A Perk of the Assignment

by Crazy Ivan

One of the many cool things about being stationed in Pigeon Forge over the summer is the fact that Tennessee has some of the coolest firework regulations in the nation.  Pretty much anything short of a hand grenade can be legally purchased in a firework store here.

Now, I'm not saying that's a good idea.  I've yet to see any statistics on it, but I would imagine states like New York with much tighter regulations probably have a lot fewer firework accidents every year.  But I will say that Tennessee is more fun (provided you don't blow your finger off or anything).

So on his way home today, Kore stopped by the firework store.  And yes, there are plenty of places dedicated to nothing but selling fireworks year round in Tennessee.  They're not even just seasonal places that operate around the 4th of July... these places are open all year.

Anyway, we'd armed Kore with $50 and told him to get a lot of stuff that goes boom.  And man did he succeed.  He got a couple 16 shot monsters, a score of roman candles, 16 giant-sized bottle rockets, 144 regular size bottle rockets, a couple sleeves of fire crackers, and a twelve pack of what I can only describe as colored mortars.

To top it all off, it rained like crazy out by our cabin tonight so there's no chance of starting any fires (that we don't mean to).  We're just waiting for Bamboo and Pinky to make it in so that we can blow stuff up.

I should note that even though I've been known to "play with fire", we're all extremely careful when lighting fireworks.  There are some things I goof around with, but explosives aren't among them.  We're all looking forward to watching pretty lights in the sky, but taking someone to the emergency room  really sucks the fun out of things.

So have a fun and safe fourth of July.