[Jayne Osborn]

Originally Posted by Roger Slater

Would the term GPS also be used in Britain?

Matt's right, Bob. We don't refer to "a GPS" (Global Positioning System) over here when we mean the actual thingy that's inside the car - that's come to be known as a satnav.
However, it doesn't mean that the term GPS can't be used in the poem.

Jayne

[Erik Olson]

My backseat driver (stoned from pot)
Tried to direct me but could not—
Satnav corrects what he forgot.
Since trading in the weakest link,
She steers me right without his stink.
None ask what satnav's had to drink.

.

[Jayne Osborn]

Hi Erik,
Nice one, ...but I think she's in need of having her 'e's removed

Jayne

[Erik Olson]

Thanks Jayne! She needed that makeover. I would have said GPS since that's what I hear said on this side of the pond; yet making GPS poetic would be harder I think. I prefer satnav's sound now that I know its sense.

[John Whitworth]

Nice one, Jerome. No satnav I ever had has a lovely Betj voice. They all sound like Miss Whiplash.

[Brian Allgar]

Good one, Jerome. I think my own piece supplies the "torrents of abuse"!

[Ann Drysdale]

I live in a world without cars and many other "awesome apps" although I always research and try to understand them because I detest the stubborn fogeyism of "don't know, won't know".

However I have an acquaintance who often goes on about her latest technological appurtenances and although I knew perfectly well what a Satnav was, I engaged her in conversation for about twenty minutes pretending I thought she was talking about Nadsat.

The result was deliciously bezoomny; she didn't appear to notice - or care if she did, that my baboochka baddiwad was unrelated to her satnav. She didn't even sloosh, let alone pony. Horrorshow!

See? Only the well-heeled can travel on their sharries. The rookerful with insufficient bugatties are reduced to toofles and forced to gooly.

[John Whitworth]

Nice one, Ann. It occurs to me that you might enter the rock diaries thing with an entry in Nadsat. The rock star's name could be Yod Crewsy of Yod Crewsy and the Crewsy Fixers. Or there is 'The Kvadrat's Kloochy'.

[Jerome Betts]

Thanks, John. Miss Whiplash? You clearly have a more stimulating range of acquaintances in your cosmopolitan corner of the island than I do down here in its damp green trouser-leg.

Egalement, Brian. Never ask to be navigated through a complicated junction with road works but then ignore the navigator's advice. My ears are still ringing.

The topic seems to have struck a chord, so competition will be fierce and the results interesting.

[Ann Drysdale]

Alas, John - Russell Brand has cornered that market with his booky-wook.