MapJack and Car Fire

Quick notes today.

Jack (in the lower window) looking at the building where I work on MapJack.com
Jack (in the lower window) looking at the building where I work on MapJack.com
1. If you haven’t been there already, you should check out MapJack.com. They have a really cool street-view map of Yosemite, and I love their interface. Click on the big picture to pan left or right, and you can move Jack around in the lower map area to explore different things. Very similar to Google Maps street view, but it seems to work a bit more smoothly for me.

At one point there was a group of us standing around the computer together joking “hey, that’s the RV I rented, hey, that’s my car…” when we panned a little left and CA cried out “OMG – that really is my car.” We checked it out from a couple of different angles and verified. Immortalized!

2. On a completely different note: There was a car fire here today that destroyed the vehicle of a Valley local. No one was injured (thankfully), and after they put the fire out, they realized that the fire was started by a stash of pine cones in the engine compartment. They suspected some squirrel had been storing food there over the winter. Many people in Yosemite end up parking their cars for a long time – so many things are within walking distance and there are public transportation options available. Still, it was a bit of a shock. Living in the mountains means that we’re used to thinking about things like loose rock, lightening, and snowstorms but so far “car fire due to rodent cache” has not really made the radar. Amazing stuff happens here.