.
At a
barren lot on the edge of Albuquerque, a team of pyro-experts with
Western Enterprises Inc. was busy Wednesday dropping hundreds of shells
into carefully aligned and wired launching tubes for the city's annual
fireworks show. Thousands of people were expected to attend.
Across
town, Nathan Farmer was setting up dozens of boxed sets of fireworks at
his roadside stand. Last summer, when the drought reached unprecedented
levels in New Mexico, sales were down but he's hopeful his sparklers
and fountains sell this year.
Farmer said concerned citizens have
in the past called the police on him, saying he shouldn't be selling
fireworks given the threat of wildfire.
Fireworks are like anything else in life, he said.
"If you give a person some money, a gun, a car or alcohol, it's up to that person to be responsible with it," he said.
Western states to enjoy Fourth of July fireworks despite severe drought: Associated Press, Thursday 3 July 2014
The
bridge that separates the town of Los Alamos, New Mexico, from Los Alamos
National Laboratory is shrouded in smoke from the Las Conchas wildfire: photo by Craig Fritz/Reuters, 28 June 2011
(gradual dawning prescience -- through the blue smoke, in the toxic dream --)
A female character not a plausibly real woman spilling out in a female character saying "What's wrong with you, this crippling, these blistering resemblances not to worry too much about some things it's probably still a flaw, inexplicable sometimes obtrusive midwestern childhood the old material investigating the shame and fear: the shame of self-exposure, the fear of ridicule or condemnation, the fear of causing pain or harm self-analysis interlude between those two materialistic master languages a shining example of how not to approach this radioactive material -- a reminder of the pressing need to find a structure and a tone and a point of view that would ironize it enough to make it old no personality, just these various intersecting fields: that personality is socially constructed, genetically constructed, linguistically constructed, constructed by some semiconscious maskless self, underlying extremity static lives being disrupted self-deception is funny, to aggressively inflict painful knowledge in joining the characters in their dream, and experiencing it with them, scavenged materials buried in a drawer or stored in some remote, inaccessible location to the structure, too, a clear and present danger the impulse to defend but the foes change with death happening to wild birds around the world on earth however many metaphor-free days --"
(gradual dawning prescience -- absence -- the fireworks just starting --)
Alex
Lopez plays baseball with his sister Sugey while smoke generated by the
Las Conchas fire covers the sky in Espanola, New Mexico. As
crews fight to keep the wildfire from reaching the country's premier
nuclear-weapons laboratory and the surrounding community, scientists are
busy sampling the air for chemicals and radiological materials: photo by Jae
C. Hong/Associated Press, 29 June 2011
People gather to watch the Independence Day fireworks display in Independence, Iowa: photo by Jessica Rinaldi/Reuters, 4 July 2011
Customers walk into a Red Hot Fireworks tent in Phoenix: photo by Ross D Franklin/AP, 3 July 2014
Crews clear brush along a road near the Butts Fire in preparation for a firing operation in Napa County, California: photo by Stuart Palley/EPA, 3 July
One
person was killed and at least 2 injured when a trailer holding
fireworks for a July 4th show exploded at Comanche High
School in Comanche, Texas: photo by WFAA-TV, 3 July 2014
fireworks: photo by shannon richardson (electrolite), 12 June 2009
fireworks 2005: photo by shannon richardson (electrolite), 24 March 2006
fireworks and flags on the fourth (Amarillo): photo by shannon richardson (electrolite), 3 July 2012
Manda, Texas: photo by Charles Henry, 23 April 2013
Independence Day, Christmas Valley, Oregon: photo by Austin Granger, 22 July 2011
Tom Brown Park on July 4th, Tallahassee, Florida: photographer unknown, 4 July 1985 (State Library and Archives of Florida)
Visual pollution along Interstate 24, Tennessee: photo by William Strode, September 1972 (U.S. National Archives)
Visual pollution along Interstate 24, Tennessee: photo by William Strode, September 1972 (U.S. National Archives)
7 comments:
It's live-in-fear of errant fireworks here on Washington's Columbia Basin shrub steppe. Doesn't take much to start a wildfire... dry grass, dry weeds, sagebrush.... Lucky for us, our nearest imbecilic neighbor's goofy attempt at farming has gone tits-up and he and his family have left their place empty (somebody feeding his left behind dogs?)... and moved close to town.
Yeah, Mr. Nathan Farmer, by some quirk of nature you were also given a brain--think about that in the context of your brainless remark. (And please don't fire till you see the whites of your (blue?) eyes turn red as they witness the 4th of July spectacle.
Civilization marches on . . .
Some thoughtful citizen here wrote to the local paper suggesting that no one shoot off fireworks in deference to returned veterans suffering from PTSD.You could call it mine-fulness. The war at home.
Since I have college essay questions on the brain some of the time lately, I would like to see this collection of words and images posed as one. I think you could learn a lot about how a person thinks reading their reaction to it. Up ahead of the dog walk and the fireworks -- last night's planned event was canceled because of the lightning/thunderstorms -- I've had an opportunity to survey the international headlines, look at pictures, read some articles and editorials, and compare and contrast (as they say in school). I don't find Nathan Farmer particularly scintillating, but I don't think he's brainless either or the devil. I think that's far too harsh a judgement and if Albuquerque wants to prevent him from selling 4th of July fireworks, they should take definitive steps to do so and not just be content with letting the AP file an annual seasonal story. The Los Alamos photo is really amazing. Curtis
Well, after a night of terror wrought by the deep reverberating whoomp-impacts announcing the general exercise of that famous Fifth Freedom (what were they again, faith, fear, folly, flagwaving and fireworks?), the old, ailing humans and other animals here have a wrung-out, desperate look this morning suggesting that PTSD may well be a contagious cultural disorder affecting even those whose only response is the frustrated desire for escape.
But of course this is strictly a micro-minority view. Meanwhile...
Even in a tinderbox, American Slob wants its fireworks right now!
"Tanya Borghello knows all about California's drought and unusually bad fire season, but early on the Fourth of July, the San Bruno Softball League president had other pressing concerns.
"Standing next to the San Bruno Storm team fireworks stand in the parking lot at the Tanforan shopping center, she was hoping a buyer would come along for this year's big-ticket item: the $500 TNT Maximum Charge Big Bang assortment of Zombie Zappers, Exploding Piñatas, American Spirit Sizzlers and Mad Dog Fountains.
"'It's 155 pieces and hours and hours of fun,' she said, adding that the money would help pay for the Storm's tournament travel this summer.
.
"But the fireworks sold in San Bruno don't necessarily stay in San Bruno, said Travis Nuckolls, deputy fire chief in neighboring South San Francisco.
"'I have no problem with them selling them in San Bruno as long as they are not brought into ... South San Francisco,' Nuckolls said.
"Pyrotechnics is a growing industry in the United States. Forty-six states allow some sort of fireworks to be sold. Revenues from the sale of consumer or 'backyard' fireworks climbed from $600 million in 2006 to $662 million in 2013, said Julie L. Heckman, executive director of the American Pyrotechnics Association, with this year's sales expected to top $675 million.
.
"Independence Day is hardly a day of relaxation for San Bruno police officers. Every officer on the force is required to work, said Lt. Tim Mahon. Between 9 p.m. and 1 a.m. last year, the department received 178 calls for service, 88 of which were fireworks related. In 2011, four officers were attacked by a crowd as police attempted to arrest a man who was seen throwing an M-1000 - a powerful and illegal firecracker - under a parked car."
That kid with the baseball bat below the cloud. A beautiful photograph.
Last year a wayward Chinese Lantern set fire to a recycling plant in Smethwick, just down the round from us. That was an odd and dark morning.
That is a great photograph.
Life goes on as usual... on the dawn of the Apocalypse.
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