In southern Vermont, we celebrate Independence Day by letting our freak flags fly. I dunno, maybe small towns throughout America do it this way.
Sure, we start off official with our Veterans.
And the obligatory sexy car, carrying our parade marshals, which kinda freaked me out, because one of them has the same name as my deceased grandmother.
The official stuff dispensed with, we cut loose with the Eclectic Gourd Orchestra.
Kids on stilts, and – not shown – kids inside huge handmade puppets of unrecognizable animals.
…accompanied by impromptu drumming from rasta boy.
No parade is complete without the roller skating transvestite.
There were a few floats and more sexy cars. We’ll skip over that.
Here we go: farm stuff. I believe a state law mandates that Vermont parades include tractors.The next several floats were filled up with several generations’ worth of a family that’s been farming in the area since 1780.
Oh No! It’s the crazy Morris Dancers!
They are uncompromisingly brave.
…for which I secretly admire them, but I have no plans to do this in this, or any other, lifetime. It’s the shoes.
They only perform a few times a year, so they have to really let it all out.
A gaggle of teenagers do jumping jacks in formation while sucking down the exhaust of yet another sweet ride.
I’ve always been annoyed by local businesses having boring floats in parades. That’s why I was so psyched to see a local septic company in this one. They’re singing BTO’s “Taking Care of Business”.
Now for the fire trucks…There were plenty of them. I’ll just show you the first one – the prettiest.
Cause it’s all about the pretty.
Am I right?
This year we stuck around for the egg toss and the water polo championships.
We actually missed the egg toss – we were wandering around down at the other end of the street, and didn’t get there til they were hosing down the street in preparation for the water polo.
Our team! Yeah!
The evil opponents!
Dum dum dum…..(that’s supposed to sound suspenseful.)
Checking water pressure…
On your mark…get set…
GO! That’s Kevin at lower left. He’s about to get SOAKED. Repeatedly.
Because invariably the ball ends up against the fencing.
Soon everybody’s wet.
After a while the hose positioning discipline starts to fall apart and the teams are spraying the crowd, nearby buildings, and each other willy nilly. It’s awesome.
And so, to bed.
This is great! Thanks so much for posting so I can send along to the family members that couldn't be there! Super day, and super job recording it.
ReplyDeleteHowdy, "Anonymous"! Glad you enjoyed it! =)
ReplyDeleteFun to see your July 4th photos. I lived in Saxtons River from '79 - '83. Best Regards, Andrew
ReplyDeletehttp://hungrynaturalist.blogspot.com/
this post and your commentary was highly entertaining. people love to let their freak flag fly here in upstate NY too. I fly mine inside on the internet where I'm invisible. (aren't I?)
ReplyDelete