#328 Krud

So recently, my neighbors engaged in their annual burn-up-a-bunch-of-money fest. Oh, they got a lot of bang for their buck. In fact, they got the original bang for their buck. Cause they were blowing off expensive fireworks for half the night. People in the southland don’t appreciate the nature of living in the northwest when it comes to fireworks. Cause it doesn’t get dark here at a reasonable hour. Us early risers, if we want to have a halfway non-sleep deprived existence, must of necessity be early-to-bedders as well and already have to go to bed when it’s still light out. So unfortunately, come Independence Day, we are just nestled into a nice deep sleep when we are suddenly shocked out of it by a loud crash boom and a sound like someone has exploded a mortar round on our bedroom balcony. True story, the next morning I found an exploded cardboard sphere on my balcony. Thank God Juliet doesn’t live at my place: Oh Romeo, wherefore art this noxious sphere that explodeth me out of deepest slumber so mine underdrawers doest be drenched with the fluid of fear? Like I say, darkness falls late in the summer northwest and neighborhood blasters, armed with the ordnance of hellsfire and brimstone start exploding things at 10:30 and keep it up till after midnight, when they finally let it all hang down and shuffle back to sleep. And no doubt a late morning sleep in. I think perhaps it’s a conspiracy between our Native American brethren and our Chinese commercial competitors to deprive the active early to bed Americans of the vital sleep necessary to function effectively in a global economy. And it’s kind of strange when you think about it, that the two groups making the most money off American Independence day are sovereign nations not exactly 100% signed on to wishing the American people success. And another thing: Trash. I wake up the morning of July 5 and my yard is littered with krud. Blown shells whose trajectory indicates my house was in dire danger of going up in flames the previous night. Big cardboard tubes in the shrubbery next to my front wall, mortar spheres next to my garage door, numerous, small, expired bottle rockets on my dry lawn. All in good fun. Ha ha. Nothing better than waking up from a short night’s fitful sleep because of my neighbors’ exuberant patriotic noise pollution and finding my yard a litter zone of cardboard, confetti, scorch marks, and unexploded gun powder. Makes you proud to be an American, yes it does. Oh lighten up, Funny Guy you say, and I should. But it’s hard not to be cranky when your neighbor has not only deprived you of sleep but generously given you a yard full of litter to clean up as well. What made it worse was Independence Day was on a Tuesday this year. And Wednesday was complete dependence day, on the job I need to pay my fire insurance.
America, ya gotta love it.