Globe Trotting

Of course the best news of all, that Sherry's fine, and the bonus that 1109 weathered the storm so well, has made everyone's weekend. Courtesy of cousin David Zehender, Mom and Dad heard about earth.google and its power to show us virtually any place on the planet; so I downloaded the free version and plugged in 1109's full address. Our beautiful green and blue globe appeared, as seen from space over the USA, and then the view began to zoom into the south, then the Gulf, and before I knew it I saw the railroad tracks, the playing field, and there, nestled on the corner under some trees, sat 1109. My view was very grainy; I couldn't, as Aunt Marvel reported, read license plates or identify someone in the yard, and I don't know whether that's due to my connection, weather conditions, using the free versus the fee version of the software, or what. But nonetheless it seemed miraculous. I plugged in Mom and Dad's address and watched the view back up, zoom across to Texas, and down again into Austin. There was their condo. Next I flew over to Winter Park to see my old (now Haley's) apartment. And finally, I zoomed over the Atlantic to Jolly Old England for a look at St. Paul's.

Just amazing. "The age we live in," as Dad said.

Getting my online courses up and running has made for a hectic week -- only 2 students dropped, so that meant reading about 175 posts in addition to everything else. My connectivity at home is not good so I've been living in the graduate computer lab at the library. But that's another post.