To Australia, Pittsburgh, the North Pole, and Beyond!

It might not surprise you, but I love Google Maps Street View. I can travel vicariously through my computer, and that's awesome ... a few weeks ago, in fact, I spent a good half hour wandering around Sydney, Australia.


Even more, I like to go back and visit all my old haunts, the ones that are hundreds or thousands of miles away from me now. Not all of my favorite places are on Street View yet, but enough of them are that when I get homesick for whichever place - I've had a lot of homes - it's not a bad antidote.

It never occurred to me to see Street View as a performance venue, but other people have, some for prurient purposes (go find your own links for that one if you want) and others just for the sake of plain old fun, wacky entertainment. Like Street With a View, in which vignettes were purposely set up in time for the Google car to capture them on camera. Take a look at the photos, then click the links on the side to see the scenes in Street View. (Via http://stormthecastle.blogspot.com)

This is my favorite:

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Or maybe this one:

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In other news, I was knocked off my feet and out of the studio last week, not by sword-bearing people, but by a very rude flu. This week I am gratefully on my way to recovery, aided by joyous excitement that my holiday postcards with my map of the North Pole have arrived!

As soon as the envelopes (ordered separately) get here, I will list the cards in my Etsy shop. Reproductions of the map are already available, here. Not only that, but you can find it on nifty products here, in the other Interimaginational Institute shop, including a coffee mug and an apron for wearing while you make your favorite holiday cookies. While you're there, you might just find the perfect gift for your favorite map lover. Happy browsing!