Happy Fourth Of July!

As a kid, whenever anybody would ask me what my favorite holiday was, the answer was obviously Christmas.  After all, what kid doesn’t like Christmas?  Free toys, lots of candy stuffed into clothing designed for feet, and did I mention free toys?

Now that I’m a bit older, I still love Christmas (I think it’s the free toys thing), but I’ve developed a deep appreciation for other holidays.  Thanksgiving is awesome but the Fourth of July holds a special place in my heart.  There’s something about seeing an American flag flying as a wing of F-16s fly overhead that makes me extremely grateful to live in this wonderful country.  Add to the the fact that we’ve developed some really fun family traditions, and you have a day that we all look forward to each year.

The best part about the Fourth of July isn’t the fireworks, those are a rip-off propagated on our country by the Chinese, it’s the parade in Kaysville.  It has got to be the best parade in the history of parades.  The first hour and a half of it’s a regular parade but every business and organization in Fruit Heights, Farmington, and Kaysville shows up with tons of candy and tons of free goodies.  The kids have to take grocery sacks to hold it all.

I’m sure you’re thinking “So what.  It’s a parade with candy.  That’s not very cool.”  Let me tell you that if you love saltwater taffy, it’s heaven.  The best part though is after the main parade; that’s when the water fight starts.  I commented on this a bit last year so I won’t go over it too much, but basically the entire city comes prepared to get wet.  People bring garbage cans full of water to refill squirt guns.  I’ve even seen pickup trucks with tarps lining the beds full of water.  It’s a very big deal.

In the past, we’ve mostly just enjoyed getting sprayed with water.  We’d get a bit wet then leave.  This year was different though; we had squirt guns and a five gallon container full of water.  Our friends, the Rimingtons, even brought water guns and water to refill them with.  One of the hose trucks in the parade got Holly and I pretty wet.  Our friend John then decided to dump his water supply on both Alex and myself.  The thing he didn’t realize though is that my water supply was twice as bit as his and I believe that revenge is a dish best served wet.  I dumped about two and a half gallons over the top of his head.  Needless to say, he was soaked.  I almost peed from laughing so hard.  Next year, I need to remember to watch my back.

After the parade, we went to Arby’s for lunch.  It was much better than when we had dinner at the Arby’s inside of Lagoon.  Can you believe that they acutally had Arby’s sauce?

Once we finished eating, we decided to go see Horton Hears a Who at the Kaysville Theater.  I’m not a big Jim Carrey fan.  He irritates me to no end with his over-acting and constant mugging for the camera so I was a bit wary of actually seeing the movie.  Having him do a voice in an animated movie though was surprisingly easy to watch.  His antics didn’t distract from the movie at all.  I loved the animation and I thought it was brilliant how when Horton would imagine something, the art would go from being computerized to hand-drawn.  It was a very entertaining movie with a good message.  I’m sure that we’ll end up buying it when it comes out on DVD.

After the movie was over, everyone was tired and still a bit damp.  We decided that it would be a good idea to go home and grab a quick bite to eat before we headed into Layton to watch fireworks.  I tried to bar-b-que some sausages but the grill ran out of gas.  I keep a spare tank in the garage but I’m not sure if it’s full and there’s so many stairs to go down to get it…  I was just too tired to bother with it so no grilled sausage for dinner.  They still tasted good despite having to cook them indoors.

As the sun started to set, we went to the Rimington’s where we watched around $75 in fireworks go up in flames.  After we were burned out (pun intented) from doing that, we headed over to Layon High where we watched the city’s fireworks display.  Their’s was much more entertaining than the one we did in the street a short time earlier.

As we were driving home, Holly and I were discussing how fortunate we are to live in this country.  Sure, the politicians are trying to turn us into a 1920’s Soviet Union, but it’s still a great place to live.  Thanks to all of the men and women who put their lives on the line so that we can enjoy the freedoms that we do.

No Comments

Be the first to leave a comment.

Leave a comment