Happy Fourth!
July 04, 2012
It's the last day of my vacation, so it's only appropriate that it should end with a bang!
Heh.
We will not be going to see the fireworks tonight; many of the local shows have been canceled because of heat and/or storm damage.
The big DC fireworks show is on, but we are not crazy and will not be going downtown to see it. It'll be on TV; that's fine for me!
When I was a kid, we used to go to my Pop's best friend's house for a barbeque. Mr. and Mrs. Hickey always had a great spread, and Mr. Hickey would devise silly games for us kids. One year he had a crabgrass pulling contest; another year, after he'd had his house painted, he had a paint-chip picking-up contest.
It didn't take long for us kids to cop to his ulterior motives.
After the barbeque, we'd go to the fireworks show at the local high school, then shoot off our own. Of course, we'd been shooting off snakes and sparklers all day, but at night we pulled out the fountains and rockets, the roman candles and crackers. Pop always bought a box for each of us. My older brother got the big box, but my younger sister and I got a pretty good selection too.
And it was always hot -- not as hot as today (official DC temperature: 99 degrees, with heat index of 102), but hot enough that Pop would sing his traditional hot weather song:
When it's too hot for comfort
And you can't eat ice cream cones,
It ain't no sin to take off your skin
And dance around in your bones!
Hope you have a glorious Fourth!