Google Earth

I've spent a majority of my time online in the past two weeks either looking for job opportunities or searching for real estate. Most of the real estate sites generally include a map feature with their listing, and I've been using them.

Recently, I listening to a local tech-talk show on the radio and they were singing the praises of Google Earth. I decided to give it a try. WOW! This is an amazing program. It allows you to zoom in (from space, mind you) to any address you list. You can even tilt and rotate the axis of view 360 degrees.

Want to fly around the Eiffel Tower? Big Ben in London? The Grand Canyon? All of these are open for viewing on Google Earth. Or you can do something as simple as look at your backyard. For the fun of it, I started at my house and navigated the 15 minute drive to my children's school using the direction buttons. It was liking driving to school watching myself from above.

There's another program that I also downloaded called Google Sketchup. This allows you to create 3-D models of anything you'd like. You can then print them, export them for use in other programs, or even import it into Google Earth to give your home or office a 3-D presence. I haven't dug into it yet, but it looks great.

I plan on making a model of our house, and then trying different colors on the outside to see what looks best so we can paint. A little curb appeal goes a long way!