Happy Independence Day everyone! Celebrate your nation's freedom by blowing up a little piece of it.
As usual, festivities were held at Riverside's Mount Rubidoux, the largest mountain/hill in the city of Riverside. Mt. Rubidoux is the site of the largest and best fireworks show in all of southern Cali. They fire them right off the top of the mountain into the night sky where they can be seen all across Riverside by anyone with a clear line of sight to the mountain. The show is usually 20 minutes long, making it one of, if not THE, longest show I've ever been to. The other outstanding facet to this yearly event is that every year they manage to showcase new types of fireworks no one has ever seen before. This year, it was cubes, fireflies, and hovering sparkle clouds. It was amazing.
A secondary part of the Mt. Rubidoux annual display...the Mt. Rubidoux Fire.
Riverside gets pretty dry in the summer. Dry is prone to fires. Igniting gunpowder above dry vegetation tends to light fires. So nearly every year, a fire is started on the top of the mountain. Two different years, we watched it start, once from a firework that misfired and shot sideways right into the brush, and last year from one that exploded too close to the ground and the sparkles set off the fire. Last years actually got pretty big, visible from where we were watching, and actually brought the show to a halt for about 20 minutes while fire crews got it under control. This year's fire, set off by a stray star, didn't get very big and slowly died down. I think the city got smart this year and cleared out the dead brush BEFORE the show.
The one detractor from this lovely event...Isaac. Isaac's family camped out on the stretch of sidewalk next to us. There were a lot of them. And they were noisy.
Isaac...clearly had issues. Isaac had a toy rifle. Isaac pointed his rifle at the other kids in his group and pretended to kill them. Isaac also pointed his rifle at Rick...and just stood there staring at him. Pretty creepy. But wait, there's more! Isaac pointed his rifle at a distant figure only he could see, pulled the trigger...and announced, quite loudly, snarling, "Dad, you DESERVE this". A cold stare hardened his pudgy features, sharpened the edges of his flat headed mohawk. Isaac clearly meant BUSINESS. And Isaac wasn't done, oh no. Did I not mention he clearly had issues?
At some point in the waiting for the fiery festivities to begin, the moms of all these charming tots fed them root beer floats, prompting Rick and I to mutter to each other..."Oh, great...feed them MORE sugar".
During a game with the other kids which apparently involved an invisible alien watch pinning Isaac to the fence, Isaac snarled at the little girl "attempting to free him" to "just get it OFF ME". Whoa little dude. Charming little chubby Isaac then went on a killing spree, putting his green wooden rifle to the backs of the little girls' head and slaughtering them cold execution style. Did I mention Isaac also informed us that his dad "lives in the shadows and wears a hockey mask"? Yep, good times, good times.
The little girls wised up, and in that charming fashion of children to instantaneously change the rules of any game they're playing, became wizards and threw up force fields to keep Isaac at bay. Deprived of his targets, who were all laying on the ground screaming "Force field, force field", Isaac sought new arenas for his bloodthirst. Pulling the pin on an invisible grenade, Isaac launched it over the fence, shouting "I want to KILL my dad". I believe he launched one or two more invisible grenades at Dad, then shot him again to make sure he was good and dead.
Isaac clearly has a wonderful relationship with his father. I really have to wonder where ol' Dad is, and whether Isaac's on medication because of it.
**Post mortem:
Marcella discovered a new species of wildlife...the boblion. Bigger than a bobcat, more secretive than a mountain lion, the boblion apparently lives in the deep wilderness of riverside and wants to eat her chihuahua. :)