely used and then with the irritating voice turned off. I prefer a printed map.
I did get lost in Boston when I visited it, but I was 16 years old and didn't have a map, just one of those Auto Club "Triptic" things.
I got lost in New Orleans once when I first moved there. It was a little nerve wracking. But being lost in the woods, which I have been, is more frightening.
Rick, in New York - at least the parts where we've lived - you can easily get around without a car. The subways and buses are mostly safe and reliable. (If I lived in Manhattan I'd definitely get rid of my car unless I was rich enough to have my own parking space.)
Jackie has had driving lessons in the past but in the end she decided she'd rather be a passenger. She's afraid of left turns.
I agree with you on the GPS. My only real experience with it was riding with Patti & Phil in Western New York. When Jackie and Beth had troubles with directions in Orlando they called me in New York to give them directions.
Jeff M.
Perhaps you have not lived long in San Diego. When I lived there, I do not recall ever being lost--and those were days long before GPS. The different San Diego communities seem to be so well connected by the main arteries that I guess I do not understand being lost there. Yes, it is large and spread out, and yes, the hills and winding roads can sometimes get you temporarily confused, but the whole east-west-north-south orientation is really quite clear. Has GPS perhaps allowed us to become less attentive while driving? Perhaps our natural navigation instincts are being destroyed by technology. I apologize is my verbal meandering seems insensitive to your plight. I am glad you survived your anxious odyssey.
Proud to say I have an exceptional sense of direction and love of maps and charts. I often joke this is probably because in a former life I was a navigator. The only time I truly became disoriented was when I followed someone else's lead mountain biking deep in the Shenandoah. Lesson: never bet on your guide knowing more than your natural instincts. I trusted him and didn't "breadcrumb" my own route. Dude started to panic when we realized we were all wickedly low on H20 and darkness was closing in.Ended up wasting valuable energy arguing w/ him over the overhead descending flight paths of a couple of passing private planes-meaning the local airport was close.
I think part of our problem here is that there freeways just seem to flow one into another if you are not very careful. You think you are on 15 and suddenly realize you have merged onto 8 or 801 and are climbing into the mountains. City streets would be much easier. I have only been here for a few weeks. And these double turning lanes are really hell too. If you so much as edge onto the line, people honk like mad.
56 UP Jeff. And although I liked it, I think I am done with that group of people. No 63 UP for me although Phil says I said that at 49 UP too.
I'm thinking Florida next year.
I'm a very good map reader so we never really got lost. But now, our Nissan Rogue has built-in GPS and I've come to love turn-by-turn navigation. Patrick and Katie have GPS on their iPhones. My brother has a wrist watch with GPS. It's hard to imagine people getting lost anymore with all this technology.
Patti - Your story just reminds me of how important it is to trust one's instincts and not simply blindly trust technology...
When I lived there, people had bumper stickers: "Pray for me. I drive 94!" I never got lost, but I did pray a lot.
And another problem is that there are not many lights on freeways here. Only exits it seems. In Detroit, they light the freeways up like the road to heaven unless you are far out of the metro area.
New York is the same, Patti. Everything is lit up. The freeways down here are only lit up at exits and in urban areas. I got used to the left turning lanes years ago.
The good part - and I'm guessing New York and Detroit are similar - is how much better paved the streets and highways are, as a rule.
Jeff M.
That's funny! Detroit lighted as if it were heaven. I have no axe to grind against Detroit, and I would not want to insult your city, but matching up Detroit (according to news reports available to an outsider) and heaven is a rich paradox.
Perhaps San Diego will grow on you. Of course, I was last there in the early 90s, living first in La Mesa and later in Bonita and I am sure there have been some changes. Perhaps I would no longer care for it as much as I did in the past. But, hey, you cannot beat the climate! And where else can you see whales (off of Point Loma), sandy beaches (in Coronado), and snow (in Julian) all within an hour?
Just don't do ANYTHING to get yourself arrested in Florida. Or shot. Yes, I know you live in Detroit. But Florida, damned near the whole damned state, is crazier now than even when JDM was bemoaning what it was becoming.
I guess South Beach is OK if you're a heedless party animal. Who doesn't get shot or arrested.
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