sparkler "pose-offs" & acoustic trauma

Happy 4th of July to all my sassy readers out there!  I have to say that the 4th of July is slowly becomming one of my favorite holidays, if for nothing else but the fact that it allows me an extra paid day off work.  This year it has been especially helpful in that it delays the inevitable email jail I will be in upon my return from vacation at least on more day.  Hallelujah!

I also love Independence day because it affords me the freedom to drink copious amounts of acohol with my girlfriends and try not to pee myself from laughing so hard at our sparkler pose off we had this weekend.  The boy loves 4th of July too because this year he had a little mishap with a sumo-sparkler that will allow him to play deaf for the next week everytime I ask him to put the toilet seat down in the bathroom (though I suspect he does this anyways)....but more on that later...

So our celebration started out with a little cookout and adult beverages at Miranda's house and ended with  me coaxing my Sawyer boy out from under the grill cover because he's not much of a fan of fireworks.  Poor boy.  Here he is when he was still speaking to me:

Anyways, no 4th of July would be complete without fireworks, so being patriotic like we are, we brought about $20 worth of sparklers, fireworks, and rocket sparklers to the party.  The fact that he got to light things on fire made the boy pretty happy....

As I said, the night started out innocently enough with some sparklers....

And then the boy got the party started with some things that pop and make pretty colors....

Look at how proud he is of his work!  At this point, one of Miranda's neighbors had come out to her driveway to express her displeasure at our firework show, by watching silently from her front porch.  I'm not all that sure what was so offensive about our show other than my constant reminders to the boy that I was not stuck with him and if he bent over the fireworks one more time while they were going off, I would come visit him and his mangled face in the hospital with my new boyfriend.  Besides, if she didn't like the show to this point, I doubt she cared much for our next display of drunkenness: The Rocket Sparkler Pose-Off.

I went first.

Then went Whitney....

Ahh....fire can be so much fun.  The boy tried to get festive and take a turn at the pose off with our last Rocket Sparkler, but as I we were readying ourselves for pictures and watching the fuse burn down to light the sparkler, something strange happened.  Instead of lighting off the sparkler, it caught and blew up....no really...it was a boom so loud, I got in bomb shelter position like it was the '40s or something. 

Once we all got up and stopped our stunned laughter, I thought it was appropriate to check on the boy and make sure he still had a face.  Turns out he does.  He also had some ringing in his ears that wouldn't go away either.  No worries though....he consulted his friend who has a doctorate in audiology and he said that he will probably have some ringing and hearing loss for a few days, but it would go away.  Besides, a little acoustic trauma never hurt anyone.

In closing, I leave you with these....happy 4th friends, strangers, and stalkers!  Hope you all have a safe, acoutic-trauma-free holiday!