Dan's Papers - June 29, 2007

Last week, I drove to Lenox, Massachusetts to attend a wedding. It was a very big deal, a whole weekend affair at the Cranwell Resort and Spa in that town. We had a wonderful time.

The wedding coincided with the end of the lease for my Land Rover, so I thought I would turn that in and get a new car I have had my eye on, which is a giant, white, Chevy Tahoe with every conceivable bell and whistle imaginable on it that they had at Buzz Chew in Southampton. This new car, in its second day in my possession, would take six of us from East Hampton to Lenox for the weekend.

I will spare you a description of four people sitting in the back seat with wireless earphones on watching a DVD playing on a flipdown screen on the ceiling and every once in a while letting out a cry of terror or shout of joy as I drove along. Although I will tell you that driving and listening to this can be very disconcerting.

The real story here was about the car's navigation system. It has a full color touch screen on the dashboard. I never had used a navigation system before.

"I have a name for this car," I told my girlfriend next to me and the four idiots in the backseat. "I name thee, STARSHIP."

"Very good," girlfriend said.

"Yeee Haaa!" came from the back seat.

We made a stop in New York City and then set it up to give us the fastest route to our destination. It did that. And, along the way, it would speak up -- there is apparently a woman in there -- who would give us direct instructions in a soothing, calm voice.

"Two miles ahead, make a left," she would say.

And then, just before two miles later, a little ding would go off and she'd say, "make the next left." And then there would be, just exactly before we got to that turn, two dings one after another to remind you.

"I wonder what would happen if we didn't turn left," I told my girlfriend.

"Don't try it," she said. "We have to get there."

I imagined that the lady might get angry. YOU MISSED IT!!! GO BACK. GO BACK. HEY, I'M TALKIN' TO YOU. That, with what was going on in the backseat, could be even more troublesome.

I didn't try it and the lady led me over the Tappan Zee Bridge and out and up the New York Thruway to where it meets the Massachusetts Turnpike. It was a three-and-a-half-hour trip up from East Hampton and we'd stop along the way at rest stops and the lady seemed to be understanding when we'd stop at a rest stop, only speaking up when we got back in the car and turning it on.

"Navigation will begin again when you return to the selected route," she said. And then, as we pulled out into traffic "navigation begins. Continue along this route."

I had a discussion with my girlfriend along the way -- I rather hoped the lady was not listening to any of this -- about why she hadn't had us take the Taconic Parkway up to the Mass Pike rather than the New York Thruway. But, we guessed, she had her reasons.

The wedding went on for three days -- Friday, Saturday and Sunday -- and we used the navigation lady with wonderful effect as we drove around in the Berkshires, seeing the sights. We came to rely on her. No need for maps at all. The navigation map would appear on the screen and a little arrow would move along a red guideline as you drove along. And then there was the lady.

"Can you change who talks to you?" my girlfriend asked.

"She's fine," I said. We had already found out what she would say if we missed a turn she had planned for us.

"Make the next legal u-turn," is what she'd say. Or if we INTENTIONALLY had gone another way and it WAS another way, she would readjust all her computations, which would take four seconds and then say "proceed on this route for 2.6 miles." No recriminations whatsoever. And she'd have the new route. What a lady!

On Sunday, we got into the Starship and set her up to tell us how to get back to New York. But now we wanted to use the Taconic. On the touch screen, there were three choices. You could choose "fastest," which is what we had done coming up, "most direct" or "most scenic." We pressed "most direct," figuring that would be the Taconic. What appeared almost immediately was the red line of the route showing you heading down to New York about where the Taconic would be. So we headed out.

We followed the lady's instructions down some lovely two lane back roads, heading south, toward what we believed would be a hookup with the Taconic, and this continued on for quite sometime through some towns such as Great Barrington and Sheffield I never heard of and never had been in and pretty soon saw a sign reading WELCOME TO CONNECTICUT.

"What's this Connecticut business?" I asked my girlfriend. "I thought we were heading toward the Taconic. That's in New York."

"I don't know," she said.

"Could you get me a map out of the glove compartment?"

"There are no maps in the glove compartment," she said after shuffling around.

I forgot. New car. There are no maps in the glove compartment.

We passed through the town of Canaan, then Salisbury, then Sharon. Something was definitely wrong. We were on Route 41. Lots of cows and horses and barns.

"I used to board horses in Sharon," my girlfriend said. "THERE IT IS!"

We were passing a white horse farm.

"Still here. Wow. I haven't been here in fifteen years."

Somebody in the backseat took off his earphones. I am talking about four people comfortably side by side in the backseat, not the third seats. This is a BIG car.

"Nice farmland," this person said. Then put the earphones back on.

"I can't believe we are not on the Taconic," I said. "Didn't we say the Taconic? I pressed 'most direct' not 'most scenic.'"

"I think this is 'most direct,'" the girlfriend said. "I know the way. We're going to be going down Route 22. It runs parallel to the Taconic. But it's probably more direct."

"I don't think we should be putting ourselves in the hands of this woman just like that. We should be double-checking. I'm going to stop for a roadmap."

We drove on and on. There were no gas stations. Pretty soon, we were in New York State on Route 22. We were in Amenia. Then Dover Plains. Whoever heard of these places?

I finally found a gas station in a little one horse town called Wingdale. It was more like a store with gas pumps out front than a gas station. I went inside.

"Don't sell maps," he said. "New York City? Just keep going straight." He pointed. "Follow your nose. Can't miss it."

Just outside the town of Pauling, we came upon a country store on the side of the road in the middle of farm fields. Might have a roadmap here. I pulled in.

One of the contestants in the back got out and said, "Wow. This place is beautiful. I could LIVE here." This was my son, David. Bye, David.

They had apples and corn and baked goods and crackers and prepared dip you could buy in clear plastic containers. It looked a bit like Round Swamp Farm on Three Mile Harbor Road.

And for $5.95 they had a map. I unfolded it. Indeed, we had gone 80 miles with the Taconic maybe twenty miles to the west but going parallel all the while. No Taconic. Route 7 out from Lenox to bear right at Route 41 then right again on Route 44 to Route 22 and then "proceed down this route for 23 miles." Bah.

Soon we were in New York City and soon after that, we were back in East Hampton.

The Starship has heated seats, or heat just the back of the seat and leave the seat cushion cold -- your choice -- it has automatic foot pedal adjustment levels, it has a button that will powerwash your windshield with 160-degree water, another powerwash button to wash your windshield with outdoor temperature water, it has backup beepers, satellite radio, fog lights, headlamps that swivel as you go around corners --I think -- it has an engine that kicks out four of its eight cylinders at certain times to save gas, it has cruise control, low-range 4-wheel drive, a display that will tell you the pressure in each of your four tires at all times and it has this lady. And then there's another lady, the OnStar lady, you can call on your cell phone if you get in an accident or have a breakdown. She'll send help.

As Captain Kirk, I've spent about five days on the cellphone talking to the salesman Joe at Buzz Chew asking about this and that. He cheerfully and patiently helps me figure it out.

One very hot day a few days ago, I went out to the beach with the idea of writing on my laptop, on a folding chair in the sunshine, or if it was too hot, in the car with the AC on. It would depend on the temperature.

Driving out Sagg Main Beach, I couldn't find the temperature gauge and so I thought I'd call Joe. But then I found it. It was on the climate control screen and read just 74 degrees.

So I set up in the sunshine, wrote my story, finished up and got back in. But I was melting from the heat. It still said 74 degrees. So I called Joe.

"That's the INTERIOR temperature," he said. "The EXTERIOR temperature is in the window on the right side of your rear view mirror. There's also a compass setting in there."

The car was pointing SE. And the temperature was 96 degrees. You know, you just can't believe everything your car tells you.