Oh so lost

In preparation for a road trip, I decided to update the maps on my GPS. It did not go well.

 

I learned that I needed to connect my GPS unit to my computer. I would have bet my life I did not have this cord so I tried my camera cord. This did not work. Luckily (ha!) I was able to find the proper cord.

 

So, I started the update. Things seemed to going well....until it stalled partway through. I figured it was some kind of glitch, so I tried again. I followed all instructions and power cycled the unit.

 

When I turned it on, a lovely warning came up about there being no navigational maps on the device.  UM, WTF? Isn’t a GPS unit an electronic map?! should there not be maps ON the unit?

 

So, I swore a lot. And I plugged it back into my computer and was informed the unit was up to date. Um, no jerkface. There were no maps on it. IT WAS NOT UP TO DATE. I was pretty sure the world had not exploded, so there should be maps on it.

 

I decided to go to the troubleshooting section of the company's website....to find a message that the site was down for maintenance. Um, what?!

Eventually I fixed it and came out of this experience knowing one of four things to be true:

1. technology hates me
2. that you should not wait until the day before you leave to plan for your trip
3. that cast iron frying pans can also be used as little sledgehammers
4. and that planning for this trip was pointless, since we messed up the navigation anyway. And we were rewarded by sitting in traffic for over an hour (unnecessarily).

Our 9.5 hour trip took 12. I quit.