Fourth of July

Had a chance to go see fireworks here in NYC for the Fourth of July, and it was a good time.
They do fireworks in a couple of different places in the city, and it’s great because since the city is a port, they can set them off over the water, where it’s safe, and people can see them from multiple boroughs.
(Quick lesson in New York city layout, the city is divided into five major areas called boroughs; they are Manhattan, the Bronx, Brooklyn, Staten Island, and Queens. Easiest way to visualize it is to think of Manhattan Island in the center with Staten Island off its south tip, and the other three arranged around it.) So, if they set of fireworks on the Hudson, those fireworks can be seen from Brooklyn and parts of Queens. The fireworks are set up on barges on the water, and everything is controlled electronically. It was a good show, maybe not quite as spectacular as I’d thought they might be, but still very good. One thing to consider is that there are several barges stationed at different places in the city, so everyone can have a chance to see them, and each barge does a complete (and identical) show, which is the equivalent to a city fireworks show you’d see almost anywhere else. So, I suppose really it’s fair to say that NYC puts on 8 or 9 firework shows, instead of a single really extraordinary one. Interestingly, I found out the show is primarily sponsored by Macy’s, the same ones who put on the annual Thanksgiving Day parade.
It would have been cool to have gone and seen the fireworks barge down by the Statue of Liberty, but the place would have been a madhouse and that wasn’t where my friends were going anyways, so maybe next year. We got going a bit late, but we still found a pretty good spot. They’d closed down one of the major freeways by the water, so everyone just filled up and spread out there. We had a good time that evening.
My friends in the picture are, from the left: Ron Steckly (a fellow student and good friend), Will Melendez (another fellow student and DJ), his wife Caroline (not a student, she’ll be doing law school shortly), myself, and Bobby (friend of Will and Caroline, also not a student).

By the way, I think I may have found a way to share more complete sets of photos. Facebook is a site that connects current students and alums from different universities, it's a little bit like Friendster but more snobbish (I guess ...). Anyways, I've set up an album with more of the photos from this outing on my Facebook site (since the uploading app they have there is WAY slicker than blogger) and I think that this link should allow anyone to browse to it. Does it work? Let me know! Is it busted, does it not work? Let me know ...
Cheers,
http://columbia.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2031119&l=d9398&id=121067