Twice this week Google Maps (GM) stole chunks of my life. The first was when I drove to get my new headset for MacSpeech. GM told me to go this utterly bizarre route - which I did, because I thought it probably new better than me about the messy tangle of highways and freeways near to where I needed to go.

Turns out I could have just left our driveway, turned left, turned right and arrived there about half and hour later. Instead I cruised areas hitherto unknown to me and somehow ended up near Noble Park. Which was not at all Noble by the time I reached it, and I saw no park. About a billion u-turns later, I extricated us to the proper road. Sigh. On the way back (the quick and non-GM way) Small Z and I jumped out and investigated Dandenong. Wow! It’s like a cooler, trashier, seedier, more multicultural version of Footscray. Small Z and I cruised amongst people of many races, investigated Dimmeys, found a European deli, a couple of fish shops and earned some points with M by getting him some empty ice-cream containers from Dairy Bell. Thanks, Dairy Bell!

We liked it so much we went back on Tuesday and conquered Savers. But I digress. Today we tried to go to a different pool for baby-swimming. It seems we live smack bang in between two pools - and I wanted to find out which was nearer. Thanks to GM I am still none the wiser. I searched for the address. GM ‘found it’. Unfortunately I failed to notice the tiny grey writing that said it was it was ‘just an approximate’ of the address. ARGH!! ARGH!!! ARGH!!!!

Then, of course, as I desperately didn’t want it to be my fault for relying again on el stupido GM, I decided to blame M as he had usefully taken the street directory out of the car, leaving myself and Small Z to drive guided by little more than frail hopes and a stray seagull that we would find the pool in time to actually get in it.

As it happened, we made it, and had a good splash around for about twenty minutes. I dunked Small Z, who remained unperturbed, surfacing without having stopped her race for the big yellow floating duck she had her eye on. We were the only ones there, so it all felt quite palatial. After some supermarket shopping we arrived home, to find that M had made the most fabulous apple pie out of the current Delicious magazine (thank you, J&I) - which vaporised the street directory angst. Custard powder in pastry - who knew!? (You did, didn’t you, Jen…)