After spending eleven summers at his house Upstate, the Gay Uncle finally broke down today and attended his town’s Fourth of July celebration. Not the parade; as you may recall, he hates parades. (All that phony pageantry, and old firetrucks. Ew.) Or the chicken barbecue. (He hates animals so much, he refuses to even eat them.) But he loves to see shit blow up, so he drove in for the fireworks. For geographical reasons too complex to get into here, the best viewing area for this display is from atop the berm on which the town’s railroad tracks run. This is a spectacular locale, overlooking the river, a field, and the setting sun, and is pretty much an ideal play area for kids, loaded as it is with lots of fun rocks to pick up, rails to hop or walk along, and tons of railroad spikes to hunt for and collect. Since these events always start about fifty minutes after you think they’re going to, Gunc is all in favor of letting the kids who attend wander around within a safe distance and engage in all of these entertaining activities. But apparently the mother who was sitting just to his right didn’t agree with this practice. Every time her two and five year olds started to do anything resembling “fun” she yelled at them. “Put those rocks down before you drop them on someone.” (?) “Don’t walk away, there are a lot of people around.” (??) “Put those railroad spikes down before you fall on one of them and cut yourself and get infected with tetanus.” (???) Stranded without anything to do, the kids began quarreling amongst themselves. Big surprise. What was surprising was her solution: she bribed the two year old to behave by giving him a can of Pepsi. Gunc is just glad he didn’t have to go home with that family and witness the ensuing caffeinated bedtime battle. Happy Birthday, America!!