Men take things too literally. Men have little common sense. Even when there are signs, they will listen to the GPS voice and not the woman in the passenger seat's voice...that's why they fail.
Today we headed south and then west into New Hampshire to do some additional antiquing. John programmed the GPS in my car for one of the addresses we wanted to visit. Everything was fine, except he began to panic when there was road construction on route 4 that did not interfere with our travel plans whatsoever. He is also an over-reactor when he drives- slams on the brakes when he thinks someone is going to pull out in front of him, which makes the person think he's stopping to let them out, then he gets mad when they keep coming out and I'm like- "Take your foot off the damn brake and drive!" He also worries about the cars behind us and what they're doing, more so then the idiots driving in front of us and what they're doing.
Everything fell to pieces when he programmed the GPS to get us back from Concord, NH and it began taking us in the wrong direction. It was trying to send us to Manchester. He would have been fine if we'd gotten on route 3 which connects back to 4/9/202, but he got onto 93 even though there was a clearly marked sign for Route 3 just ahead- three close exits and he took the wrong one then got mad because he made a mistake, not the GPS- and then freaked out because I was ticked off since we were traveling south instead of east. And then there was road construction and detours, and the GPS kept wanting us to loop around the same road construction...and he would have kept following its stupid directions if I hadn't taken out the map and told him to go straight and stop listening to the GPS as if it was the voice of God in the desert. I got us heading back in the correct direction, despite his white-knuckling the wheel thinking I was leading him into the wilderness and he'd never see anything familiar again. He was fine when we got back onto the road that had brought us to this major crisis in travel in the first place. Men have too much faith in technology and all it's myriad flaws and not enough faith in the common sense of a female with a map in her hand and a decent sense of direction. They'd rather trust technology than a real person. Well, he'd still be driving in circles in Concord, frustrated and tense and angry if I hadn't had enough of that crap for one day.
Technology is a wonderful thing when it works, but when it's not working, have the guts to shut it off and listen to the human co-pilot!
We got back later than planned, I missed meeting my favorite author in Portland- a huge disappointment, but then again, he'd have been driving since my night vision is horrible, and we'd have probably gotten lost in Portland again like we did the other day, so maybe in a way, technology's failure saved me some additional stress tonight.
Lesson learned, I hope: A GPS is a useful tool, but you have to read the damn road signs and get on the right roads on your own. Just because you have a GPS leading you around by the nose it doesn't mean it's foolproof. You still need to read the route signs and get on the right entrance ramps and off the correct exits-it's the human error aspect that ticks me off the most on this vacation. The GPS says take the next right onto Route 3, and the driver takes the next right, but it's for route 93. The correct right was one entrance ramp a few yards further up the road. Read the SIGNS!
And now I will jump down off my soapbox and walk away- in the right direction- toward my bed because I am cranky and tired tonight.
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