Perhaps the BEST B1G Forum anywhere, here at College Football Fan Site, CFB51!!!

Ok so the premise is pretty simple. 

We've all heard about technologies or product features that we think "who would ever need THAT?" 

And then suddenly you have it, and you think to yourself "how did I ever NOT have this???"

For example:

Rain-sensing windshield wipers: I mean, this is ridiculous, right? I mean, we already had intermittent wipers with multiple interval settings, a constant regular speed wiper setting, and a constant high speed wiper setting. Why would I need my windshield wipers to automatically sense rain... I've got two eyes. They sense rain just fine.

Fast forward to having it... And when you have that sort of intermittent misting sort of precipitation that isn't coming fast enough to even sit on the lowest intermittent setting, you start realizing that is wiping too often and you're getting that annoying wiper blade sound because the windshield is too dry and it's probably wearing out your wipers prematurely. Or you have rain that's very intermittent and you have to constantly swap between the various intermittent settings, always trying to find that *perfect* interval to not let the windshield get too covered in drops but not end up with that annoying wiper blade sound because it's too fast. 

Now, I don't even think about it. And I realize how annoying it was to deal with manually, only because now I don't have to. 

Remote start --- may be even better than the wipers.  Cold as heck, frost on the window -- no problemo.  Start it up from the comfort of your nice, warm home, or workplace.....with no fear of the keys being in it, and someone stealing it.  Come out to a toasty vehicle and take off.

The first vehicle we had this in was a truck we plowed snow with.  It was stored near my apartment but mind you that my apartment at the time was a second floor apartment with an outdoor staircase so if I needed to plow it was never wroth it to go start the truck early because I needed boots, gloves, and a heavy coat just to start it and by the time I had all that on I was ready to go.  

Once I got remote start, when I needed to plow I woke up at zero-dark-thirty, started the truck in my boxer shorts from the comfort of my apartment, THEN got ready to go out in the snow and by the time I got to the truck it was warm and ready to go.  

Heated steering wheel.  Maybe not a big deal for the Yanks, -- they probably all wear gloves.  Not us southerners, though.  The heated steering wheel....NICE.

As a cold-weather Yank, I'm going to disagree.  I usually don't wear gloves for just running to/from the car unless it is literally below zero so I almost never have them on and even when I do I don't want them on for driving especially now that we have touchscreens that I can't use with gloves.  Honestly, if I had to choose between a heated seat and a heated steering wheel, I'd pick the heated steering wheel without hesitation.  

Personally, I'm not a big fan of auto-wipers and auto-headlights.  I'm IN the car anyway so they don't save me any time.  I don't feel like it is a big deal to reach down and flip the wipers on/off as needed or turn on/off the headlights.  

Yeah, my older sister was terrible with directions, and I've always been extremely good with them. I recall her and her friends when they got their license trying to go to the mall, and they got lost. This, by the way, is the mall that they'd all been to dozens of times, and a car full of teenaged girls were lost. So she called me, her 13 year old brother, from a pay phone, and I asked a few questions, figured out where they were, and gave her directions 

I do agree that the GPS does make us lazy sometimes. However I can say that it's always been my goal despite having it to learn the area well enough to get around without it. I always felt good to travel to someplace like Denver, after multiple trips, and visit multiple customer sites and only pull out the cellphone/GPS if I was going somewhere I hadn't previously been. 

More history with GPS.

The absolute best kind of boat to have is a friend's boat, LoL.

Several of my friends had boats and in our 20's we would frequently go to Put-in-Bay (big party all summer in Lake Erie).

We were young so we typically had to work all day on Friday and we didn't have the cash for a marina so we were trailering and frequently launching after dark. That made the trip from Mazurik (public boat ramp) to South Bass Island (Put-in-Bay) a nightmare. There is a shoal off the East end of South Bass so, pre GPS we had to follow roughly the route I traced on the attached screenshot. Basically keep Kelleys to your starboard and go until you are WELL past South Bass then turn to port and head straight in.

The downside was that this was WAY out of our way.  We were almost going to Canada, eh! Actually, sometimes we DID go to Canada to get Molson from Peelee Island. 

 In daylight you just go around or through (there is a small channel) the shoal but at night we couldn't see.

My buddy bought a Marine GPS sometime in the late 90's and I remember going out with him to test it. The directions claimed that it was accurate to 100' but we were astounded to learn that it was WAY more accurate than that. You could literally see which slip you were in, so that is accuracy an order of magnitude greater than the manufacturer claimed.

I hate ear buds, I don't know if I have weird ear holes or what, but they all range from mildly uncomfortable, to painful.  Instead I rock the old school Walkman-style headphones.  They're available wireless, now.

I hate ear buds, I don't know if I have weird ear holes or what, but they all range from mildly uncomfortable, to painful.  Instead I rock the old school Walkman-style headphones.  They're available wireless, now.

weirdly, the only earbuds that work for me are the original ones. they don't make them anymore shaped that way, and the new ones fall out.  mine broke, and my wife said she thought she had hers somewhere, and I found them buried in a box of cords.  they are my most prized possession now

Back to cars again. You won’t find someone who enjoys the art of driving and having a performance car more than me.

But yesterday I had to drive 2 1/2 hours to and from Orlando for business in moderately heavy traffic. My AMG has self driving feature. it’s awesome. Just set the cruise and sit back and relax       it’s very polite too. It does not tailgate or cut off drivers or speed or anything.   it asks you to touch the steering wheel every three or four minutes to make sure you’re awake but other than that, and turning the turn signal, if you want to change lanes, it’s fun as hell