On Tue, 27 Mar 2012 07:55:41 -0400, "Robert Green"
wrote:

wrote in message
.. .

The POS lead me 70 miles the wrong way one of the first times I used it.

Mine just guided my low-clearance wheelchair van through a huge truck park
(to save about a 100' in normal road travel) with huge, truck-sized speed
bumps arrayed along along the roadway as far as the eye could see.
Fortunately, I stopped and since I generally knew where I was, backed up and
listened to it whine about deviating from the bottom-out alleyway route
until I got to the next junction point.

I would have liked the option to answer the unit's "You're speeding" with a
"STFU for X minutes." What a nag. My first unit took me to the middle of a
cornfield instead of the medical park I was looking for. Their best use
seems to be getting you home when you're lost. They "know" where home is
(and so do you) so even if the maps aren't very detailed for your area, it
will at least keep you pointed towards home. I'd sell mine, too, if it
weren't for that feature.

I've read that all the gains made in taking drunk drivers off the road in
the last 50 years has been quickly undone by the new "driving drunk" -
texting while driving. I see it so often it spooks me. In S. Korea, I
think, out of work people are paid a bounty to catch miscreants like texting
drivers on film.

Sounds like you have the same type that I had. A Tom-Tom.
Oddly enough, I set mine to my home location. Several months later I
hit the "go home" button and it said something like "no such location".
I tried several times to put my home location back and it could not be
changed. At one point I wanted to change the whole thing back to the
default factory settings and never figured out how. Even letting it
turned on till the battery was totally dead did not work.

Yea, mine took me down a long windy road in a medium sized city. I knew
where I was going, and knew that the highway I wanted to take was right
before entering that city. I did not need the GPS, but it was turned on
just to see how accurate it was (if it was). A half mile before the
city and the road I should turn on, it tells me to turn on this gravel
road. What a ****in nightmare that was. A windy curvy bumpy gravel
road that was so curvy I could not exceed 25mph. When I got home, I
google mapped that road and come to find I saved less than one mile, but
probably wasted 20 minutes at that slow speed v/s just taking the
highway. I'm sure I wasted gas too, since I had to brake every 10
seconds because of the sharp curves.

As far as texting on the highway, I cant imagine doing that. I cant
even bring up my contact list to make a call on my cell. Actually I
dont even make calls on the highway, but one day I was on a gravel
country road where there is never traffic, and just wanted to call
someone to ask if they were home. I slow down to about 20mph, and am
trying to bring up the contact list. I find myself nearly going into
the ditch. I pulled over, made my call, and went back to driving.
Talking on the phone while driving is not that difficult, but the minute
I need to start pushing buttons, it's time to pull over. I got the
basic phone with 12 buttons, not the full keyboard, so it's harder to
text, but I just cant see anyone in their right mind even trying to text
while driving.

They'd be better off staying home and getting drunk while texting