Paper or Plastic?

Recently, Matt and I went out to dinner with his parents. They had one of those global positioning devices (GPS) and were tickled pink showing us how well the directions took us from their house to the restaurant. In fact, they offered to buy us one for xmas. "No thank you," I said. That surprised them and I told them I would rather rely on a paper map, thank you very much. That generated quite the discussion about how much better was GPS than a paper map.

I was not swayed. I have used paper maps for decades and they work just well. Plus, who wants the aggravation? I told them of an incident on our Los Angeles trip in October. We were in the lobby of our hotel at Venice Beach and this very odd man was demanding the hotel employee get him an address for Universal Studios because he needed to program it into his GPS. Always trying to be helpful, I explained to the traveler that the studio was just a couple miles away and all he had to do was get on the freeway (just a block or so from the hotel) and follow the signs. The man turned nearly apoplectic. He needed the address and would not listen to reason. I gave up trying to help. In the time he wasted trying to find a street address for the studio, he could have driven there and back again.

People today rely too much on technology -- and this instance is just the tip of the iceberg. Three times this past week came stories of people who relied for directions on their GPS devices and got stranded in the Oregon snow. I mean, seriously, are we so ready and willing to give up common sense and basic skills (how hard is it to read a map?) and turn our lives over to so many bits of silicon and plastic?

Not me, thank you.