It's a certain sign of my society's or at least my family's advancement that no one blew anything up or shot anything into the air at my wedding.

I think I learned my dislike of fireworks from my father, who as a NY State Police investigator, saw his share of maimed men, women, and children from fireworks, and saw more than one structure burned down, sometimes with inhabitants,  from errant embers of fireworks.

I also hate crowds. I think I get this from my father as well, who, as a trooper in his early days in the NY State Police, had to deal with rowdy crowds, AKA riots, at Attica State Prison and in Rochester during the 1960s. This experience makes one untrustful of crowds.

So I hate fireworks and I hate crowds. And public fireworks draw crowds.

This was a problem in Kelly's and my early relationship because her family has always been the ones who go early and stake out a good spot in the middle of the field and feel superior when the crowd gathers around them and has to deal with the inferior view their timing chose.

To me this is exactly what hell is. Going somewhere where there are people and I'm not being paid to be with people, sitting for hours without a computer or a TV waiting for something to happen. Getting eaten by bugs as the sun sets. Stressing out while the fireworks are going on, wondering what will catch on fire bacause of the fire works. Following that, spending two hours slowly herding to a car, then spending two more hours in a car trying to get out of a field full of cars, then driving an hour home.

ALL DAY FUN!

But I used to deal with it a couple times each summer for Kelly's sake because I didn't have a backbone and I really liked Kelly. But I also made sure Kelly knew I wasn't thrilled with the whole scene.

Maybe she's just sick of dealing with me or maybe she's come around, but she now seems to share my fireworks aversion.

Now, as we have moved to California, which is entirely a tinderbox waiting to go off, our now mutual hatred for fireworks has quadrupled.

But get this: FIREWORKS ARE LEGAL EVEN FOR INDIVIDUALS IN THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA!!!!

You can't smoke indoors in the entire state (thank god), but you can have pyrotechnics outdoors. Well I guess the state leaves it up to municipalities to decide what's legal. Weird how California gets the idea of federalism, but the US government has forgotten it. I digress. So, the City of Palmdale has said that fireworks are, for whatever stupid reason, ok.

Now, you can't have just any pyrotechnics, you can only have the "Safe and Sane" kind of pyrotechnics. That is to say, the kind that can blow a child's eyes, skin, and hands off, but don't fly in the air before or after maiming.

As with any really bad thing that Americans want to partake in but shouldn't, it's best to either tax the shit out of it and "ear mark" the money "for the children" or only allow charities or native Americans to profit from it, or all of the above.

California has chosen all of the above.

The fireworks stands started going up all around Palmdale last week.



Can you read the sign above? It says "Oasis Christian Church." LOL!!! CHURCHES SELLING CHILD-MAIMING BOMBS FOR PROFIT!

No wonder god annually tries to torch this place.



This one, I think is run by the Moose Lodge.



I can't remember. Probably the Masonic Burn Center for irony.



Veterans of America or some crap like that. They at least already know about the effects of pyrotechnic maiming and maybe should profit from it for a change.

I'm not kidding that there are probably 10 of these in a two mile radius of our place. The four in the photos are less than three tenths of a mile from one another. I could visit all four in a 10 minute walk.

Palmdale must have 40 or more all together.

Our neighboring city of Lancaster has chosen to out law fire play. It is the one single thing that Lancaster has to offer that Palmdale doesn't do better.

This in a state that is (really exaggerating here) half on fire already.

All you have to do is get three inches away from a sprinkler to see how this whole state WANTS to catch fire.

Now, I'm no fan of the City of Lancaster or its ambulance chaser mayor, but I like this quote, "Let's have a body count at the end of the Fourth of July and count how many third-degree burns are admitted to the hospital. I'd like to see the media take pictures of these third-degree burns of some of these children, and let's show everybody what the cause of these are."