Ancient times - the nineties

The other week I found myself on the way to a friend's house party in an unknown part of town. Stepping out of thwe tube station I pulled out my blackberry, typed in my friend's address and followed the directions given to me like a loyal puppy. Fast forward 10 minutes and I found myself lost, my phone had died and not only took away the map (which led me into the wrong direction anyway)but alos every phone number of any friend I have. Sad and lost amongst strangers and scary mental people that kept trying to touch my alabaster skin (I don't blame them )I couldn't help but wonder: How on earth did we cope before mobile phones and sat nav on the go?

It seems decades ago that I received my first Nokia 5110 mobile phone at the tender age of 14 (or was I 13?)and by now I have forgotten what it was like before. Did we use smoke signs or maybe even written letters?
No, we agreed a time and place verbally and face-to-face and then, oh wonder, actually showed up at the agreed time and place. In a way, though technology is great in many ways, it has made us freaking lazy and unreliable. Not me though, thanks to my solid German genes that programmed me to always be 10 minutes early for everything I managed to preserve my unshakable reliability - Many thanks to my Prussian heritage ;-)