New GPS

My GPS and I had a ‘falling out’ on one of our recent weekend outings. It fell off the back of the truck, and after it was run over, I was out a GPS. Anyway, after 2 weeks of research I bought the perfect different used GPS on eBay preloaded with a topo map of California. It’s a Garmin Vista HCx. I don’t know what HCx stands for, but I have to believe it’s some high-tech techie lingo that means something to someone somewhere. It all had all the features I wanted and more than a few that I had no idea what they are. What really drew me to this model was the Hunting and Fishing feature. The ad alluded to something about knowing when the best times to go hunting and fishing would be. I had no idea how they could figure that out, but I went with it.

When the package showed up at the front door I was somewhat disappointed as it was in a package about the size of a medium sized suitcase. I was really hoping for slightly smaller GPS, maybe about the size of a pack of cigarettes. By the time I got all the wrapping off I was much happier, it was about the size of a container of Altoids.

The first night I didn’t really progress too far getting it figured out. I gave up after about two hours of trying to get it to power up and look for directions on the Internet. The last thing I did before going to bed was to try to rescue the box that it came in from the fireplace before it was completely scorched while trying to think of good reasons for returning it. “I can’t use the California topo map. I live in the state of Jefferson,” “It came in such a huge box that by the time I got all the packing out I couldn’t locate the GPS,” “You didn’t say it wouldn’t come already turned on!” I was planning to send it back and see if I could get my money back. This thing was really stretching my intellectual abilities, and when a person’s brain (such as mine) is about the size of a Fig Newton and is stretched as far a mine usually is there really isn’t too much room for expansion. Something bad happens. Very bad.

The next evening the first thing I did was to put batteries in. It’s amazing how much I figured out after that. The first night my learning curve was pretty much flat-lining. The next night it actually had a slight curve to it. I still had to download some programs to make it work. After about an hour of trying to enter in data manually I finally figured out that this was a new model where data was inputted directly from the computer with a USB cord. What will they think of next?

Just like any other techie things, it has about 20 times more stuff that I’ll ever be able to use. Hell, all I really want to do is enter in some GPS coordinates and get off my ass and find them! I can play a game, I can balance my checkbook, I can even find out what time it is in Finland right now, but I'll be damned if I can put in coordinates to save my ass! Lucky for me the Hunting and Fishing feature is stuck on “Perfect fishing weather,” “Fish are on the bite,” “Even you can catch them anywhere.”