Delivery apps have a strange talent: they can know exactly where a person is and still have no idea how the physical world works.
Another order took me to a daycare in Montreal.
Or, more precisely, the app was absolutely certain it had taken me to the daycare.
I followed the pin, stopped, and checked my phone.
**You’ve arrived.**
I looked up.
A fence.
Not a prison wall. Not maximum security. Just a normal daycare fence.
The daycare was on the other side.
Behind me was an office building.
I checked the phone again.
The phone seemed pleased with itself.
**You’ve arrived.**
Technically, hard to argue.
I started looking for an entrance.
I walked along the fence one way.
The fence continued.
I looked the other way.
No obvious end there either.
Then I saw a daycare worker on the other side.
Perfect.
I held up the order.
“Hi. I’ve got a delivery for the daycare. Can I just hand it to you over the fence?”
She looked at me as if I’d suggested passing a child over it.
“No.”
“No?”
“You need to come to the entrance.”
I looked at her.
Then at the fence.
Then back at her.
We were maybe half a metre apart.
I could reach.
She could reach.
The order could complete its journey right there.
But no.
“So I need to get back in the car, pull out, go around the property, and come in from the other side?”
“Yes.”
What I especially liked was that she was still standing right in front of me.
According to physics, we were half a metre apart.
According to daycare rules, we were several minutes apart by car.
I got back in the car and began the official journey to a person I could still see through the fence.
I pulled out.
Turned right.
Then turned again.
Drove around the property.
Found the entrance.
Pulled in.
Parked.
Picked up the same order.
And walked toward the same daycare.
Now I was on the correct side of the fence.
Everything was fine.
Of course, I understand. It’s a daycare. There are security rules, controlled entrances, kids. You probably don’t want staff accepting things over the fence from some unknown guy who has appeared behind an office building.
Maybe she was completely right.
But the app also believed it was completely right.
It had brought me as close to the customer as physically possible.
Close enough that I could hand over the order.
Just not from the right side of reality.