Heavy Artillery

On nights when I would have to work late in Anaheim for Parks & Resorts, there were times when we would actually be restricted from going outside due to "pyro" - fireworks, obviously. The whole backstage buildings and offices would be on lockdown to avoid the shell fallout, and when you're stuck in a sometimes windowless room hearing explosions in the distance lent the experience a very surreal quality.

The "bunker" experience returned tonight on the Independence Day holiday. The economy may be tanking and forcing a lot of cities to downsize or cut off their flashy celebrations, but apparently the city of Bristol had plenty of pyro left in reserve because it was an almost constant stream of bombs bursting in air from 8:00-10:00. And try though I might to get a glimpse of pageantry, I couldn't find these things! They were out there (believe me, I heard) but despite doing several laps to all the different vantage points I could think of, there just wasn't any place to watch it unfold. So I just curled up on the couch and took the long-distance artillery shelling in the way soldiers in the WWI trenches did.

To wrap up this patriotic day, what's a more vibrant symbol of Americana than 44 richly decorated robots? Here's Doris Kearns Goodwin and the Imagineering team discussing the rebooted "Hall of Presidents" at Disney World, which officially re-opened today. Happy 233rd Birthday America: