Turn left in 500 feet...

I took a road trip Mississippi last weekend. I usually have my wife beside me on such trips, and I rely on her to read the maps and tell me when I need to make a turn. Since she was already in Mississippi this time, I decided I'd get some directions from MapQuest to study before I left. And since I probably wouldn't be able to read the MapQuest instructions while I was driving, I also plugged one of those talking GPS machines into the cigarette lighter, just in case I forgot an exit number somewhere along the way.

It worked out pretty well for the most part, except that the lady on the GPS telling me what to do didn't always agree with the guy that works at MapQuest. I guess there's more than one way to get to Mississippi, and I'm still not sure which one of them had the best plan. I will say the lady on the GPS got awfully upset whenever I pulled off of the road to get some gas, or to get a Mountain Dew, or to get rid of one. Or when I decided to listen to the MapQuest guy instead of her.

We tend to get a lot of advice in our lives, both solicited and unsolicited, good and not so good, relevant and irrelevant. I think it's good to have some idea about where you are and where you want to end up before you decide which of it to take.