Independence Day

Last night we went down to a small town fair where a demolition derby was the main draw.  That was good fun.

Today will be some hanging out around the house and slow cooking ribs.  Considering going to a friends’ house around 5 for a cookout and municipal fireworks (they live next to the park where fireworks get shot off).

And if last year was an indication, return home to a neighborhood display of pyrotechnics that shames many small towns.  Seriously “fog of war” kind of thing that lasts until the wee hours.

Happy Birthday America!

Not really doing anything, but having lunch with aunt in laws. 

But am reading both history and historical fiction about the revolution. All trying to avoid the pop culture stuff that isn’t quite true. 

If I can get my lazy butt out of the recliner I am going to put a new drive belt on the mower.  

A very happy and enjoyable celebration of our Country's Birthday, to all.    Have fun in whatever you do, and reflect on what makes our nation as good as it is.

Pork butt is on the smoker and burgers, dogs, and corn are in the fridge.  Seems I pissed my mom off enough that she doesn't want to come over because she keeps making up rediculous excuses, which is fine by me, but she has custody of my neices and nephews so that means I don't get to hang out with them or my dad this 4th .  I'm really bummed but I stand by what I said to piss her off.

Dinner should be ready around 5ish, all are welcome to stop by, otherwise me and the other peons that have to work tomorrow will be having quite the lunch.

barefootskater said:

 And possibly grilling up some tube steaks 

Ummm, Okey Dokee.

As for myself. Slept LATE, 4 mile hike. Now to the Pull-a Part to get a jack for the girlfriend's car, then Brats and beer. Maybe even a dip in the apartment pool. Happy 4th, everybody.

Dinner tonight with the new lady in my life and then concert and fireworks. Today was spent with some yard work, then relaxing with a good book.

House is clean and feast is prepped.  It's baby girl and the nations bday today so that calls for a party.  Looking forward to fireworks and family.

Oh and laughed at this.

I thought they called it "Thanksgiving".

So things took a turn for the weird here.

A fawn a bit smaller than my dog came running up the driveway. No sooner did I get "Look Child #1 (my four year old), a baby deer" out of my mouth and it squeezed through the pool fence.

I tried to grab the 75lbs dog who immediately took off after it from next to me. 

Fawn JUMPS into the pool with my wife, 18 month old and 4 year old and starts swimming trying to get away from the dog who is circling around the edge of the pool.

Got the kids and wife out so no one gets cut or drown by the panicking deer, grab the dog and toss him into the garage (looked like he nipped the fawns ear).

Fawn got under one of the frog savers in the shallow end and goes under since it won't support its weight. I pulled the frog saver out, the fawn climbs onto the stairs and out of the pool. It then stood around breathing hard for a minute or so then squeezed back through the fence and ran down my front yard towards the creek and wooded area. 

What the actual berkeley...

I wish I had the security cameras up.

In reply to The0retical :

Cool story!

Ya never have a camera around when ya need one. 

Glad that ended safely

I was surprised to see a deer standing in the road, as I slowed, it wandered off into the woods

Usually they find a cool spot and stay put,especially when it is hot like it has been.

No companions.

Wey Hey! (It's a British term). We had a great Fourth of July holiday here at Casa Fairview. Good friends, and they've now all left. Great conversation, and great fun. Local fireworks were spectacular, as usual. We had a good time at our firepit commemorating our independence from Mother England a long berkeleyimg time ago ... even though I have many great friends in the old country.  Anyway, it was a very hot night in SoNE tonight, but I kept feeding the firepit ... Why? Because I have good wood (pun intended)!!!

(It's 2:25 am on the fifth, but our younger neighbors are still going strong).

That pretty much tells the story; but we had a neighborhood kid’s parade in the morning, then we cooked some great food, ate it and then lit sparklers and tossed pop-its with our 2-year old.

We put her to bed around 8:30 and when the sun went down a bit later, all hell broke loose.  She slept through the whole thing, so did my wife.  As usual, I suspect the shiny happy people to continue lighting off crap for the next few days/weeks.

Earlier in the day, we came home to a gift on our doorstep from a family a block away asking that we wouldn’t light off fireworks if possible because it causes them issues, it included some salt water taffy.  Nice.  It appeared to have mostly worked as the fireworks came from the blocks on the other side of us.  Hopefully they managed ok with all of the noise and smell.

I gotta say that I really hope people can find better ways to celebrate the holiday than cheap, Chinese fireworks that cause lots and lots of damage physically and psychologically.

In reply to Stefan :

I noticed I wasn't as jumpy this year as I have been in previous years with the fireworks at night or small arms fire during the day. Last year I was caught between a fight or flight reflex as I was in the garage working when the fireworks/cannons/etc started.

It's probably partially from being inside during the fireworks and mentally preparing myself for it for the last couple of days. I wanted to work on the RX-7 yesterday but I couldn't handle being outside at night. I'm ok if we go to the park or something to see the towns show but the random neighborhood stuff really makes me edgy.

I still don't do well with long mid range tones though. The BBC News Hour tone on NPR at 9am EST still makes my heart race same with the emergency broadcast test tones. Sounds too much like a C-RAM siren.

I really hate this time of year because of that and because my 18 month old doesn't like to sleep through the noise.

Had a great 4th here in our little mountain town of 900 people, that expands to 10,000 on the fourth (no, not kidding).  Ouray, Colorado really puts on a super fourth - BUT:  it bothered me that during the parade, when the honor guard with the flag led things off, from my vantage, of the maybe 500 people within my viewing range, the only people who took off their hats were about a dozen of us on the steps of the Elks lodge.  It's only about 20 seconds of their time, but the general population (admittedly 95% tourists, who are often clueless about lots of stuff) seems to have no respect.  I don't consider this a political issue, but one of general respect and recognition of how fortunate we are to live in this country.  I'm curious - is this pretty much what others here experienced?

Best part of the day (OK, we had some really cool cars in the parade, too) was a flyover by two F-16s maybe 300 feet off the ground - flying up a narrow box canyon, well below the canyon walls that rise about 1000 feet.  Unbelievably loud, and super impressive.  They do this for our event every year, and it never gets old.

I took my son to see the Independence Day parade at Cumming. They had about 20 restored traction engines leading off the parade. Here's a video I took of one of them towing a calliope:

Came back from quick overnight trip to Belmar, NJ with Mrs. TJ. Stopped at home to drop stuff off and relax in AC for a bit in house. Then off to grandparents for dinner with family. Then home to collapse in couch to relax and hear fireworks go off 360 outside our house and freak all the cats out to no end..

Neighbor across the street the street had 5” mortar.  I was able to take that from my front porch.

MadScientistMatt said:

I took my son to see the Independence Day parade at Cumming. They had about 20 restored traction engines leading off the parade. Here's a video I took of one of them towing a calliope:

https://www.youtube.com/embed/qfcL4a805Y0?rel=0&showinfo=0

 

We used to go to the annual Rough And Tumble steam show in Gap, PA when I was a kid. It was awesome. Steam tractor pulls are majestic, if slow-paced.