Happy (Belated) Fourth!

Things are funny here in Wester.  Instead of celebrating July 4th on, say, the fourth, the powers that be declared that the big fireworks fun should be held on the more convenient third of July.  To maximize the opportunity for folks to get wasted and drive around after the fireworks, you couldn't possibly set them off on a Sunday! Humph.

Anyway, we planned accordingly.  The in-laws planned their swing through Wester on the way to Colorado to coincide with the fireworks display and T invited the night unit to come have steaks with us. 

Enter the rain.  My fam has long compared me to Rob McKenna from Douglas Adam's So Long and Thanks for All the Fish:  a "Quasi Supernormal Incremental Precipitation Inducer," aka: a rain god(dess).  Having recently been to east Texas, I apparently soaked up moisture like a sponge and brought it home with me.  Wester is now the wettest desert known to man. 

The fireworks were canceled because the (beer) vendors couldn't set up shop safely in the standing water at the fair grounds.  Awesome.

Our dinner was great, but somewhat anticlimactic.  It certainly didn't end with a bang!  (Ha!  Fireworks humor!)  After the required patriotic flag cake, everyone went home.

The actual fourth was such a non-event that I forgot to put the kids in their cute July 4th outfits!  It was only after I started hearing the neighbors blowing up the horse pastures that we ventured outside.  The great thing about living outside the city limits is that fireworks are legal here.  I am personally too cheap/chicken to purchase incendiaries.  Lucky for my poor deprived (all-their-digits-having) children, my affluent neighbors have no such problems. 

The local display started around 9:00 and continued until past midnight.  And not the cheap fire crackers, either.   Big, gorgeous, bursts lit up the sky for 360 degrees .  It was like theater in the round, but more explode-y. 

The kids were entranced.  For about ten minutes.  Then they were entertained with the novelty of being allowed to run around outside in the dark.  Once they got whiny, we went back inside.  Unfortunately, the big free display going on around us did not take bed times into consideration.  I think we made it into bed sometime after midnight.

Happy birthday, America!  Thanks for letting me sleep in today!