JulieLeung.com: a life told in tidepools

Both David Weinberger and Dave Winer on the same day last week commented on wifi available in hotels. In choosing hotels for two recent road trips, I have failed to be choosy about wi-fi availability, leaving Ted dial-up on a line as his only option. I agree with David Weinberger, that I’d rather have the Internet than a pool for free. I wish too that it would be easy to find places that offer broadband connections in the rooms. Looking at my AAA tour book again, I see that aquatic recreation is clearly designated in the description while no mention is made of wireless network availability.

Earlier that week Dave Winer had proposed

Feature request for Yahoo. If I ask for driving directions from St Aug to Madison, how about an icon I can click for hotels that are about 1/2 way that have free high-speed Internet? And another I click for any Starbucks that are within ten minutes from my route? This is one of those things you know we’re going to have in two years, but of course I want it now.

Days later Dave had another good idea:

But what about pointers to places for humans to get a bit of exercise? “You’re about to pass a great state park and they have a free hiking trail for Interstate drivers. Spend one hour exercising, you’ll enjoy being cooped up in the car more.”

Hey, put that on the map too!

Sounds great to me. In fact, I had a similiar idea on our recent road trip. We have had some bad hotel experiences in the past month, and knowing where to get wifi would be great. But as we were driving up and down to California and back, I commented to Ted that it would be helpful to have a map that would locate and list restaurant and gas options. At one stop we paid $2.50 a gallon, only because we thought it was the only gas available for a while. Little did we know that there was another option at the next exit. And, as I joked in my road trip test, we ate plenty of Burger King chicken bites. The kids were happy with the stability of restaurant choice. But Ted and I would have appreciated some variety. I wanted to know where the In ‘n Out’s were or an Arby’s would have been refreshing too. And knowing where we could stop and stretch our legs, let the girls swing on a playground or have a quick picnic would be refreshing!

Wouldn’t it be great if the driving directions could include where and when to stop?! Hey, maybe they could even order ahead for us…and have those stacks of chicken bites hot and ready when we pulled in…now I’m really getting ahead of myself….and perhaps even the technology…

then again, as Dave Winer said, maybe we’ll have it in two years…or less…