DLand - The Best Fireworks Spot in the World

Dan and Mary left around 7:30 and we sat in the living room debating whether to go look at fireworks. We played some ping pong and then sat around some more trying to decide. Jeremy was very tired so we thought about just going to bed. But I was raring to go. He agreed to go for a drive if I drove. So we climb into the Saturn (aka midget-mobile) and head off. We just started ambling down Chesapeake. Chesapeake became Lafayette. Lafayette intersected with Tidewater. We jaunted down Brambleton. We passed the Martin Luther King Jr. obelisk. Jeremy said, "Turn onto Colley. Maybe we can cut over to Hampton and get a place to park." I complied and we ended up in this strange, slow caravan of people who obviously knew something we didn't know (all making the same turns in back roads). We played along. Suddenly we were at the PeTA parking lot (national headquarters in downtown Norfolk). There's not much else down there and we didn't see any parking on the street. We decided to turn around in the parking lot. This group of PeTA folks moved aside as we're about to pull out and said "You can park in this space if you're car will fit." Uh..... we squeeze our car in. So, we're parked in their parking lot. That doesn't imply some sort of alliance with them. Just parking. Nothing but parking. So then we walk over to the fence line. There are about half a dozen other folks over there. But in order to see the water where the fireworks would be, you had to stand in the bushes. A teenager next to me stood in some Queen Anne's Lace and said to his father \"Dad, are these poisonous?\". His dad retorted \"They're flowers - flowers and grass.\" I snickered a little myself. So on the other side of the fence was this patch of perfect grass with a volleyball court and basketball net and a little garden. There were maybe 50 or so folks there all smiling and playing and sitting around waiting for the fireworks. One man asked, "I wonder if we could go in there. Probably some private party." His wife said, "We eat meat, dear, they won't let us in there."

Jeremy and I were tired of standing in the Queen Anne's Lace so we decided to give it a shot. We wandered over to this friendly lady at the gate and she held it open for us and said, "Hi guys, have a good time." We looked at each other and decided we'd venture into the proverbial poppy field. It was a sparsely populated patch of animal loving families. We squatted on a piece of grass (which was plush and trimmed and brilliant green). After about 5 minutes the best fireworks I've ever seen in Tidewater started. We had a perfect view. The explosions were right in front of us. It was amazing and we had stumbled onto it, nay been warmly coerced into it.

I felt kind of dirty sitting on PeTA grass watching fireworks when I don't really agree with their politics. But we justified it by the fact that we don't believe in killing kittens or starving dogs and we'd just skip the Murder King protests. Overall it was very creepy. Jeremy said that he didn't really want to work there, but they had a very nice volleyball court and some nice sunflowers. They apparently treat their employees well. Hell, they treated us nice.