Looking for a traveling companion

Ok, this is a cry for help. My work is sending me to France June 2-6 for training. I have someone staying with me until the 8th to sightsee in part of France. Then she's going home. I think it's an awful waste of a trip to Europe to sightsee for only one day, so I want to stay later. But I'm a big fat chicken and I don't want to tour Europe by myself. Thus, I am looking for a traveling companion for approximately the dates of June 8-14 (the ending date is more negotiable than the beginning date) for any place in Europe. I'm kind of leaning towards London right now. I would not be opposed to Paris. If someone would go to Norway with me, I would bless them forever. However, in exchange for a traveling companion, I would be open to most any location.

Here's the clincher. I'm supposed to book my flight today. April 3rd. So I would need to know where I'm flying from and how long I am staying. By today. During business hours. Help!

ALA #3

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Fired for Calling the Police on Child Porn?

My commentary for this post is on the last article. At first I was outraged. How could they possibly fire someone for calling the police on a patron looking at child porn on a library computer? There are not words to describe my feelings on this. Next I was pacified when they said they had other reasons to fire her (she was in a probationary state anyway.) Well, not totally pacified, but much less angry. I can see how it's possible that two things happened at the same time. Granted, the other thing had better be something really good to fire her over just one week before her probationary time was over. Really, they couldn't have waited one week and avoided all the bad press that was certain to come out of it? If they are telling the truth, however, I kind of feel bad for them having to deal with bad press on something that is completely valid. If they are not telling the truth, however, my blood pressure levels will rise back up to the initial reaction. In fact, to keep y'all from having to read yet another soapbox, I'm just gonna stop my rant here.

A blast from the very ancient past

Building structures out of dirt was not uncommon in Biblical times. At Tel Dan you can seen a mudbrick gate that Abraham probably walked through. The bricks that the ancient Israelites in Egypt made during their time of slavery were mudbrick. Mudbrick is simply taking moist dirt (often supplemented with straw) and packing it very tightly into bricks, then letting them dry. If they dried in ovens, the brick would last a lot longer than bricks dried in the sun. Either way, maintenance was a must. Rain, snow, etc. would eat away at the mudbrick and the people would have to patch it up. No one should be surprised that we have moved past mudbrick to stone, brick, wood, etc. for buildings. Imagine my surprise then when I read about the Sublette County Library building an addition out of dirt. It will be the first ever rammed-earth public building in the United States. I think probably for good reason. When this is done, I think I might be up for a trip to Wyoming--simply to see this dirt structure. I also will be interested to see how it's holding up in 10 years. I wonder what kind of protection they will give it and how they will maintain it.

Oddness

Ok, this also isn't Jerusalem-related, but wanted to be shared. (I promise! I'm working on the last few days! I have one almost done and the rest I have my notes typed up.)

I finally set up Google Analytics on my blog. Just because I'm a curious cat like that. (Please don't let that stop you from reading. I enjoy people reading my blog.) Also, because everyone is doing it. I had 8 hits on my blog. 5 from Utah, 1 from Washington, 1 from Montana, and 1 from South Carolina.

Now, Utah makes sense to me. But the other three? I have no idea who you people are. I love you for reading my blog, though. But really, I expected Idaho or Oregon first. Although, I did set those people up with Google Reader... perhaps they're following my advice. Cuz that doesn't show up on Google Analytics. (Which I think is the strangest thing ever... you'd think they'd work together or something...)

Related tangent

Ok, ok. This isn't a Jerusalem travel-log post, I know. But I saw this article the other day, and it's about Biblical Israel. And I was laughing so much I just had to share. Y'all should read it.

We now return to our feature presentation

Due to some serious pressure, I've decided to once again put in some time to finally finish the Jerusalem experience. (Special thanks go out to Aunt Trudy, Aunt Elaine, Mom, Travis and BJ. And anyone else who was silently pushing me on.) I've only got a week left. Hopefully I can finally get this done.

Anyone who wishes to make contributions of food, money, or anything else that might free up some of my time is more than welcome to do so.

Google Reader

It has come to my attention that many of you are naïve when it comes to the brilliance that is Google Reader. (Ok, many of you don't even have gmail accounts, which I think is rather silly myself, considering how many amazing perks come with a gmail account... but that's for another time.) So... why Google Reader? I'm guessing that since you are reading my blog, you probably read other people's blogs, too. Do you ever get sick of checking 10 blogs every few days, hoping that someone will have posted something? Do you ever hear people talking about the amazing video posted on Friend A's blog, but you don't know what they're talking about because you hadn't seen the update yet? Well, my friends, Google Reader is for you. With Reader, you can subscribe to any website with an RSS feed... not just blogs, either. I also subscribe to Harry Potter websites (go ahead and groan), a comic that all my friends think is the best thing ever, and a cooking site. In fact, just writing this post has inspired me to add lds.org to my Reader. I am currently subscribed to 90 different sites. There is no way I want to look at all of those sites on a regular basis. Instead, I just subscribe to them all in Google Reader. Then, every day or two, I come into Reader and it shows me who has updated. Not even just that, but I can read the post inside Reader. If I want, I can also click on the name of the post and it will take me straight to the actual site.

Because of this happy amazingness, I can now keep up on the lives of people I knew in high school that I haven't talked to in years and years and probably have no idea I read their blog. I can keep tabs on my college friends who have moved to various places all over the glob. I get see cute pictures and read funny stories about my nieces and nephews (when my siblings decide to actually post...). And I never have to worry about if I forgot to read someone's blog. Really... it's a beautiful thing. Here, I'll even give you a screenshot of my Google Reader so that you can see how much fun it is. (Please forgive the smallness and blurriness of it... I'm at work and only had Paint to work with. Chalk up a point for Photoshop.)