In another life, I was a cartographic draftsman, using both conventional aerial photography, and satellite imagery. I can't tell you the number of times a little puffy cloud was right over the top I something I needed to look at, or pick a fiducial.

There's probably still a lineman somewhere in southern Ohio who's trying to find the utility pole mislocated in a lake!

It looks like there are patches of Kansas in Midland. ;-)

Deborah, I had to look up the meaning of "fiducial." I don't believe I'd ever seen that word before...thanks for expanding my vocabulary!

Gwynne, you're welcome to have 'em back. I don't think we'll miss 'em; all we ask is that you replace 'em with some hills or valleys or something besides flat. Oh, and a little green would be nice, too. ;-)

Actually, I was referring to those flat green patches as the Kansas parts. It's very green here, and flat. ;-)

Well, that's what I was trying to say. It's flat and brown here, so the green obviously stood out as not being homegrown. You can have those patches back, but you'll have to barter with Colorado to send us some terrain with some relief. I suppose you could send them some barbecue; they seem to be lacking in that regard. ;-)

Sadly google maps aren't detailed enough for my area so nothing to see over here hehe.

Rachel, I know...I tried finding your location once when they first introduced Google Maps. Bummer.

I just googled my own place and learned that our neighbors have what looks like a junk yard full of cars and trucks in their back yard...maybe 40 or so vehicles). I had no idea! It's amazing the things you can learn on the internet. ;-)

Are these the same neighbors who griped about your lawn? ;-)

What's really fun is if you try to look at places that the government considers "sooper secret" -- like Los Alamos, NM -- cause they don't let you get very much detail on the satellite photos. (I was only looking cause I was born there and wanted to see if I could see my house. I found my street, but it won't let you get down to a level where you can see actual houses. Very sad. )

You were born in Los Alamos? Cool! That area is my favorite part of New Mexico, when it's not being devastated by government-induced wildfires. You landed pretty far from your geographical roots, didn't you?

I was - and I have the hospital t-shirt to prove it (babies born in LANM get the following shirt: I was born in Los Alamos, I glow in the dark.) :)

I haven't been back since the yahoos at Bandelier made a mess of things but I nearly lost my childhood home in that - it burned out the canyon that went behind our house but didn't make it up the sides, apparently.

It's a very pretty place to grow up and is, in fact, the area of the country for which my heart yearns - I miss the mountany southwest more each year. Someday I suspect we'll move back that direction.

When I looked at the thumbnail, I immediately thought of several of my neighbors. In the midst of drought and watering restrictions that have most of our lawns turning brown and crispy, their lawns are somehow a lush, dark green (and not at all crispy).

As a former manager used to put it, "It's HPFM."

M$ has a neat little satellite mapping program, that include low-flyover oblique angles (in some areas from four different compass angles) kinda neat to look at the house from one angle and see your car in the driveway, and switch angles and find out you really parked in front of the house (here in Plano, the driveways are in the back).

Also most of the photos are taken in the winter (to avoid foilage, perhaps). There is a grab bag of source photos, in some places of South Texas (*cough* Ingleside) you have what looks like circa 1943 photos along side relatively modern 1990 photos. Including a look at the mine sweepers at the Naval Base there.

Beth, I almost made a glow-in-the-dark reference in my initial comment. ;-) We love visiting that area, and have spent much time in Santa Fe (and some in Taos), but I'm not sure we'd want to live there.

Foo, I'm drawing a blank as to your acronym ("hell performing for monkeys"? "hard parsing fake memoirs"?) but something tells me that it probably doesn't fit this blog's MPAA rating. ;-)

Jon, I'd love to find out how these guys decide when to update their maps, or if there's any logic to it whatsoever.

Check the Google Earth images for the northern Davis Mountains near Balmorhea -- the photos taken around the I-10 I-20 junction are clear enough to see vehicles on the highway in the close-up mode, but when you slide it over to the Balmorhea State Park area, the image looks like someone smeared Vasoline on the lens. Apparently, Google's focus on sharp (or cloud-free) images is greater in areas where there's more population, and the quality control on some of the smaller-sized cities or rural areas isn't where it ought to be.

John, it could be that there's something going on at Balmorhea that the government doesn't want us to know about! ;-)

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