Category: Social Activities

So in December this happened:  The city is redoing Nicolette – the whole street will remain car-free and get beautiful tree lanes and walkways and places to sit and be enjoyed.

To do that, they are tearing it up numerous times and doing all sorts of ruff stuff.  So a world known statue of Mary Tyler Moore was taken off the mall and put in storage.  We even had people coming into the store and ask us where the statue was.  So someone got the good idea to take her out of storage and place her in our store.

So we had to almost completely strip the store for the seven hundred pound lady to move in and her ton and a half base to be placed under her.

After hours of careful dancing, she arrived at her home for the next two years or so.  Then she will go and brave the elements again.

And there she is.  Ready for people to borrow our selfie stick and get pictures of her.  And you will have a tough time convincing me that this is not the most photographed statue in the world!

Some sunrises just compel you to take out the camera.

Working downtown makes for a few weird surreal scenes.

Like on this one early Saturday morning. NOBODY on the streets at all, except …..  these protesters for green energy, who started a march in front of an energy company building where there was nobody at work to see them.  One was blaring on a bullhorn and they were chanting; and THERE WAS ZERO AUDIENCE TO SEE OR HEAR THEM!!!!   Just me peering through the window of the store before opening time, wondering if I had awakened in a type of Alice-In-Wonderland alternative reality…..

The day after Christmas (we did not have a white one) saw the second snowfall of the winter and the start of more permanent temperatures under freezing.

I am not sad that the year is over.  But it is always important to focus on the positive things in our lives.

Two dogs always fight in your life – a white and a black one.  The one you feed most, will win.  Have FUN!!!!

The night closes in!!  After work one afternoon  I walked to where Gina was attending a course on the other end of Nicolette to get a ride back home with her.  I was able to get this photo out of the parking ramp …. Days get really short and the sun even more precious.

Some fun on a quiet afternoon in the store – the director brought in a selfie stick for customers to use (the big purpose for this came in December!).

Well, those selfie stick might be looked down upon by many, but I dare you to try to use one!  Not easy at all – especially at my age…..

The month ended with the first snow for the winter – and not much snow at all.  It was gone in a few days because of the many days after that with temperatures above freezing.

On the 11th we went to the local special Sunshine Restaurant for breakfast with the boys!  For no reason. Just fun.

The two old guys in the household.  Top is Tuffie, born in 1999 and bottom is Chippie, born 1998.  We were basically providing hospice care for Chippie.

Not many fuculties remained intact for old Chippie, but I suspected he still had a very keen sense of smell.  And somehow they just always know when they are close to you.

I made biltong and it came out good.  I have not done that for so long that I am not sure where my biltong cutter is, but a sharp pocket knife is actually just as good!

On the first of February Wilhelm came home with the first car he bought for himself – flashy red!

My leatherwork continues and I made this guitar strap for a singer in Mankato.

I continued to drive school bus – this was the half size special ed bus I was responsible for.  Schoolbus drivers are thankful for  every early morning without snow on the buses.  Cold did not bug me – this one was small enough to warm up really fast and was very comfortable to drive!

At the end of February the four of us went out to eat a dinner for Jacques’ birthday – I am still sporting that beard and the young man is doing his best to keep up with me!

Having a birthday does not mean you must stop having fun.  I just hope I can continue getting older and being like Jacques.

A Facebook friend of mine, Marc Carlson, have been posting one photograph per day and he is planning to do a full 365 days of photos. This inspired me to do the same, so now I am doing the homework to see what vehicle to use for this.
I want it to be a glimpse of our surroundings for our family and friends in South Africa and also a nice record for us to look back on.

This will also be a mini tribute to Marc : he was the very first person I identified on the web and whose writings of the Internet I enjoyed. This was when the Internet was only text based and mostly used for sharing University documents. The document I found, put out there by Marc, dealt with the heat hardening of leather. I have that same document not quoted in my leather instruction blog.

I have to decide on where the graphics should be stored for this blog, how to group them and how to present them. Hopefully I will be ready in January first to kick off this fun project.

To help test, I took this picture this morning on the train going on to work.