LAUREL, Md. — Local emotional person Cara Lucas was interrupted while crying and shouting along to the chorus of Bright Eyes song “Poison Oak” by her GPS’s instructions to turn left in three hundred feet, concerned sources confirmed.
“All I wanted was to beat my fist to my chest while I poured my heart out to my favorite sad boy anthem, but Google Maps left me high and dry,” said Lucas while struggling to talk over her GPS giving directions to take the first turn off an upcoming roundabout. “I backtracked the song four times, and every damn time the most cathartic moment was wrecked by my phone’s disruptions. I mean, should I even bother playing ‘Mariana Trench’ knowing my exit is coming up?”
Lucas’s best friend, Eva Smith, has been a passenger-side witness to the emotionally unsatisfying disruptions of the navigation app in the past.
“Look, I understand the need to sob along to satisfyingly depressing songs as much as the next emo kid, but what I don’t understand is why she needs to use the GPS to get to a 7-Eleven that’s six minutes from her house,” said Smith. “She would totally reduce the amount of annoying interruptions during her panic attacks if she just memorized the way; it’s literally two turns. Her sad midnight drives to get taquitos would be way more cinematic if the GPS wasn’t offering a faster route every ten seconds.”
According to Dr. Maria Marino, a professional researcher in transit technology at Google, this kind of pattern in Google Maps is intentional.
“Our app uses advanced AI technology to sense when the driver is deeply invested in whatever they’re listening to,” said Marino. “We keep the roads safe by not letting drivers get too carried away. Our GPS will interrupt influencers singing along to The Lumineers on road trips, the most intense moments of true crime podcasts, and the deepest lyrics of any early 2000’s emo song. You want to weep along to ‘Land Locked Blues’? Well, good luck making it to that sick trumpet interlude without a road work warning from us.”
When asked if she had any plans to decrease her usage of Google Maps, Lucas was continuously interrupted by her phone’s Instagram notifications each time she attempted to reply.