My west coast brother has informed me that today is "Marooned Without a Compass Day." Fortunately for me, I seldom roam far enough from home to need a compass and if I have gone that far we are likely to be in my husband's car which has a compass built into the rearview mirror. That does come in handy occasionally. But with GPS even that isn't really necessary. However, now I'm wondering, do compasses work the same if you're south of the equator? As soon as i wrote that question I realized that I could Google the answer and so I did. Bottom line, a compass made specifically for the southern hemisphere will work better there than one intended for northern hemisphere use. In fact manufacturers of compasses customize them for five different geographic zones. Just Google the question yourself and you will learn more than you ever wanted to know about compasses. In case you're wondering why I even care about this it's because, in February, my wonder spouse and I will actually be travelling in the southern hemisphere, and while we will mostly be on a ship, you just never know when a compass might come in handy.
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