Sat navs and SeaWorld

On more than one occasion today I have felt like crying. Not because I've seen a sad film, or a puppy being mistreated, or an old person shopping on their own (this used to break my heart when I was a checkout girl many moons ago), but through frustration caused by technology of the satellite navigation variety.

It all seemed so easy when the brother was driving over the weekend and the sat-nav told him with lots of advance warning that there was a turning coming up, which lane to be in and when we had "reached your destination". We managed to get to SeaWorld from the hotel, and then back to the state's west coast, found an IHop and then got home with no problems.

(BTW, SeaWorld was fabulous. We started off watching the dolphin show (are these shows cruel? I can't decide), then wandered around watching more dolphins, manatees, alligators, sea lions and seals, and sharks, then headed off to the Manta, a rollercoaster which starts by dragging us and the other riders face down staring at the ground up a massive hill before spinning and whipping us round all a twisty-turny track for a couple of minutes. I felt a bit sick. The afternoon was spent at the Shamu show - watching an enormous killer whale splash hundreds of surprised folk (despite them being sat in the "soak zone") - and getting drenched on the log flume. Just before leaving, i fed some sting-rays (raw prawns, fish-food-fans) which was fabulous, watching them flap and splash their way over to me, then gliding over my hand with a slight tickling and sucking sensation as they gobbled up the prawns out of my fingers.

After SeaWorld, it was back home, via an IHOP (International House of Pancakes), which has been on my wish-list since I arrived. Any place that sells itself on providing pancakes with all its meals is a winner to me. I had a spinach, mushroom and cheese omelette which arrived with three buttermilk pancakes, covered in syrup; the big brother had an all-day breakfast with a side order of pecan pie pancakes. It's just brilliant, like a pancake version of the Little Chef.)

Anyway, today the big brother went back to work and it was up to me to pick up the hire car I had booked to get around, see something of the city and, most importantly, do some shopping (clothes; I have managed to resist the lure of the supermarkets today), all in the company of the posh-lady-voiced sat nav, who insisted (I believe) on sending me off on to random highways, interstates, and other roads which turned 3 mile nip-down-the-shops into 28 mile round-trips across very long bridges. And so there were almost tears accompanying moans of "why? why have you sent me this way?? how do i get home?" All very distressing. And this was even before it took me ten minutes to realise that I had to have my foot on the brake to move the automatic gear stick into drive; I was on the verge of calling the big brother to ask him to come and get me from the shopping mall carpark.

So maybe I just don't get on with technology? Or roads? Or American cars (a chevvy by the way, i feel like an extra from a road movie)? Put all of the above together and it becomes a recipe for disaster. Tomorrow I'm heading for the beach, which is apparently "turn right out of the hotel and keep going until you get to the sea." My flight home is at 19.45. Hmmm...