Adventures with The Bitch (Governor's version - not suitable for children)

No, John and Debbie are still married.  The Bitch is our GPS navigator by Garmin.  She allows us to specify the size of our coach, so as to take those measurements into account when considering low bridges along the route, and such like. An admirable quality, you would think (and it is), but Debbie has given her this name --along with occasional colorful expletive adjectives-- because...

We have a definite love-hate relationship with The Bitch.   Usually her directions are clear and quite timely.
     In one mile, turn right on State Route 98.
  In half a mile, turn right on State Route 98.
  In one quarter mile, turn right on State Route 98 to Parkerville.
  Turn right at the next traffic light to take State Route 98 to Parkerville.

First off, Debbie does not like unnecessary diphthongs.  "Why does The Bitch always make mile two syllables?!" she exclaims loudly enough to be heard over the road noise of open windows, almost daily. "You stupid Bitch, it's NOT mi-yull!!"

John frequently has a problem with her pronunciations, too. While traveling through Missouri, which alphabetizes its state roads, The Bitch would try to pronounce things:
          In one miyull, exit to the right on Missourian.
            John (driving): "What?"
            Debbie, calmly: "Take the next exit."
            John, pressured: "But we're not going to Missourian. I don't know where that is!"
            Debbie, less calmly:  Just take the next exit."
            John, pressured and irritated: "What if it's tiny and we can't turn this monster around?!"
            Debbie, far less than calm:  "Just exit the--
           In one quarter miyull, exit right on Missourian and bear left.
           John, angrily: "Where the hell is she taking us?!"
             Debbie, exasperated; "How the hell should I know?!"
             John, losing it:  "I sure as #%^# don't!  Look at the damn map!"
             Debbie, screaming:  "WHAT MA--"
           Exit right on Missourian, then bear left for Main Street.
           John, jerking wheel back and forth:  "WHAT DO I DO, DAMMIT?!"
             Debbie, already having lost it:  "DRIVE THE DAMN BUS!!!!"

Seriously, would you tolerate somebody trying to screw up your 46 year long marriage like that?

And then there's programming her, which supposedly you can do orally without becoming distracted while driving.  
     John:  "Voice Command.  Find Place."
     The Bitch:  {no response}
     John:  "VOICE COMMAND!  FIND PLACE!"
     The Bitch: {continues ignoring him} 
     Debbie, in copilot's calm quiet tones:  "Voice Command."
     The Bitch:  Say a command.
     Debbie, smirking:  "Find Place."
     The Bitch:  Speak a place.
     Debbie, confident of her superiority: "Aldi." 
     The Bitch:  Did you say "Kohls?"
     Debbie, PO'd:  "NO! --  BACK!"
     The Bitch, calmly, as if nothing had happened: Speak a place.
     Debbie, strained:  "ALDI."
     The Bitch:  Did you say "Ace Hardware Store?"
     John:  "HAH!  Fifty years as a Radio announcer....."

This is a Google Map
providing a superior
overall image. No link
between Garmin and
Google is implied.    

Communication skills aside, we seriously began to doubt her intelligence
on our "test trip" to the UP last fall when, upon leaving Traverse City, she told us a state park in the UP would be 742 miles away.  Finally, after several frustrating attempts to tell her our destination is not far across the Mackinac Bridge over the Strait, we deduced that we had set one of her options to Avoid Tolls, so The Bitch kept routing us south through Chicago and back up again, just to avoid paying $4 to cross Da Bridge.  OK, then, our fault.  BUT even the laziest program coder should have built some common sense logic into her, so that she should have asked: Four bucks or an extra 700 miles? Are you sure?  Y/N.

C'mon, Garmin!  John's relied on your hand-held eTrex in the backwoods for decades and it's been reliable and sensible.

It was later that same day that we discovered her ignorance and confusion about local country roads when she tried to take us off our Michigan paved road to send us down a sandy unpaved track in the middle of Nowhere Forest.  We did not turn into that for fear of bogging down all six wheels plus the four on our Toad.  Good thing.  We discovered the deep sand rejoined our paved state road just a few miles ahead.   The #^%|#@ stupid Bitch!!

The latest straw occurred on this trip, after we left Capitol Reef National Park, headed for Bryce Canyon NP.  Our destination was a KOA between St. George and Hurricane, Utah.  Debbie had left The Bitch thinking we were driving a car, as we also use her in our Honda Toad for side trips while encamped.  About ten miles before the final exit from I-15,  Debbie realized we probably should tell The Bitch she is navigating the RV this time.  John made the adjustments (manually; he knows how to push her buttons) and we were gratified to see her direct us an extra nine miles to one exit farther.  "There must be a low bridge or a tight obstruction," we said to one another. "Trust The Bitch!"

So we made the indicated turn to SR9 in the middle of busy construction, a plethora of orange barrels, and narrow travel lanes.  Whatever.  We are fewer than three miles from the comfort of full hookups at KOA prices (Debbie will spend money for a shower between BLM boondocks).  As instructed we made the first left, north, on Old Highway 91, drove about one mile and were greeted by this sign on the side of the road.

It's not a joke.  In fact, so many of their customers had been screwed by their own GPS navigators, that KOA felt it necessary detail a much better way to reach its full service parking pads. It seems somebody had decided to drive a heavy tank-treaded machine on the hot asphalt road which was old to begin with.  As Debbie was behind the RV's wheel, John disconnected the toad for a recce and found the last 1.3 miles to our destination was a jouncy asphalt washboard, broken out sections of pavement, and ....  well! It looked just like a Michigan highway after six decades of Governors (Democratic and Republican) imposing new taxes, drivers registration fees, and other pocket filchings to Fix The Roads.  {Now that John's no longer a professional objective reporter, expect a highly emotional political diatribe below.***}

So --back on track-- the Brys offer high thanks to the distastefully spelled "Kampgrounds of America" and will even forgive the ungrammatical warning.
[To be fair, John knows professional writers who google "further versus farther" each time they come to it.]

KOA's heart is in the right place, which usually results in better business, too.

First thing John said to the owner of this local KOA was, "Thanks for spending the big bucks on that durable, colorful, attention-grabbing, metal sign!"   That woman blamed all GPSs.  John and Debbie know better.

It's The Bitch's fault.




_______

***
Our latest Guv, of course is the Democrat Whitmer who ran with the slogan Fix The Damn Roads.  Months of that coarse and crude campaigning on the family televisions got her elected and we find that her only solution is to make Michigan's gas tax the highest in the nation, while intending only 60% of that extra money for actual roads, and not diverting any dollars from the other waste.  It doesn't seem to bother her a bit.  In a recent speech, she threatened the Legislature that her only alternative is to shut down the Government!   So, do it, Gretch!!  Fire yourself in the process.  We the People can FTDR without paying public teat suckers....or setting up another decade of the Nation's Worst State Economy under another profligate politician who's only future is to spend the rest of her life teaching unthinking Californian youth to do likewise.