boom boom shakalaka boom boom chief rocka
Seeing as it is Independence Day today, I got to chatting with a Philippine compatriot about our expectations of what a fireworks festival entails.
Here in the USA, birthplace of the Red Cross, stronghold of OSHA and HIPAA practices, it involves little boxes of sparklers and snaps you could light with a match, hand to your little nephew or niece and smile about how happy life is.
Somewhere else, where I grew up, it's World War II.5. Stray dogs and cats and wrens and the odd giant rat and bats and pigeons (we don't have squirrels, not big enough to barbecue anyway) would find their numbers thinned quite a bit on New Year's Eve. Homo sapiens, it pains me to say, aren't much better; my M.D. relatives always complained about the ER's being ridiculously full all night. The rest of us who escaped loss of life and limb would have to clean out our ears and nostrils for a day or 2 from the airborne soot. "But Ryan, what's wrong with this extra soot and ash?" In addition to the usual city smog and dust, it's also laden with all the smoke and soot from the combustion of TNT and gunpowder and various other explosives I don't really wanna think about. Gotta love the unregulated commerce of fireworks.
It's ear-splitting, nasty and very unsafe, but nothing could possibly beat WWII.5. The US experience is just a wee bit too sterile for me.
Here in the USA, birthplace of the Red Cross, stronghold of OSHA and HIPAA practices, it involves little boxes of sparklers and snaps you could light with a match, hand to your little nephew or niece and smile about how happy life is.
Somewhere else, where I grew up, it's World War II.5. Stray dogs and cats and wrens and the odd giant rat and bats and pigeons (we don't have squirrels, not big enough to barbecue anyway) would find their numbers thinned quite a bit on New Year's Eve. Homo sapiens, it pains me to say, aren't much better; my M.D. relatives always complained about the ER's being ridiculously full all night. The rest of us who escaped loss of life and limb would have to clean out our ears and nostrils for a day or 2 from the airborne soot. "But Ryan, what's wrong with this extra soot and ash?" In addition to the usual city smog and dust, it's also laden with all the smoke and soot from the combustion of TNT and gunpowder and various other explosives I don't really wanna think about. Gotta love the unregulated commerce of fireworks.
It's ear-splitting, nasty and very unsafe, but nothing could possibly beat WWII.5. The US experience is just a wee bit too sterile for me.