Jamie Thingelstad

My cousin Josh Ellis has been writing a twice-monthly column in the Burke County Tribune for nearly 20 years. He has been writing old school, publishing in an actual printed newspaper all those years. He’s written over 450 columns! Over the years I’ve been able to read some of his writing but not much because of the limited distribution. I’ve always wished I could read them all.

I had recently been chatting with Josh. He shared a couple of columns he had written about Ireland and thought I may like them after our recent trip — Lucky Man and Friends and Children. I thought they were great and told him that if he ever wanted to get a website running for his column on I would be happy to help.

About a week later he pinged me asking how to start and shortly after Rambling Josh was up and running! ¹

He sent me 240 of his columns and I imported them into his site. Plenty to read, but only about half of all of them. We are going to keep working to add more. I also made sure to get his first column Shadow Puppets up. I hope to be able to help him get them all online. Some of them will have to be OCR off of clippings he has saved.

It was awesome to help Josh get this going. I can now get his new column in my feed reader. He also has a subscribe option so you can get it via email. Plus, his collection of columns will now be available for all. And even better, the open web gets a great site. I joke that when a blog is started an angel gets their wings. 🪽

He is a really good writer. There is wit and personality in all of it. Check out Rambling Josh and add to your reader. He may get an email subscription option going too.

PS: The “Surprise Me” button is a good way to read random columns. Just keep clicking.

Update: We’ve added another 80 columns, for a total of 320 now!

I find it incredible that Pump 1 in our sump pump system has run 324,989 times. Pump 2 has only run 15,179 times. It also indicates that Pump 1 flow rate is 59 GPM and Pump 2 is 81 GPM. I would guess the extra 309,810 times it has run has reduced its rate a little.

We decided to have dinner at Crisp & Green last night so that we could see Mazie at work! She was surprised when we showed up. Delicious bowls! 🥗

Last week when I repositioned one of the UniFi G4 Cameras so that I could keep an eye on the flooding and the pontoon I didn’t consider raccoons getting interested in the camera. I had just put it on a 2x4 on the ground. The 2x4 was to keep it from being on any pooled water. That didn’t even make it 24 hours.

Luckily I had a yard stake and some scrap wood. Problem solved! Additionally I’m now looking closer to eye height instead of having a view from the ground. Stay away raccoons! 🦝

Wondering about all that green stuff on the water? That is floating algae that collects in the little alcove that our dock sits.

We stopped at our cabin yesterday to check on the flooding on Cannon Lake. Lucky for us the only real situation we are managing is our pontoon and dock. The water was down a few inches from last week but still very high. The lake association also sent a warning that the water may be contaminated due to all the flooding upriver from us.

I also replaced the sump pump discharge line. Usually the sump pump there doesn’t run often but it is running every minute to two now and I noticed the discharge line had several holes and it was spraying water all over the place. I figured with all the flooding I may not be able to find a replacement but Faribault Ace Hardware had our back. Our sump pump didn’t have a threaded connector but I was able to make it work and got the new line in place.

We drove along Cannon Lake Trail and the water had receded a few inches but still a lot of flooding and even more debris after a week. We also looped through Dodge Court and most of the really big houses there were still okay but there were a few that were badly flooded. In Warsaw I was surprised that bridge that crosses the Cannon River on Farwell Ave was still open. I thought it ould be flooded too. The Channel Inn was not flooded, but Doc’s Dock was flooded and several of their permanent RV spots were as well.

It is fun to think back to 17 years ago right now, tweeting on iPhone launch day, when I got my hands on the original iPhone. What a journey! 🚀

Lovely stroll with Lucky this evening. A blooming Northern Catalpa, Minnehaha Creek brimming with water, and Asiatic Lilies.

This weekend I received my Ledger Stax crypto wallet! I pre-ordered this in December 2022 because I loved hearing how Tony Fadell, who designed the original iPod, approached designing this. The device is meant to look like a book and you can customize the spine and cover however you wish to help see what is “inside” the wallet. I unboxed it tonight.

The packaging is well done but very big for such a small device. The box it comes in is the same book shape as the Stax itself, and then the Stax is simply tucked away inside. Very nicely done and all simple cardboard so very recyclable.

I didn’t set it up yet, but I did power the Stax up and it makes a nice twinkle sound and the screen comes to life. It is a touch sensitive screen and is surprisingly responsive when you touch it. Very cool.

I have a Ledger Nano X already so I’m going to need to sit down and figure out how I want to configure and setup the Stax. I actually pre-ordered two of these so am expecting another one to show up soon.