Jamie Thingelstad

First pot from ceramics class made it through the kiln. It’s about 3 inches tall. Glazing next.

Second pot from ceramics class. Much smoother. On to glazing!

I’m not buying or drinking. No Starbucks for me.

There is no culture here. Sterile. Unhappy people.

Long live local coffee shops.

Driving to Chicago — heading down the interstate in Wisconsin.

When I went up to Ely to go dog sledding I was pretty comfortable with most of my gear, but I wasn’t real sure about my gloves. I had decent liners, but the outer mitten wasn’t made for really cold weather. I was lucky that the forecast was relatively mild, but I was also aware I would be outside all day and cold hands can be a problem. I stopped into the Wintergreen Designs store in Ely and took a look at the Plunge Mittens, “the ultimate trail mitt”.

These mittens are, far and away, the most industrious piece of cold weather gear I have ever owned. I have no doubt that you could wander around all day in severe cold weather and have nice and toasty hands in these things. If you suffer from cold hands and wish to make that situation disappear forever, these will do the trick. Of course, it may seem a little odd to walk around the mall with mittens that have double-insulating fleece liners and snow guards that go all the way to your elbows. The straps that hang around your neck would also look a little out of place, but they keep the mittens attached when you need to get your fingers out.

With all that said, I’ve never had cold weather gear that I could put cold hands, after taking a few shots with the liners on, and get my hands nice and warm again when it was -27 °F.

They were a splurge. I’m counting them as my souvenir. And boy, do I have really warm hands. I’ve got my hands covered for a future arctic trip. As an added bonus, they are hand-made in Ely, MN.

When I was getting ready to go up to Wintergreen for my dog sledding trip I was talking with my friend Jim about the trip and he told me there were two things I had to do. First, I needed to check out the two papers in Ely. Ely is a small town, but they have two vibrant newspapers and they have a spirited back-and-forth between the two. I enjoyed reading the Echo and the Timberjay on the couch at Wintergreen on my first day. As an aside, if you are looking for a little Ely love, go to WELY’s website and start streaming the local radio station. It’s awesome. I’m listening to it right now as I type this.

Jim’s second recommendation was that I take “the best road in Minnesota” while I was up there. The “fast way” to get to Ely is to take I-35 North and then head up on 33/53/37/169. The “slow way”, which is about 90 minutes longer, is to take I-35 North and go through Duluth, take the scenic drive on the North Shore, and then Highway 1 to Ely. On the way to Ely, I took the fast way. On the way home, I decided to put my camera with a couple of lenses in the passenger seat and head down Highway 1. It was great, and there were a lot of photography stops. Here are my pictures on the Long Way Home.

Not the best looking restaurant, but really great food.

Simple and to the point advertising. Also proof that the Internet truly is everywhere, and everything. This billboard is on I-35 northbound heading out of the Twin Cities. I don’t remember the exact locale, but it sure caught my eye. (Sorry for the blurry picture, we were doing 75 mph.)

The Turning Gate Lightroom Web Galleries ← Nice set of additional web galleries that can be added to Lightroom.

I just pulled the data out of my Garmin GPSmap 60CSx from my dog sledding trip. I just love being able to go into the wilderness and just drop my GPS somewhere with a little visibility and get a perfect track log. I fired up GPS Babel and got the data into KML format and you can now see it in Google Earth, check out Wintergreen 2009 Photography Workshop in Google Earth.

If you don’t have Google Earth installed, you can see it in Google Maps using your browser too.

I just upgraded to the new Google Earth 5.0 beta and was really surprised when I first launched it to get this dialog.

The problem with this are the options. So, I get to either install Google Software Update, or Quit Google Earth. Where is the button saying “Decline” and allow me to just happily run my software and update it myself. Smells a lot like Microsoft. The last paragraph of the text is the worst (highlighting is my addition).

To continue using Google Earth, you must accept the new Google privacy policies and allow Google Software Update to run in the background on your computer.

I may have to remove Google Earth and bid this thing farewell. Google, you must accept that people have the right to choose what software they allow to run on their computer. It’s my computer, not yours. Get back! I didn’t read the new privacy policies, almost scared to look in there. What else does this Google Software Update do while running in the background?

World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms looks like an interesting opportunity to take a vacation and learn about organic farming.

North Shore Photography Workshops ← Photographer offering workshops to improve your shooting, using the North Shore as your subject.

My home office is ready for the hardwood floor installation tomorrow!

You aren’t cold and dead, until your warm and dead. — Jason Zabokrtsky

When I left for my dog sledding trip I decided that I would get into the spirit of things with a book for the trip. Wintergreen had listed Winterdance: The Fine Madness of Running the Iditarod by Gary Paulsen as a suggested read, so I picked up a copy before I left town. The book was the perfect length of read for a few days in the woods with the dogs.

Winterdance is a really enjoyable read. The book is divided into two major sections as Paulsen prepares and trains for the Iditarod and the more than 1,100 miles of the race (Wikipedia has an excellent Iditarod reference to learn more). The book has several stories that make you laugh out loud when Paulsen discovers the power of the dogs. It was fun to read while on a dog sledding trip as I could truly understand the insanity of putting yourself on a bicycle behind a team of dogs. What was he thinking!

The second half of the book gives insight into this amazing race that I never really knew. It made me really want to learn more and definitely gave a deeper appreciation for the challenges of it. I’m making a note on my calendar now to remind when the 2009 Iditarod is (Sat. March 7th, 2009 if you don’t want to look yourself).

Reading this book and having the howl of the sled dogs fresh in my mind was really great. I’m a bit surprised it hasn’t been made into a movie. It would be a perfect movie plot with all the required ingredients. If you’re heading up into the snow, or better, on a dog sledding trip – I don’t think you could beat this book. Even without the snow, it’s a good read.

The scene just wouldn’t bend to visualization. — Ansel Adams