Independence Day Rant

After a long night of hanging out on Thursday and what felt like an allergy/sinus attack, I decided to stay in and chill for the holiday. The previous two 4th of July's that I've lived in Shaw must have been spent elsewhere because I do not ever recall such loud fireworks. I felt like I was in the middle of a war zone! Like most people, I appreciate a good professional fireworks show even though I do stay away from crowded venues to see them like the National Mall. But this shit was ridiculous and went on from 6pm until at least 1:30 in the morning. What I wanted to know while enduring this and possibly going deaf, was whether or not this was legal and where was the police. According to the news, DC police were expecting a high volume of calls. The article mentions what is illegal but none of that means much to someone like me who knows nothing about fireworks. I don't know and really don't care to know what a cherry bomb is. All I know is that the article and DC government Fire and Emergency Medical Services state that firecrackers and fireworks that explode are illegal. And this stuff going off in my neighborhood was definitely exploding! Being the pissed off citizen that I was, I called the police. Of course, the dispatcher assured me that someone would be out. Two hours later, I still felt like a hostage. My other question is this: how can the police distinguish between firecrackers that sound like gunshots and actual gunshots? And given my experience with DC 911, if I had said that I heard gunshots outside my window, no one would have shown up for hours anyway. While I love my neighborhood, it's times like this that I miss upper northwest!

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