Address challenged

In news, you spend a lot of time trying to find certain locations: a school, a fire/crime scene, the home of someone you need to interview... you get the idea. With the advent of GPS units and things like MapQuest, you can find an address pretty easily, but I've come to realize that there are an inordinate number of people and places that are evidently address challenged.

By address challenged, I mean that if you ask someone there what their address is, they say, "What direction are you coming from?" Why do they need to know what direction I'm coming from? Does their address change if I approach their house from the north rather than the south? I really don't understand.

Actually I do. It's because a large number of people apparently don't have addresses. The larger the city, the less you see this. You still see it quite a bit in Toledo, but this was especially prevalent in Huntington, IN, home of the last newspaper I worked at. In Huntington, I didn't live at 1755 Freedom Street. I lived at, take the bypass until you get to the intersection where Arbys and K-mart sit. Turn so you're going away from those and go until the road forks. Take the left fork. Go three streets and turn left. It's the second to last house on the right.

The smaller the town, the more this comes up. Two examples for your consideraton...

A) Markle, IN... I was looking for a street. Not a specific house, just a street. I stopped in a gas station and asked for directions. The girl at the counter stared at me blankly for a couple of minutes and said, "I don't know where that street is. Who lives there?" When I explained that I didn't know, I just needed the street, she asked one of the customers standing there who asked the same question, "Who lives there?" It would seem that in Markle people can't find streets or addresses, but they can find each other.

B) Bloomfield, NM.. In this instance, I was looking for the middle school. Unable to locate it, I stopped for directions. The guy at the counter thought for a second and said, "You know where Cindy's Diner used to be about 10 years ago? It sits right behind that." Now, seriously, if I knew where things used to be 10 years ago, would we have been having that conversation?

Apparently, that was a big thing when I worked in New Mexico, giving directions by where things used to be. I would get things like that on assignment sheets all the time. Finally, I stood up in in a staff meeting and said that people had to stop assigning me to places that used to be. The only building that used to be that I could find was the Old Post Office, and that was because it actually had a sign out front that said, "Old Post Office."

Admittedly, there are indeed people who need things like this. A coworker of mine used to go to her favorite greenhouse by taking the highway at the end of her street until she got to the billboard by where the cows used to be and turning right. This was pretty much how she used to find everything (her children would actually pack food if they were driving anywhere with only Mom). But even she has embraced the 21st Century, admitting that with MapQuest and a cell phone, she can find anyplace.

So, is it just me or has anyone else out there besides me noticed the address challenged? You can drop me an email or send me a letter at:

WTVG 13abc
Take 475 to the Airport Road exit, turn so you're going away from the movie marquee. Go until you get to the intersection with the Baskin Robbins and turn left. Go until you get to the intersection with the Speedway and turn right. Go to just before the second traffic light and we're the big brick building on the corner on your right.