Wow.

Just wow...

City of Valparasio put on an amazing fireworks display by Lincoln Park at the end of my street, using a barge laden with explosives to launch the fireworks.

It's literally breathtaking to see the fireworks detonate, the bang they make, and the thunder the echo of the explosions creates along the bayshore...

Excellent show, excellent day.

So...

Today's the Fourth of July.

Lady Liberty is now 227 years old. God bless America.

Freedom isn't free

I watched the flag pass by one day.
It fluttered in the breeze.
A young Marine saluted it,
And then he stood at ease.
I looked at him in uniform
So young, so tall, so proud,
With hair cut square and eyes alert
He'd stand out in any crowd.
I thought how many men like him
Had fallen through the years.
How many died on foreign soil?
How many mothers' tears?
How many pilots' planes shot down?
How many died at sea?
How many foxholes were soldiers' graves?
No, freedom isn't free.

I heard the sound of taps one night,
When everything was still
I listened to the bugler play
And felt a sudden chill.
I wondered just how many times
That taps had meant "Amen,"
When a flag had draped a coffin
Of a brother or a friend.
I thought of all the children,
Of the mothers and the wives,
Of fathers, sons and husbands
With interrupted lives.
I thought about a graveyard
At the bottom of the sea
Of unmarked graves in Arlington.
No, freedom isn't free.

Have fun, y'all.

You know, it's funny... I spent all day yesterday moving Brian's mother and aunt into their new home, down the street from me.

Not only do I load huge amounts of their boxes into the You-Haul moving truck, I also have to unload all that shit at their new house. While this is happening, Brian does almost nothing... Nothing except stop by, move a few boxes and maybe a piece of furniture, then complain that Candice and Carole didn't do things as fast as he wanted them to pack up.

So I'm listening to this fucking asshole complain and do nothing whenever he decides to drop by, which was twice, and wanting to beat the hell out of him. Apparently, Candice and Carole wanted a part of it, too... Seeing as how Candice was tearing into him about how he did nothing over at Andreanna's house (my sister.) that night.

I'm happy I don't bother to pay much attentiont to that guy anymore.

My sister has horrible taste in men... that's all there is to it.