Since I plan on trying to be as far away from a computer as possible this weekend, I wanted to wish everyone here a great weekend! I hope that it is filled with charred and sauced meats, improvised and colorful small explosions and good times! EDIT: To make this RR, fuck... someone. I dunno, anyone.
As a dual citizen, having Canada Day and the 4th of July in one long weekend is not good for my liver.
Still at work and got to come in bright and early tomorrow as well. Must we always feed the machines ?
Now begins 12 days off in a row for me! Well-needed after two simultaneous proposals (albeit small ones).
Well, I'm scheduled to work. Of course, if census is low I might be called off. Not holding breath because as soon as you want that, you don't get it. Oh, and thanks to Hurricane Alex, we have rain rain rain. Maybe it will stop the crazies from shooting the rockets and stuff in the wrong direction and nearly burn down someone else's house..... (sorry the idiots around here couldn't hit the far side of a barn at one pace with a blunderbuss)
Fireworks are illegal here, but legal across the river in South Carolina. Thus, it's pretty much impossible to keep people here from shooting them off. The cops don't care, because they would have to arrest their buddies - a big percentage of my neighbors are cops. I pity any pets that aren't used to it.
In a follow up to my post in the Canada day thread..... Can I be offended if someone waves a Mexican flag in my face on the 4th?
Well I am home from work now. It was a "fun" ride home. Must have been 40 cops at a license check between my work and home. I got the full shake down and I was not in the mood. Why can't cops just be normal people and not all the attempts at intimidation and the bullshit 20 questions. They must have had 50 vehicles there, trucks with the big lighted arrow on them, cops cars, fire trucks, rescue squad, light flashing everywhere. I got to go back in at 7 and now I am still pissed off. We pay out the ass in property taxes to pay people to stand around. They even had a big truck with what looked like a portable tv broadcast station in it.
Wish me luck, y'all. Some friends and I took up a collection in a nearby neighborhood, and we've got a fairly elaborate display of maybe $2,500-$3k worth of semi-legal consumer fireworks ready to rock tomorrow night. We've got strings of quick fuse, remote ignition systems using "e-match" igniters we made by hand, plus racks and racks of mortar tubes to send up insane amounts of shells. Should be pretty kickass. But....it might be raining on us tomorrow night. [YT= "In case I don't have time to check in tomorrow..."]IhnUgAaea4M[/YT]
Uncle A, I'm jealous. I prolly won't get to blow up that much. Gonna be around too many guys who don't understand I'm a bigger pyro than they are.
In review: Rain cleared up in plenty of time. It was actually good to have the lot wet down like that. No grass fires or anything. Fancy ignition system we spent hours putting together only worked intermittently. Lost one of our fucking propane torches, and the ones we had kept going out. But, we eventually got everything to go off (if a bit out of order), and our audience was pleased. Time to start thinking about next year. : : : :
Well, the dog has spent much of the last 2 days hiding in her crate. I'm sure it's still not over. I'm amazed how many neighbors had full-out sky shows this weekend, especially considering that fireworks are illegal in NJ! Mary took a walk this morning and said you could easily tell which houses had the shows from the fireworks debris all over their lawns. If the cops wanted to, they could nail everybody. Guess they don't care.
As with thunder, our dog wanted to go outside and "fight" the booms from the illegal fireworks in our neighborhood.
If police start going after people for having fireworks debris on their lawns you can bet you would get quite a few people finding out where members of the local police force live and dumping the spent fireworks on their lawns.
One of the neighbors has a big white fluffy Forbin dog. Their neighbor had a big BBQ, replete with plenty of fireworks, and the dog was actually out in the yard, interested in what the heck was going on. But then I think that's a particularly awesome dog. Between it and the pack of Chihuahuas across from me, suspicious people get plenty of attention on my street. As far as clamping down on illegal fireworks, the offense would have to be pretty egregious because an arrest/prosecution would be a PR nightmare. More likely the laws get used if someone gets killed/maimed/a house burns down/etc.
