Month: January 2025

Misc Pictures

~ Guy Hall

Above is a picture I took years ago with an earlier version of the iPhone. It was incidental—that is, I took it without much forethought. I looked, snapped a few, and moved on. Honestly, I don’t know exactly where I took this on the St. Louis River. I suspect it is right after crossing the swinging bridge in Jay Cooke State Park.

Cinnamon on my wrist
Cinnamon is upset I’m not paying attention to her

One morning, I was working at my computer, and Cinnamon, the cat who chose me on 10/23/2004, decided I was paying too much attention to the screen and not enough attention to her. One day, I will write about how she came into my life.

The original incidental picture.

This is the original incidental picture. I was at the Como Conservatory in St. Paul early on a Sunday morning with Caleb, the son of my then-girlfriend. The flowers caught my attention, so I stepped back, held my digital camera (my first one) over them without even bothering to look through the viewfinder, and snapped a photo.

The sun shines on a rainy day. Snapped from the front door of the house I owned in Hastings, MN.

This is the water flowing over the dam on top of the Vermillion Falls in Hastings. Snapped the summer of 2024.

The outside shot of water flowing over the dam just before the Vermillion River Falls in Hastings, MN

Here is the outside shot of the flow over the dam.

So, there you go—just some random images taken over the years, with little connection to each other.

Happy Belated New Year

The Castle
~ Guy Hall

So, last night, the four-year-old furnace decided to crap out. Thankfully, the furnace wasn’t the issue; it was the old fuse element. Somehow, the wiring at the base of the connection plate of the element came loose. Anyway, this occurred at 9:14 PM, in sub-freezing weather. However, the local gas company has emergency repair technicians on duty. They arrived and got to work less than 10 minutes after making the call. The furnace was up and running by 11:30 pm. It was a stress-free situation. The technician was a pleasant man with whom I enjoyed talking while he repaired the problem.

Meanwhile, as the furnace was malfunctioning, the house managed not to lose heat. Despite the outside temperature being at 4 degrees above 0, the house did not drop below 50 degrees. Not bad for a 70-year-old building with original windows (sans one). Oh, there was a draft on the floor, and it felt like a window might open somewhere (there wasn’t), but it didn’t get uncomfortable.

The only members of the household stressed out were Loki and Smokey. Loki made a run for the ductwork in the basement and stayed hidden. Smokey hung out under a table in the living room. Kang? He did not give a shit that there was a stranger in the house. He stayed on the electric blanket and enjoyed the heat.

So, yeah, Happy Belated New Year.