Fireworks

Corinna insisted this was the best place to watch fireworks for free on the Fourth.

The Three O'Clock Ride scouted it a few years ago, and it's up at the top of downtown where you can see the Berkeley Riverfront stuff, Worlds of Fun to the East, all the small fry stuff in KCK to the west, and hints of Gladstone and Riverside displays.

You're not close to any of them, mind you, but you can see quite a ways from the IBEW building on Admiral.

We got there a tad early. I was thinking nine-ish for the fireworks, based on living in Gardner for over a decade.

Gardner has a nice display, my former employer pays for a lot of it, but they get antsy and fire it off before the sky is fully dark. It's always annoyed me, spend thousands of dollars and then fire it off before it will look its best.

So we were in place by eight o'clock, got a premium perch at the edge of the hill where the grass wasn't too tall to see over. I didn't realize we'd have a two hour wait for the big display.

But we had fun, met a few people who also turned out for this popular overlook. Beers, pickles and blue Powerade was consumed.

It might have been more impressive if we'd been closer, but we probably got home an hour earlier even with dropping my Mom off.