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My arms are a bit longer nowadays.

Not by much – an nowhere as long as I anticipated when I decided to take the plunge and enter the modern world.

Yes, I got a smart phone. I was one of the last. There was no real reason for my holdout other than I didn’t see the need for the expense. And I liked the idea of being different from everyone else. I could sit at a restaurant table with friends and not even be tempted to pull the thing out and stare at the screen like everyone else. Lately, there has been nobody to talk to because everyone else at the table (and in the world) has a smart phone and loves to look at it in public. Even when you watch national news on television, you can see folks in war-torn or third-world countries on a cell phone.

For one, I don’t even like talking on the phone. And I’m at a computer most of the day if I need to look something up. So why get a smart phone?

I was tired of being called a dinosaur, you know, those prehistoric animals with really short arms. They might be able to eat you, but they couldn’t slap you. A smart phone could do neither.

Or so I thought.

I’ve always enjoyed studying geography. I love reading maps. I pore over atlases. I used to memorize travel routes and amaze people with the knowledge I had gained from simply reading a map and getting them to where they needed to go without a hitch.

That’s not so easy in these times. Roads are added and moved all the time. Landmarks are being torn down at a rapid rate and new buildings are going up.

And maps? If it was printed last year, it could already be out of date.

To go on a road trip to parts unknown nowadays, a feller needs a smart phone with one of those apps that features a sweet-talking female voice giving directions. “Turn left in 100 feet,” she says. Maybe it’s because her sweet voice makes you believe every word she says. Maybe it’s because she’s a computer and way smarter than you’ll ever be, but we follow her (its) every word.

We were headed into Bristol, Tenn., with my buddy driving. We had made it safely through “The Snake” on US 421 and were crossing the lake headed towards town. We had a rental, and the address. I had looked at it on a map and had somewhat of an idea on which direction to travel.

My buddy, the driver, apparently had other ideas. He’s no dinosaur, and was relying on one of those apps with the sweet voice that tells you where to turn. Unbeknowngst to me, he’s so advanced he had an earpiece, with that sweet woman talking to him. None of the rest of us in the car could hear.

Traveling at our age, we’re always in a hurry to get to our destination. I think bladders shrink as we get older.

And when he made that first turn, I thought to myself, “He has no idea where he is going.”

Then there was another turn, and we passed an abandoned factory. We turned again, and again, and again – and with each turn – we drove further into the bowels of Bristol. More abandoned factories, houses that looked like they should have been abandoned years ago but weren’t.

Everyone in our vehicle was wide-eyed by now. Here we are, in a new town, with out-of-state license plates, wide eyed and cleanly bathed and smartly dressed, unlike those folks we were looking at. The worst part, some of those people we were looking at were beginning to look back at us, as well. In situations such as this, stop signs are made for slowing down.

We were about halfway through those bowels when I questioned the directions. That’s when I learned we were being guided by a smart phone. I felt a little better, but not much.

Eventually, we made the last turn and found our rental. Luckly, the neighborhood had changed for the better just as we made that last turn, so we should be safe.

Still trying to rid myself of that dinosaur moniker, I quickly whipped out my new (new to me, at least) smart phone to see what had just happened. That directions app had got us to our destination fine, but was it the best route? Looking at the map, you could clearly see that had we just gone straight for a couple of miles, we would have come to another road that would almost have taken us to our front door. We went back to downtown that way, on a tree-lined street with a landscaped median and stores hidden from view. It was idyllic.

That directions app could have taken us through Bristol’s shangri-la, but rather chose to send us through the town’s bowels. Thanks a lot.

Looking back, that trip through the real Bristol was much more entertaining, much more revealing, than the quiet and safe tree-lined street. We saw the real Bristol, not the one on the chamber of commerce brochure.

I would credit the app on the smart phone with sending us on the most entertaining route, but that computer woman didn’t know. She (it) was just following some sort of algorhythm to get us there with the fewest miles.

It’s going to take me a while before my arms grow back out to regular length.

– Mike Barnhardt(asaurus)