Everybody has those days. (No, I’m not quoting Hannah Montana. Or am I?)
We all have those days where we just feel absolutely…. stuck. Bogged down by a seemingly dead-end job or stress at work, irritated by family or friends or coworkers, tired of dealing with the car payment and the rent and the ten other things you need to budget for this upcoming paycheck.
It’s easy to let all of that get to you, and to feel like you’re absolutely stuck right where you are. While it’s nice to imagine a vacation or picking up and moving abruptly to another city, state or even country sometimes, much of the time it stops at imagining.
There’s one website that many of you have probably already seen, but that I’m going to bring to your attention today. It’s called MapCrunch, and the premise of it is really very simple. Daily, going to the website brings a new image from somewhere around the world. Today’s, as I write this, is a spectacular underwater view from Burnett Heads, Queensland, Australia.
So not only is there the daily view that is automatically loaded upon visiting the page; you can also click the green button that says “Go!” (with an arrow) at the top of the screen and instantly, a new image from somewhere else in the world will be loaded. You can zoom in, navigate around, etc. You can also select options so it gives you views only in certain continents or countries, etc. and can easily download the image you’re seeing just by clicking ‘Share’ and then the little arrow pointing downward that signals download!
It’s a great way to get some different views of the world, escape from your desk/family/bank account and remind yourself of all the other things that are out there in the world. Sure, some are closer than others, but this world is truly a magnificent place, and even if I can’t always explore it in person, it’s great to be able to do it via a computer screen, simply by visiting a website. Some of the views may be majestic, bright beach scenes; others may be busy city streets or rural towns. You never know what you’ll get.
Just to get a little taste of the variety of worldly views MapCrunch has to offer, I decided to test it out and click ten times and see what different views I could get:
1) Daily view – Burnett Heads, Queensland, Australia
2) Unnamed Road, Co. Wexford, Ireland
3) 21913, 431 91 Kryštofovy Hamry, Czech Republic
4) Ceriņu iela, Gaisma, Bārbele parish, LV-3905, Latvia
5) Pnt Rouge, Martinique
6) Jerusalem
7) HaBustan Street 94, Hatzor HaGlilit, Israel
8) 53, 8677 Kalchevo, Bulgaria
9) R393, South Africa
10) MR26, Swaziland
Below is a slideshow of what I saw in my mini virtual vacation. I think this is a pretty neat website. I like using Google Maps sometimes to do just this, give myself a little escape from my current reality; MapCrunch provides a GREAT way to do that. Instead of having to click on a specific place on a map and figure my way out from there, MapCrunch is completely random, but I can also select certain regions if I so choose, and I like the random aspect of it. I can go from the Czech Republic to Latvia to Martinique in a matter of seconds… all while sitting at home in Buffalo.
thoughts of Melissa 