Jaw-dropping internet

I've been spending far too much time on the google maps site lately. For those who don't know, you can visit maps.google.com, click satellite and then view an aerial photo of pretty much anywhere.

For example: The Pyramids. Once the page loads you can drag the map around by clicking and holding your left mouse button. (I didn't realise they'd excavated so much of the area surrounding the pyramids.)

You can zoom right out until you can see the whole planet, then have great fun locating Disneyland, Heathrow airport, your own house (if your area is one of the high-rez images), and anything else you can think of (I've always wondered what the Rock of Gibraltar looked like from the air. Or the London Eye, Meigs airfield in Chicago and the Statue of Liberty.) For example, I found my house and showed my kids an aerial view of the drive to their school, following the roads.

Much fun. Big time waste. Beware.

Simon Haynes is the author of the Hal Spacejock and Hal Junior series (Amazon / Smashwords / other formats)