Guest Post: 4th of July Salute!

Like many Murkans in our godly and humble land we---by "we" I mean me, Kate and Kate's niece---celebrated 4th of July the traditional way: we watched shit blow up. And it was real good. Oh the rocket's red glare and the bombs a-burstin' in air... Why, it just makes my little soldier positively turgid with patriotic fervor! When I think of all the souls that made the "ultimate sacrifice" so I can watch a splendid Murkan spectacle of shit blowin' up... Well, you'll hafta excuse me. I'm getting misty eyed just thinking about it.

Rather than drive to the fireworks we decided we'd ride a bike trail to the show, which was at a nearby sports field. (Sorry 'bout the bike thing. I know riding bikes is très Surrender Monkey, but my Freedom SUV... tristement, n'existe pas.) Anyway, adjacent to Maison d'apathie is a quite serviceable, if little used, bike trail that winds its way through an enchanted forest of high voltage power line pylons. 'Round here we call it "Power Line Park." It's really quite scenic. And the low thrum of the power lines is magnificent on a warm July night. It's a little like crickets. Giant, humming mechanical crickets. With mandible-mounted rail guns. OK, not so much. It's much more like the sound of the planet's burgeoning carbon debt. But I digress; that's genuine fossil fuel-fired freedom juice flowin' down them power lines, and that's all ya need to know. Back to the bike ride.

We made our way down Power Line Park at around nine o' clock. There were little gaggles of people sprawled around the pylons---no doubt greatly enjoying the humid, ninety degree night air and soothing buzz of the power lines. We soon arrived at a cross street leading to the field proper. Since traffic was pretty heavy at the cross street we decided to camp out at the end of the bike path. Several minutes later the blowing up of shit real good commenced. As shit blowed up in purty colors I reflected upon what it means to be a Murkan.

I couldn't really think of anything, but that was OK 'cause some upstanding, full-blooded fellow Murkans behind us were thoughtful enough to treat everyone to their scratchy boom box recordings of Murka's finest patriotic songs. As tinny strains of Lee Greenwood's "God Bless the USA" crackled though the air, my thoughts about the significance of being a contemporary Murkan fell into place.

Naturally, I reflected on Dear Leader's bold and well-planned war for Eyeraki freedom. My heart swelled near to bursting with nationalistic pride as I considered the foresight and wisdom that went into this wonderful crusade extension of God's great gift of liberty. Truly, our Dear Leader is a tool--of providence. For the life of me I can't help but think back to the day Dear Leader announced, way back in 2003, that the Mission was, indeed, Accomplished. Gentle readers, I even teared up a little when I reminisced how our troops were greeted as liberators, and were showered with rose petals and candies. Of course, I also considered the not-at-all unimpressive number of Eyeraki civilians and brave Murkan servicemen Dear Leader sent to the bosom of the Almighty! If this isn't evidence that Dear Leader truly embraces the culture of life... well, I just don't know what is. All those precious snowflakes landing on the golden lap of the Lord. Glory!

Now I don't really know if these ruminations of mine shed much light on the contemporary Murkan experience... but I do know this: it was one helluva show. And we sure blowed some shit up real good, didn't we?

God bless the USA!

*cross-posted at Ours d'Apathie