First time returning to Hotel Monaco in Denver since our Honeymoon 20 years ago.

Couple taking a selfie in front of the Hotel Monaco entrance in Denver, smiling at the camera on a cloudy day.
  • 9:08pm Flight got pushed back to 10:08p at 6:22p.
  • Delayed heading to airport, and flight restored to original 9:08p departure at 7:25p.
  • Quickly departed to airport, and 12 min from house realized we didn’t have passports.
  • Return back home for passports, depart for airport with ETA of 8:07p.
  • Got to airport and parked strategically to get to gate fastest, North security closed. Detoured to South security.
  • TSA Pre closed. So many CLEAR passengers.
  • Clear security at 8:28p. Very fast walk to F12.
  • Walked directly onto plane on our boarding group.

Phew.

My Gnosis Chain home validator is spending the next day or so getting synced. The Dappnode Home i732 was relatively easy to get setup.

Two sync status cards for Gnosis Chain nodes: Gnosis Beacon Chain Prysm at 32% with 1554817 of 4751686 blocks synced, and Nethermind Xdai fully synced at block 24114008.

We finished the unofficial last day of summer with a nice bike ride around the lakes, dinner at Punch Pizza, and ice cream cones at Bread & Pickle. What a great day!

Four people smiling and holding ice cream cones near a lake on a summer evening, one wearing a bike helmet.

We had a great time at the Minnesota Renaissance Festival today. It was our first time back since the pandemic. It was nice to be there. Labor Day is always our preferred day to go.

Crowd of visitors gathered at the medieval castle gate entrance to the Minnesota Renaissance Festival Family of four smiling together at the Minnesota Renaissance Festival with Tudor-style buildings and crowd in the background. Teen girl in teal shirt climbs Jacob's Ladder rope ladder over hay bales at a Renaissance festival while an attendant watches. Three people in Renaissance festival costumes stand near a hay bale maze, with colorful balloons and confetti on the ground. Bungee trampoline ride at a Renaissance festival with two people suspended upside down by harness cords high in the air Fire performer standing atop a flaming ladder juggling torches for a crowd at the Minnesota Renaissance Festival

Signed "Proof of Stake" by Vitalik Buterin

Vitalik Buterin is releasing a new book called Proof of Stake: The Making of Ethereum and the Philosophy of Blockchains. This is going to be launched right around the same time that Ethereum makes the transition to proof-of-stake. Buterin is donating all of the proceeds from the book to support open-source public good through Gitcoin Grants. I’m a fan of Gitcoin Grants and have participated in multiple Grant Rounds. I already pre-ordered a copy of the book.

Vitalik is doing a very interesting thing with the ebook though. You can make a donation of any amount and get a copy of the ebook. In return you get a non-transferrable NFT and when the book is published you get a digitally signed copy with your NFT in it. I’m in!

Proof of Stake NFT certificate showing vitalik.eth as signer and thingelstad.eth as recipient with mint timestamp and contract address

PS: The book itself is also published under a Creative Commons license, another organization that I have been a longtime supporter of. I publish my website and newsletter under Creative Commons as well

This bat has been flying around our cabin for the last two days. Seems odd to see a bat in full daylight flying around but I guess it isn’t that abnormal. 🦇

Small bat flying in a clear blue sky above leafy green treetops in daylight

Dairy Queen stop at the halfway mark of today’s family bike ride.

Four people smiling outside a Dairy Queen holding ice cream treats, two wearing bike helmets on a sunny day.

With Labor Day and some additional travel, I decided to extend the Weekly Thing summer break for two more weeks. Issue 226 will resume on September 17th!

I couldn’t resist grabbing a nuNoun and picked up nuNoun 88. Yet another noun project. ⌐◨-◨

Pixel art avatar of a figure with black hair, red glasses, tan skin, and a blue shirt with LOL text.