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One of our neighbors on the cul-de-sac that Meg and I live on in our subdivision has made it a habit of having a fireworks show each year, located in his backyard. His house is in a great spot, on the very end of the cul-de-sac, with the back facing a cow pasture. Therefore, he has plenty of open space to have his show, without the risk of damaging a neighboring house. Over the past couple of years that we’ve resided in this area, another gentleman from the neighborhood has partnered up with our neighbor to increase the stockpile of fireworks set off on July 4th. The two of them will make a trip down to South Carolina at some point in the year, to buy as much as they want (or can) of the “good” (illegal) fireworks. Even better is the fact that other individuals in our subdivision also hold their own fireworks show, so we can usually look in several different directions and see a decent show.

For this year’s display, the crowd was close to enormous. It appears as though my neighbor’s fireworks show is gaining in popularity, and more and more people are showing up to enjoy the spectacle. Unfortunately, it also appeared as though less safety precautions were taken then previous years, as the hosts kept striving for a larger, longer, and brighter fireworks display. During yesterday’s show, one of the mortars came flying out of the container, slammed into the fence surrounding my neighbor’s pool, and exploded within 10 feet of a group of children. Needless to say, there was quite a bit of screaming and scrambling, but luckily no one was hurt.

After this misfire occurred, Meg and I decided to take in the rest of the show from our porch (2 houses away). A little while later, one of the larger fireworks was expelled into the air, but only reached a height of about 15-20 feet before exploding. We could again hear the sound of “concern” resounding from the group of individuals still gathered to catch the rest of the show. Again, nobody was injured, but we’ll probably continue watching any future shows from a safer distance.

I did attempt to take some pictures of the fireworks (as I also did last year), but I pretty much failed miserably. The last picture that I took was the best of the bunch (relatively speaking), but at the time I thought it was near the end of the fireworks show and I wouldn’t be able to take any more pictures, so I decided to stop. There ended up being several more groups of fireworks, and there would have been some great picture opportunities. Oh well. Here’s what I got from last year (on my LG cell phone):

  

And here’s what I took this year (with the new Canon SD400, larger images):

 

I did notice that taking pictures from our porch proved to be better, since there was less light to interfere with the image and I had a better angle to work with. I’ll try to do a better job next year.