Happy New Year! - OR - Mama, hide the matches, Jethro is a-comin'!

So. New Year's Eve. I'm expecting a fairly quiet evening. I can see the city fireworks, or the highest of them, from my living room window when they set them off at midnight, so I'm planning to have a look. Other than that, I'm just hanging around, relaxing.

9:00 p.m. finds me sitting in my favourite chair, reading a book, having a drink, faithful dog by my side, when... BANG!!! There's an explosion right outside my house. I almost drop my book. The dog almost drops her liver. Then, BANG!!! BANG!!! several more times, then nothing. My darling neighbours, they of the charming backyard trampoline (10 feet from my bedroom window- see my post of Feb 1/06) that gets more use at ridiculously late hours than I care to relate, have... FIREWORKS. Fireworks which they are setting off in their backyard... 10 feet from my bedroom window.

Now you must know this about my dog. Despite the fact that she's a Beagle, and meant to be a hunting dog, she has an awful, terrible secret. She is terrified, ABSOLUTELY PETRIFIED of gunshot or anything that sounds even remotely like it.

So she spends the better part of the next hour with her ears scrunched up, tail between her legs, the whites of her eyes showing because she's rolling them back in her head the way frightened horses do and is pressed firmly against my leg at all times, which makes it very difficult to walk.

By 10:00 p.m., she's starting to relax and will actually allow me to move an inch or two away from her, when, BANG!!! BANG!!! it starts up again.

And I suddenly find myself with a Beagle in my lap, the poor thing shaking from head to toe.

By 11:00 p.m., she's gotten back down on the floor and has calmed down again, when (brace yourself), BANG!!! BANG!!! they set off half a dozen more fireworks. She doesn't freak out quite so much this time but still eyeballs me with that, " I gotta get outa here!" look on her face.

And by this time I'm beginning to worry about my roof. My neighbours may have lots of money, but what they don't seem to have is a surplus of brains. Should they be setting off fireworks so close to houses? Are they watching to ensure they don't burn any of us down? Should I go outside and check that flaming bits of fireworks aren't landing on my roof? It's freezing and very windy out there. I relunctantly decide to balance the fear of hypothermia against the fear for my roof and trust that they will not set my roof on fire.

So the dog and I hunker down again and await midnight. And we are not disappointed. The clock ticks over to 12:00 and BANG!!! BANG!!! off they go. About 10 minutes of constant noise with a grand finale of about six rockets that sound like they may be nuclear warheads. The dog has completely lost her mind by now and just stares at me hopelessly, too traumatized to even move.

And then blessedly, silence.

I've theorized before that the spot where the trampoline sits is a portal to hell, as it's exactly the same spot upon which sat the previous neighbour's "lovely" fountain that sounded exactly like a running bathtub.

Based on the events of December 31st, it seems that portal to hell is still alive and functioning. So that's nice.