A Mellow Week for The Swank Family
Todd Swank's Diary Entry for June 24, 2018
I have been blogging on shortarmguy.com and Todd Swank.com for about 19 years. My family and I try to do something interesting each week so I have photos to post and captions to write. But some weeks, we just don’t do much. This is one of those weeks.
Miss Sheri and I were in the neighborhood of the Bloomington Ferry Bridge, so we thought we'd stop and look at the Minnesota River. Heavy June rains have caused it to create flooding in several areas and we could definitely tell that it seemed higher than normal.
On weeks like this, we find ourselves out playing basketball. All four of us enjoy a good round of PIG on a regular basis. The trash talk can get a little heated, but we are all pretty competitive with one another. We like to think that’s because we are pretty good, but
more likely it’s because we are all pretty bad.
We also like to take Blue swimming. It’s his favorite thing to do in the world. He goes absolutely apeship the second he hears the word. He will literally run in circles in front me over and over again as I hold the“chuck it” ball thrower in the sky and we walk from my house to the lake. He is so obsessed with getting in the water that he completely ignores his family when we walk by them. We have to pass by our neighbor's house where his mother, father, and brother live. They go nuts when they see him and start barking at him from the other side of their fenced in porch.
He completely ignores them never taking his eye off of that treasured tennis ball. It's kind of bizarre when you think about it.
He's much more focused on people when he's at home, especially when Grandma Linda comes over for a visit. He adores her and won't leave her side. We think it's pretty cute. I hope Grandma Linda enjoys it also. At least she pretends she does.
We hit a couple graduation parties this week including one for Megan Perera who will be attending the University of Minnesota this fall and has already earned the honor of joining the school's marching band. Congratulations, Megan!
We were excited to eat at her party because her parents are really good cooks. Guy likes to make things spicy which is right up my alley. I can't remember the name of this chicken he was cooking, but it had a really good kick to it!
We went our separate ways this weekend as Miss Sheri went to Iowa to visit her mom on the farm. Luke had to work so we had a boys weekend at home.
One of our favorite boys weekend activities is going to Mystic Lake Casino. It has the tendency to create some drama for us from time to time though. Recently Luke and I were there for a visit. We had been there for an hour or so when suddenly I stepped away from a machine and an employee confronted me. He asked if he could see my ID. I said "Why?" and he responded with "I'll tell you in a minute." My heart started racing as I reached in for my wallet to turn it over to him. I couldn't figure out why I was being questioned like this when he suddenly told me that "Surveillance had been watching me." My mind raced trying to figure out what they thought I was doing. We had played blackjack so I was wondering if they thought I was counting cards or something. Then he says "We saw him pushing the buttons..." Well, my fear suddenly turned to anger and I started lashing out at the guy. I told him "He is 18 years old. I feel like we get harassed here since he's already been ID'd 3 times since we've arrived and now this." I asked to speak to his superior. He responded that "I'm the manager of the casino, sir" I said "I'm a good customer and we are here pretty regularly." He said "We have thousands of customers, sir " and "He does look very young." I then explained that he has a medical condition that has caused that and eventually things calmed down, we shook hands, and went our separate ways. Kind of shook me up, though!
I remember 40 years ago being a kid and hearing about our country's national symbol, the bald eagle, being an endangered species. I can't remember the first time I saw a bald eagle in the wild, but I can definitely remember a time when I thought I would never see one. Therefore, I am quite excited whenever we do spot one which seems to be pretty regularly anymore.
Luke spotted this guy while we were driving around our neighborhood, so of course we had to jump out and shoot a bunch of pictures of him. They are just such majestic animals that I never get tired of seeing them.
