Tom Swift:
CLASS OF 1979
John Marshall High SchoolClass of 1979
Rochester, MN
Mayo High SchoolClass of 1981
Rochester, MN
Kellogg Middle SchoolClass of 1976
Rochester, MN
North Broward / Lighthouse Point AcademyClass of 1974
Pompano beach, FL
Indian Creek Elementary SchoolClass of 1974
Clarkston, GA
Tom's Story
Life
I guess classmates took out the web page so DON'T click above :-) ^
I moved to the Washington DC area in '83, did really well working for a black & white photo lab as a courier delivering to all the photo stores on a set route in downtown DC. I also processed film and printed enlargements. It was a small 3 man company... Great for a few years but then the digital age came along and the business went bad so I moved to Portland Oregon in '97.
From '79 to '86 I was really into black/disco music, (NO rap!) collected a LOT of 12 singles (vinal), then discovered "euro-dance" music around '87 (NO rap!) and collected heavily as much as I could find from a special place downtown DC that specialized in imports for DJ's for the clubs. I scrapped the black music and made a complete switch to euro-dance which was called at the time "DISCO, EURO DISCO, & SLEAZE" The BEST dance music I ever heard. (NO RAP!) It is a "Dreamy" dance music, very melodic vocals with that european flare to it along with a HI-ENERGY or healthy dance beat around 120-130 bpm... "Pretty Disco" I've heard it called... Yeah it's probably played in gay clubs but I don't care... the stuff is too good! Most of it comes from Germany and Italy, some from England.
The "party every night" eurodance phase lasted 12 years... was a lot of fun keeping up to date, making dance mixes, etc. That in conjunction with a little cold beer I found to enjoy quite a lot :) went from Shaffer ('87) to Mickeys Malt Liquor ('88 to '96) and eventually to Milwaukees Best Ice ('96 to '99)
For a while I was fascinated with True Crime around 1993 and was especially interested in the "Jeffrey Dahmer" case to the point of even going to Milwaukee to visit actual JD sites and took pictures like where Jeff's apt. 213 was... went to see if I could meet him at the prison in Portage WI only to be turned away.
I was really into "Sam Kinison" Saw him 4 times live, collected all his albums, enjoyed him all the way up until he was killed by the very type of guy he would defend in his stand up routine... a DRUNK DRIVER! (bless Sam's soul)
In 1985 and '86 I went thru the Mormon phase hanging out with the missionaries which led to me giving in and getting baptized... I've had my ups and downs with that and it's a sore and touchy subject... In 1999 my one and only "fiance" whom was mormon put me thru the most rigorous 6 months of the most horrible roller coaster ride thru pure hell you could imagine!! I found myself doing the most idiotic stupidest things I would NEVER have done in a million years just to keep the relationship going to please her, and her mormon parents... I learned the hard way that you DO NOT want to date anyone who's manic depressive!!! They'll eat your heart alive. I learned later thru Leykis 101 all the things I fell for. I was the epitomy of all pussies. (Photo above is of myself with her during one of the great & wonderful times, at the good end of her bi polar cycle...)
Today I'm a Michael Savage fan! I also record daily Phil Hendrie for my own personal collection. Michael Savage is like my coffee, gets me riled up, makes my blood boil sometimes, I get a kick out of hearing a good blow up, or ripping a of a new one ;-)
Yes I was the UFO nut back in HS... (I remember what I did in my anthropology class) Yeah I still get into that off and on today... Bob Lazar really raised my eyebrows in 1995 with ground breaking FANTASTIC information... I LOVE Betty & Barney Hill. I bought an original hard cover copy of the book "The Interrupted Journey" by Fuller and the made for TV movie "The UFO Incident" w James Earl Jones that played Barney Hill did a great job... Love that movie. Travis Walton & The Alagash case are totally facinating even though the movie "Fire in the Sky" sucked. It was a typical Hollywood prefabricated blown out of proportion movie of what really happened...
It's a fascinating subject but it's not 100% in my priorities...
School
In the 7th grade at N. Broward I used to say I was really from Mars.. ;-) I stuck to my guns thru the entire year but made a total ass out of myself... I never did that again... besides, I knew we were moving to Minnesota after the last day of school anyway... It was a prank just like a LOT of pranks to come... like walking out into the middle of pep fests in front of the whole school dressed as Darth Vader completely unplanned by the pep assembly people...
North Broward (7th grade) was the coolest most fun school! My brothers and I went to private schools when we lived in Boca Raton Florida and North Broward Lighthouse Point Academy was a total blast... Good Ol' "Mr Jim" was the headmaster of North Broward who was the nicest most laid back principal for a school.... Like every 2 weeks we did what was called "Adventure Fridays" which was a class trip to Sea World one time, Lion Country Safari another time, A trip to Cape Canaveral to see "Skylab" lift off! (This was the school year of '73-'74) One Friday night our class went out for pizza and a movie, I think it was "Shakey's Pizza" and the movie was perfect and right up my alley; Woody Allen's "Sleeper"... and since I was interested in "futuristic Cool" things and Woody Allen was so funny.... we all had the best time! Last but not least; That weekend trip to Disney World I'll never forget (have reg. 8 footage of all these times too!) where we camped at Fort Wilderness which gave us kids status to all monorails, trams any time we wanted and renting individual "speed boats" to race around all the lakes around Disney... as a 12, 13 year old kid to get to do that with his friends was a dream!
Kellogg, back to public schools after we moved to Minn. I remember having a tough time at first fitting in, being picked on in the 8th grade, brutal ass fights after school scared the holy crap out of me... When I went to Hollisters office scared of certain kids that wanted to kick my ass, they encouraged me to stand up to them and throw the first punch and fight them!?! I couldn't believe it! He said he'll send us both home as punishment but he'll "pat me on the back" on the way out... Well that fight never did happen but I earned respect from my peers by the 9th grade especially when I made and showed my films in school. I remember Zanders class when he asked everyone if they watched Monty Python and Zander did the "silly walks" in front of the class while we died laughing! He was one of the funniest teachers I remember!
In my senior year I made the pixilation film called "Paper Route" Where we delivered papers on invisible motercycles! My UFO film was a reinactment of the Travis Walton case and the...Expand for more
film starred Me (JM), Craig Slack (Mayo), and Jim Vessey (Lourdes)
Hard to believe it's been over 25 years since the days we were at JM in 1979!
Right after graduation 2 friends and I drove to Florida for a 2 week vacation visiting Disney and Six flags in Atlanta... we stayed at KOA campgrounds most days with a budget of less then $300. each for the 2 weeks and we took my "11 miles to the gallon" Fleetwood cadillac too! But it was 2 of the most fun adventurous weeks we ever had! We experienced the tornado that touched down right where we were at Cocoa Beach... right after we smoked a joint and split a twelve pack and we looked out in total awe at this big white tornado touch down about 1000 feet away from us and start heading toward us!
It was that trip that the Iran hostage deal was begining and I remember seeing Carter on TV saying "We wont buy a single drop more of Iranian oil!"
So anyway I graduated from John Marshall, but I didn't actually attend Mayo, Lourdes, or Frederick High School.
Ironically My UFO film starred 3 guys... One from JM (me), one from Mayo, and the other from Lourdes! I was always proud of that.
College
I took film making classes at "Film in the Cities" which is a part of Inver Hills community college up in St. Paul. Took animation and 16mm and all the availble classes to get my hands on school equipment... Made my classic Claymation film thru the animation class summer of 1982. We had a boat load of fun... Did I do anything with it? F no. When I moved to Maryland in 1983 I took "some" college at Montgomery college but I quickly got bored with it and eventually wound up with the Photolab/Courier job which I dearly miss today... Best job and situation I ever had. Couldn't have worked for a nicer boss... TOO nice to be honest.
College just wasn't for me and I felt like an idiot sending for stupid idiotic transcripts from Inver "!#&*%$" Hills whenever I tried to enroll into what I didn't have the foggiest idea what I was enrolling into at times within the last 20 years after that... feeling like a total A HOLE whenever I strolled into the reception area of any college... Shows I was just doing it because I was being pushed.
I HAD my career at the Post Office... which was brutally ripped from me forever. For the Nazi Postmaster, it was a politically correct "feel good" firing to make them look good while it devistated my situation worse than you could imagine... It was the equivlant of being put up into a pillary for public veiw and tarred and feathered while my rear end was hangin out. It left me at 38 years old to now having to start over. That's why I'm just a delivery driver today even though I like the job.
Workplace
My first Job was at McDonalds when I was 16 in 1977. Started at $2.30 an hour! Worked there thru HS
When I moved to Bloomington in 1979 I worked at Lincoln Dell as a line cook from '79-'83 I was offered a job at a photo lab summer of '79 but was 50 cents an hour less at the time than Lincoln Dell but I wish I took the photolab job back then because I would've shot up and my life probably would've taken a much better path if I did... I would've had my weekend off back then when weekends were important! I will never work in a restaurant again!!! Miserable job.
In 1983 I got a job at Lightning Photo in Gaitherburg Maryland. It was a one hour photo, made good friends but THAT was a high stress miserable job too! Weekends too!
In 1986 I got a job at Kodak Processing Labs in Rockville MD. That was a M-F job but was VERY tedious, every night the same thing over and over again. I worked the night shift. I worked there for a year... I started delivering pizzas (Pizza Movers) in 1986 while I was working at Kodak, found that I was making as much money in my pocket in a 4 hour shift as I was working 8 hours after taxes at Kodak and that wasn't even including the check for $3.35 an hour I would get later for driving pizzas. I was making 3 to 4 times as much per hour as I was making at Kodak so I quit Kodak to deliver pizzas full time... Eventually when Dominos moved in and took a lot of our business, I got discouraged and had to find something else, a fellow pizza driver was quitting a photo lab route that paid an easy $45. per day for running a 2 & 1/2 hour route. I did that and it eventually grew into a 5 hour a day route for twice the money and I worked inside the lab developing film and printing enlargements for a nice hourly wage on top of the route.. I had a nice 2 bedroom condo, 2 Cameros, an '84 Z28, a '90 V8 RS, both with T-Tops. I had a Yugo, a Champ, a Nissan Sentra, and today a Mazda Protege... that life lasted for about 9 years.
Out here in Portland my first job in 1997 was a photo lab route which I drove a little Geo Metro from the lab in Portland all the way out to McMinnville, all the way to Vancouver, then to Greshem... It was a peacefull fun little job but I wasn't making the money like back in MD... I took the postal exam and got an interveiw but I was so homesick for MD and planned to move back that I didn't act enthusiastic enough to get hired the first time... Then I got the DUI which was very bad. I lost my chance to be a carrier and had just quit the lab route job, so I had to work at Dominos which was a miserable job because people out here in Portland don't tip like they did in MD. So I then got another photo lab job for "Photocraft" out here in Portland for 9 months until I got another offer for the Post Office working inside as a distribution clerk... I took it and it was tough working from 2:30 in the morning to 11 but the wage was double what I was making at Photocraft to start... and the benefits and the automatic raises and promotions were a dream... I got used to the work... was making good friends when the big bomb hit hard... I was busted for something that is too ugly to say here but all I can say is I hurt no one. It's a white collar so called crime, not stealing, just dabbling into something I knew was wrong to dabble into. too easy and tempting to look at and it has ruined many men. I made the stupid mistake of sharing something I found on the net to a friend in Maryland and his carelessness got it found and shown to the wrong people and he was busted and they forced him to tell who sent it which they came down hard on me worse than you could imagine. I have been thru about 4 years of pure hell and lost my postal career and the fiance that was given to me right when the busting of me was in the works almost like god was rubbing it into my face. It cost me plenty and could've been ten times worse... The state had a vise grip on my testicals for 2 years
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