Thursday, June 28, 2012

July shortened to 30 days here in Colorado

By now you've heard the state of Colorado is one gigantic marshmallow roast. You gotta bring your own sticks, though. The High Park Fire--northern Colorado, near Ft. Collins--is about 75% contained, at a cost of $33 million dollars so far. And that's not even counting the property damage. The Flagstaff Fire--Boulder, home of the University of Colorado and Celestial Seasonings Tea and Shuttles, Spindles and Skeins--is about 30% contained and has grown to 300 acres. The Waldo Canyon Fire--Colorado Springs, near the Air Force Academy--is only 5% contained and has grown to over 18,000 acres. I've lost count of the number of homes destroyed, but I think it's about 500 so far, probably more. There are many other fires but I'm running out of pixels and can't list them all here.

Bad as all this is, it's not the worst part. Oh no. The worst part is the fireworks ban. I am not kidding, y'all. NO FIREWORKS ALLOWED. Not even by professionals. As of today, June 28, in Denver County, there will be no fireworks displays of any kind allowed this year. Ergo, we are skipping the fourth day of July entirely. One day it will be July 3rd, then the next day we go right to July 5th. Watch the video clip if you need proof. "If there's no fireworks, there's no 4th of July! It's just not faiiiiiiiiiiir! These people are professionals. They can take care of any problems that might come up." You know--just like the Titanic. (Fun fact: The Unsinkable Molly Brown's summer house is a few blocks from where I live.) Skip to about minute one of the video and go right to the part that would make Darwin want to smack somebody.

Stay safe everybody. 

*


* Charles Darwin. Image taken from the Shimer.edu website

6 comments:

  1. Wow! I've been watching CO on the news. I feel your pain. Last year we were on fire and had no fireworks.
    Stay safe and I'll pray for rain. (for all of us!)

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  2. Hope you're staying safe.
    Maybe it's time for a trip to some place where it is safe to have fireworks?

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  3. We had a real bad fire season in July 1998. Whoo-ee, it was miserable and it was NOTHING as bad as Colorado. I feel so sorry for all those in the firepath and all those trying to get it under control.

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  4. Hope your family is all safe and out of harms way. Will do a little dance that you get the much needed rain.

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  5. Is it just me or does Darwin look like George Carlin?

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  6. Wow. You were not kidding. That lady was either bereft of sense, or just in total denial. I imagine few there agreed with her silly "risk-versus-reward" assessment. I know some people from the Greely/Ft. Collins area, and have been relieved to find out they're all safe and (relatively) sound.

    The coolness of being able to turn tragedy into a tool of promotion aside, I'd still probably not name a boat after Molly Brown. Turns out, there's a lot more to being unsinkable than just making the claim. Who knew?!

    And I bet when Charles Darwin smacks you, you KNOW you been smacked... evolution of a red hand-mark on your face. [=

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