Word Alive

Skegness is calling like a siren on a treacherous river. Thankfully, hardcore Bible teaching and the opportunity to swim in the North Sea will compensate for Butlins' prison holiday camp accommodation. 3 days to go!

Travel update

I just got back from the first trip of 2007, and very welcome it was after a bit of cabin fever at university for a term.

Chatel had its best snowfall all season with several feet dumped over the week and a LOT of powder on the slopes. Fantastique!

I've also booked my tickets to Toronto later this summer with FlyGlobespan. Well, at least it's supposed to be Toronto...

"Toronto has two designated International airports - Lester B Pearson International (20 miles from downtown) and John C Munro Hamilton International (40 miles from downtown). Flyglobespan's choice of John C Munro International Airport has many compelling advantages ... if your destination is downtown Toronto you can certainly expect to arrive sooner than you would if travelling through Pearson. A recent survey revealed a 48 minute time saving, departing downtown Toronto and taking off from John C Munro Airport over Pearson."

I don't believe any of that for a moment, but the ticket was exceptionally cheap, so I don't really care. I'll be in Canada from Wednesday 22nd August to Sunday 2nd September.

Mastermind

Confusion at its best.

I love geography

Google Earth is the most user-friendly and well-known application of GIS: Geographic Information Systems. Unlike most GIS applications, Google Earth has one program-set layer of standard information - the imagery - and then a load of optional layers showing things like roads, Wikipedia article links, international borders, cities and so on. Anyway, I am a big fan of the near-continual upgrading of the imagery (and no, it isn't live!). Recently Switzerland had a nice update with great resolution on both the images and the elevation model:





Denmark was also updated, but to be honest isn't quite as impressive. Can't think why.

Summer plans

Spring is in the air... which means it must be time to start planning the summer!

Two trips on the drawing board at the moment:

• Poland (4th year running!) from 1st - 19th July
• Toronto from 23rd August - 3rd September
• Finding somewhere to live in London in September, before starting study in October

The dates for Toronto are provisional, it seems a waste to go such a long way for a couple of days so I'll have to figure out who's around and how to fill my time there...

End

9776 words is no book, but it certainly took its time to complete. Suddenly I find myself with something called "free time" - how do I fill it...

I went home over the weekend, partly because Carey was having a baptism service. Eight young people (all girls, as it happens) gave testimony to their sin, need of a saviour and faith in Jesus. It was a real encouragement to hear so many sound testimonies - and an uncompromising sermon - that didn't water down the truths of the gospel for the sake of their friends. There were nearly 500 people at the service, of whom over 100 were schoolfriends of the baptism candidates. Good work girls! (SDG)

This week I can make up for my absence during the mission week thanks to the Islamic Society on campus. A few talks to go to and investigate the claims of Islam... and they usually provide much better food than the CU as well!