Jamie Thingelstad

Merry Christmas! Hope you have a wonderful day. 🎄

Merry Christmas Eve! 🎄🎅

Wassail Tea, Lefse, Carrot Cake — these are some of the traditions of Christmas for us. 🎄

ChatGPT’s Year in Review is pretty neat.

This is a big deal.

America’s Food and Drug Administration approved a daily pill version of Wegovy, a weight-loss treatment manufactured by Novo Nordisk that is usually injected. Eli Lilly, a rival drugmaker, is expected to receive regulatory approval for a similar pill soon. Pills–which are less effective than jabs, but far more convenient–mark a new frontier in weight-loss drugs. — The Economist, World in Brief, Dec 23, 2025

100 Years of the Opry!

We went to the Grand Ole Opry for Opry Country Christmas. It was a fun evening with a wide variety of music.

• The Gatlin Brothers
• RaeLynn
• Mandy Barnett
• Tasha Layton
• Riders in the Sky
• Charlie McCoy
• John Berry
• Spotlight Artist: The War and Treaty

We got a very slow start in the Legend of the Yeti room at The Escape Game Nashville today. This was one of those times that in hindsight there was an obvious thing that we just didn’t explore enough in the first section of the room. The game master missed that we hadn’t found that one puzzle and we managed through it but it caused us challenges to the end. We did ultimately solve the room and it was a ton of fun. I’m pretty sure they gave us a few minutes extra though! Room 84!

We completed the Ruins: Forbidden Treasure room at Escape Game Nashville today. This was a really well done room with good puzzles and very immersive experiences. Solved in 55m 12s. Room 83!

Now that is a big tree! Gaylord Opryland Resort. 🎄

Tons of Pokémon cards in this kiosk at MSP Airport — and only 400% more expensive than it should be! 💸😬

Clash Royale milestone — first card to level 16, Witch!

Old Fashioned at Aster House.

Mazie and Tyler finished their Gingerbread Houses for 2025! Delightful. 🎄

The cure for sub-zero temperatures. 🥶🔥

These meme ornaments at Runamuck Workshop made me laugh.

Interesting comments on big goals for their organizations and the community this morning at MnTech Outlook 2026.

Some observations:

• No surprise that AI and transformation was top of everyone’s list.
• Pratt: “we are going to have a reduction in our white collar workforce”
• Tomes shared his personal experiences vibe coding. Playing and directly engaging with new tech is critical.
• Bahner: we still need coding cause somebody has to read and verify the code. I agree we need talented developers but I don’t think this is why. Nobody can read machine language or assembly. Abstraction matters. Is agentic developmetn just a new abstraction?

Thanks to Renee Edwards (Optum), Eric Pratt (Senator), Angie Schulke (Star Tribune), Kristin Bahner (Representative), and Tarek Tomes (State of Minnesota) for sharing with everyone.

Great dinner at Salut celebrating my friend Jim’s birthday and a final visit before Salut closes at the end of the year.