How's this for a first post title? "Automatic Weapons!"
Ok Richard, what are you talking about?
On Tuesday, I went out to my favorate running location, Hyland Park, for a nice long run. (6 1/4 miles with intervals!) The weather was perfect, my body was behaving properly. It was a great run.
As with most of my runs, my brains goes into overdrive. This year, I've taken off the headphones, and decided to listen to the nature around me. It also allows my brain to go off and think of things, almost like a REM sleep state. I was thinking about what to post on this blog, as Jill had helped me set it up the weekend before. One of the things that came to mind was to count the animals which I see on my run, as well as other oddities. So, here is my count from yesterday
BunnyCount(tm): 8
Baby Geese: 5
Baby Loons: 1
Turtles on the trail: 1
Smokers: 2 (In three years, I've never even seen 1)
Automatic Weapons: 2
Huh? Automatic weapons? In Minnesota suberb? Whats up with that?!??
After my run, I was by the main building, doing my stretches. I saw a park maintence worker hanging around his truck. A few minutes later, a Bloomington Police car shows up, and starts talking with the park worker. I can only hear every 3rd word, but I can figure out that the park worker is giving a description of a person to the policeman. I keep on stretching, trying to listen but not get in the way. Pretty soon, a second police car shows up, and the two policemen start talking to each other. By this time, I'm walking back to my car, and I think to myself that I should ask one of the cops if I can help. After all, I had just spent the last 70 minutes running the trails, and I might have seen the person they were looking for. I turn around and head back to where the two cars and policemen were. The two cops had popped the trunks of their cars, and pulled out some type of big automatic weapons. I'm not a gun expert, but these looked like the guns Rambo would use. One was a big M-16 type gun; big, black, and all metal. The other guy had a smaller black gun, with a hollowed out stock, which looked like it snapped into place. It almost looked like a gun a gang member would use in the movies. The each strapped their guns onto their back, and headed down a trail. I decided NOT to get involved at this point, and let them go on their way.
But the quote of the day came a few moments later, when a woman in a mini van came driving up, and noticed what was going on. From her car, she called out to the policemen, asking "Is it safe?" She had her kids in the car, and this park has a huge play area that usually has dozens of kids playing. The cop turned to her and says, "Umm... sure. It is safe down here", and turns around and heads down the trail with his partner.
The woman looks at me, and say, "I think the kids are going to have to do without the play area today..." and drives away.
I goto my car and drive away also.
I didn't see anything in the local news web pages, but I'll keep my eyes and ears open.
Jill had the second best quote of the day, "Mental note.... Bloomington police are well armed."
Enjoy!
posted by RICHARD (ignore the next line, Jill and I share one account!)
