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corilannamIt's probably not correct to say this, but as an American, I love the 4th of July. It's the one day where I allow myself to feel a pure and uncomplicated love for my country. This year my Fourth was looking kind of dubious for a while, but I finally pulled myself together yesterday and drafted ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
chelseafrew into braving the National Mall with me for the fireworks, which is my very favorite thing to do on the Fourth, and one of the things I start looking forward to the whole first half of the year.
The weather was a bit muggy when we got down there, but sunny and not very hot. There were the usual streams of people getting off the Metro and heading for the monuments through the crowd of ice cream and glowstick vendors -- but we noticed there was an even bigger river of people heading the other direction. Hm.
Well, okay, I thought, maybe they're heading further down toward the Capitol. But when we got up to our preferred location by the Washington Monument, we discovered that while a lot of people were still coming out, they weren't letting anybody in. Evacuation! I asked the police officer at one of the exits what was going on. He pointed at the sky and gave a shrug. We moved to the next exit, where a slightly more helpful officer was blocking our path. "Severe thunderstorms," he said. "Tornado warning."
Ooookay, we said, looking up at the cloudy but still non-threatening sky. He assured us that he thought the fireworks would still happen after the storm moved through. As we turned away, we heard a voice over a bullhorn saying "Severe weather is approaching! You are advised to seek shelter!"
We supposed that was not a bad idea, so we walked back the way we came. Many people had camped out along the various federal buildings, under trees and the scant overhangs. Oy, tourists, we said and kept going down to the Ronald Reagan Building where we knew there was an underground concourse and food court that should keep us dry and happy for as long as it took.
Sure enough, there was a nice area down there, and not very many people. We elected to grab a table outside, up against the building where the storm couldn't reach us, but where we could watch the rain that did eventually show up. Our table had no chairs, so I asked a guy with seven chairs if he could spare one or two. No, he said, there were going to be seven of them. So I got one chair from another table, and when I came back, he had changed his mind and gave us one of his extras, saying they could double up. When his family got back with lunch, he got reamed out for giving away the chair and evicted from the table, but he was grinning and winking at us so I don't think he regretted his good deed.
I'd brought food for a picnic lunch, so we made our own sandwiches (which made me feel minorly bad about using the Quiznos bathroom later) and hung out until the rain stopped.chelseafrew had to show photo id and go through a metal detector for her trip to the bathroom, which is how you really know you're in DC. I stayed at the door with the security guards, who were mocking all the people outside. I liked them.
Then we finally headed back to the Mall proper, which was back open for business. We had to go through security there, too, of course -- they were surprisingly efficient at getting people through, considering how very thorough they were. Tons of police, no waiting! My searcher was very thorough going through my purse, though not so much my tote bag. He made me open my cell phone, turn on my ipod, and turn on my camera. He shone his flashlight in my purse, commenting amusingly on some of the contents (yes, jellybeans, shut up, man). I had a bit of a moment when he shone the light directly onto my notebook, which I had tossed into my purse still open to what I was writing (which happened to be a scene of a priest jerking off in a confessional). Fortunately, he was distracted by my bottle of Snapple, which was glass and thus "could be used to hurt somebody." Well, I could swing my purse really hard and hurt somebody, but alas, my Snapple went into the giant garbage can of national security.
"Dude took my Snapple," I announced mournfully when I met up withchelseafrew on the other side. "That's just not cool."
She, however, was in love with the guy, since he let her keep her non-replaceable folding travel scissors, which came very close to joining my Snapple. Buoyed by that joy (though with an urge to hurt somebody with my plastic water bottle, just to prove a point), we headed up to the Washington Monument and found that perfect viewing spot. The weather was cool and breezy, the ground was barely damp, we could hear the music broadcast but we weren't too close to the speakers, and there was a gigantic national phallic symbol right next to us. Life doesn't get any better!
We chilled as the sun went down. I discovered that the reason I'd been feeling like I had a shard of glass in my foot for the last few weeks was because, in fact, I had a shard of glass in my foot. We enjoyed the frisbee antics of our fellow Americans. And then the fireworks finally started.
There are so many things I love about live fireworks. I love that first boom of the canon and the way everyone kind of squeals and stops whatever they were doing to scramble around toward it. I love that first shower of sparks hissing down toward us, almost like they're going to fall onto us because we're so close. I love the rhythm of it, the gradual escalations and pauses between bursts. I love the faint sounds of the obligatory Sousa and Copland. We had some nifty new fireworks this year, that turned into multicolored glittering stars as they fell. My favorites, though, are still the fizzy gold ones. This time they did those in patterns that looked like giant gilt chrysanthemums in the sky.
And of course, I love the finale the most, when they just throw everything they have left up into the air, so the whole sky is filled with light and color and booms and hisses.
What I don't love so much is the walk back to the Metro afterwards. Though even that was pretty pleasant. We let the crowds disperse a bit first, which they did a bit more quickly this year than usual, then headed down. It was still nice and cool, great walking weather, and we eschewed the overcrowded Metro Center for a stop a bit further down that would guarantee us seats on the train. There was ice cream. I came home to bits of new Duran fic and finished some of my own. And then I slept decently for the first time this week.
A pleasant break in a sucky week. Whether you had a holiday or not, I hope everyone else had a great day yesterday, too.
chelseafrew into braving the National Mall with me for the fireworks, which is my very favorite thing to do on the Fourth, and one of the things I start looking forward to the whole first half of the year.The weather was a bit muggy when we got down there, but sunny and not very hot. There were the usual streams of people getting off the Metro and heading for the monuments through the crowd of ice cream and glowstick vendors -- but we noticed there was an even bigger river of people heading the other direction. Hm.
Well, okay, I thought, maybe they're heading further down toward the Capitol. But when we got up to our preferred location by the Washington Monument, we discovered that while a lot of people were still coming out, they weren't letting anybody in. Evacuation! I asked the police officer at one of the exits what was going on. He pointed at the sky and gave a shrug. We moved to the next exit, where a slightly more helpful officer was blocking our path. "Severe thunderstorms," he said. "Tornado warning."
Ooookay, we said, looking up at the cloudy but still non-threatening sky. He assured us that he thought the fireworks would still happen after the storm moved through. As we turned away, we heard a voice over a bullhorn saying "Severe weather is approaching! You are advised to seek shelter!"
We supposed that was not a bad idea, so we walked back the way we came. Many people had camped out along the various federal buildings, under trees and the scant overhangs. Oy, tourists, we said and kept going down to the Ronald Reagan Building where we knew there was an underground concourse and food court that should keep us dry and happy for as long as it took.
Sure enough, there was a nice area down there, and not very many people. We elected to grab a table outside, up against the building where the storm couldn't reach us, but where we could watch the rain that did eventually show up. Our table had no chairs, so I asked a guy with seven chairs if he could spare one or two. No, he said, there were going to be seven of them. So I got one chair from another table, and when I came back, he had changed his mind and gave us one of his extras, saying they could double up. When his family got back with lunch, he got reamed out for giving away the chair and evicted from the table, but he was grinning and winking at us so I don't think he regretted his good deed.
I'd brought food for a picnic lunch, so we made our own sandwiches (which made me feel minorly bad about using the Quiznos bathroom later) and hung out until the rain stopped.
chelseafrew had to show photo id and go through a metal detector for her trip to the bathroom, which is how you really know you're in DC. I stayed at the door with the security guards, who were mocking all the people outside. I liked them.Then we finally headed back to the Mall proper, which was back open for business. We had to go through security there, too, of course -- they were surprisingly efficient at getting people through, considering how very thorough they were. Tons of police, no waiting! My searcher was very thorough going through my purse, though not so much my tote bag. He made me open my cell phone, turn on my ipod, and turn on my camera. He shone his flashlight in my purse, commenting amusingly on some of the contents (yes, jellybeans, shut up, man). I had a bit of a moment when he shone the light directly onto my notebook, which I had tossed into my purse still open to what I was writing (which happened to be a scene of a priest jerking off in a confessional). Fortunately, he was distracted by my bottle of Snapple, which was glass and thus "could be used to hurt somebody." Well, I could swing my purse really hard and hurt somebody, but alas, my Snapple went into the giant garbage can of national security.
"Dude took my Snapple," I announced mournfully when I met up with
chelseafrew on the other side. "That's just not cool."She, however, was in love with the guy, since he let her keep her non-replaceable folding travel scissors, which came very close to joining my Snapple. Buoyed by that joy (though with an urge to hurt somebody with my plastic water bottle, just to prove a point), we headed up to the Washington Monument and found that perfect viewing spot. The weather was cool and breezy, the ground was barely damp, we could hear the music broadcast but we weren't too close to the speakers, and there was a gigantic national phallic symbol right next to us. Life doesn't get any better!
We chilled as the sun went down. I discovered that the reason I'd been feeling like I had a shard of glass in my foot for the last few weeks was because, in fact, I had a shard of glass in my foot. We enjoyed the frisbee antics of our fellow Americans. And then the fireworks finally started.
There are so many things I love about live fireworks. I love that first boom of the canon and the way everyone kind of squeals and stops whatever they were doing to scramble around toward it. I love that first shower of sparks hissing down toward us, almost like they're going to fall onto us because we're so close. I love the rhythm of it, the gradual escalations and pauses between bursts. I love the faint sounds of the obligatory Sousa and Copland. We had some nifty new fireworks this year, that turned into multicolored glittering stars as they fell. My favorites, though, are still the fizzy gold ones. This time they did those in patterns that looked like giant gilt chrysanthemums in the sky.
And of course, I love the finale the most, when they just throw everything they have left up into the air, so the whole sky is filled with light and color and booms and hisses.
What I don't love so much is the walk back to the Metro afterwards. Though even that was pretty pleasant. We let the crowds disperse a bit first, which they did a bit more quickly this year than usual, then headed down. It was still nice and cool, great walking weather, and we eschewed the overcrowded Metro Center for a stop a bit further down that would guarantee us seats on the train. There was ice cream. I came home to bits of new Duran fic and finished some of my own. And then I slept decently for the first time this week.
A pleasant break in a sucky week. Whether you had a holiday or not, I hope everyone else had a great day yesterday, too.
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Be glad you weren't here in Chicago
Date: 2007-07-05 03:51 pm (UTC)Don't know if you heard, but the elevated trains here broke down for an hour right after the fireworks, stranding five trainloads of people on the tracks and hamstringing everyone else's attempts to GET THE HELL OUT OF MY NEIGHBORHOOD, THANK YOU! Oi!
Still, it wouldn't have mattered for you, since you'd've been staying at our place *g* and could just walk home--or sit in our living room and have a glass of wine. They're doing fireworks THREE DAYS here this year! Normally, we just have them on the third, but this year, they did the big one on the third, Navy Pier AND Grant Park did them last night, and there will be more tonight.
*sniffle* Last time we'll be able to do this, you know? The new condo doesn't have nearly the view this place does. *sob*
*g* Glad you guys had fun!
Re: Be glad you weren't here in Chicago
Date: 2007-07-05 04:13 pm (UTC)I am going to miss that view of yours! And I don't blame B for timing her trip to take advantage of it one last time. *waves hello*
How's the packing effort going?
Re: Be glad you weren't here in Chicago
Date: 2007-07-05 04:19 pm (UTC)Yes, the lost view is a sadness, but dude, you guys will LOVE the new condo! It's just... beautiful! And OURS! *heehee*
Re: Be glad you weren't here in Chicago
Date: 2007-07-05 04:24 pm (UTC)I can't wait to see the new place!
Re: Be glad you weren't here in Chicago
Date: 2007-07-05 08:39 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-07-05 04:20 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-07-05 04:28 pm (UTC)I've noticed the lid-taking thing at games and concerts, too. When I went to a concert in London a year and a half ago, I remember them taking my (plastic) bottle of soda and offering to decant it for me if I wanted to still drink it. I didn't mind that too much, because at a concert that summer I had a waitress spill a tray full of bottle caps on me, and it was awful stepping on them for the rest of the night.
But I keep picturing some scary looking tough guys breaking off their Snapple bottles and going at each other in the middle of the Mall. Man, that would be the most embarrassing gang fight ever....
no subject
Date: 2007-07-05 06:46 pm (UTC)And I am truly amazed that the security checks went so well.
no subject
Date: 2007-07-06 03:51 pm (UTC)The security checks were really very impressive. They had constructed at least half a dozen of these aisles with long tables, and each aisle had about 4 nosy Snapple stealers. Despite the tons of people, we got to walk right up to a checkpoint, and there weren't really any lines despite the fairly lengthy search.
no subject
Date: 2007-07-06 05:45 pm (UTC)LOL!