OB as it turns out is a strange place full of even stranger people. The beach was packed with everyone and their kitchen sinks - and I mean that literally. When Americans go anywhere, they take everything with them. We started off cautiously; exploring the waterfront to find a spot to watch the fireworks show. Along the way we came across hippie like dudes and their "I have to make sure I stay flexible by pulling random stretch moves" friends. At one stage this guy was down on the sand doing what could only be described as a humping move for an uncomfortably long period of time. Others were playing their jazz music (cue jazz hands) - and everyone knows how much I love the meaningful rhythm of jazz music. The way the music wanders aimlessly from what seems like one tune into another without any warning. It's almost like giving your 4 year old a saxophone and recording them for the purpose of a YouTube movie - go jazz ! The whiff of weed (which of course is illegal unless prescribed by your doctor because you can't ... and I use the term very loosely .... sleep) was also rather prevalent. After a while the freak-out factor along with the cold (we were total amateurs and didn't come prepared) became too much so we decided to leg it.
On the way home Alma suggested heading to Black Mountain as we'd surely be able to get a good view from there - it being at a height and all that, so off we headed. She wasn't the only one with that wonderful idea so we thought - jackpot! Following the locals through the dark and up an embankment we grabbed our spot. Amateurs that we were we hadn't brought any torches for the way back - a slight problem seeing as fireworks and total darkness tend to go hand in hand. So we sat (or rather stood) and waited for it to get darker so that the show could start. No one appeared to have a clue where the show would be however, other than there was a high school off in the distance with some flood lighting still on - so all eyes were glued on that. As luck would have it we were stood beside some psychos. This young girl (and I'm talking about 9 years old) whinged continuously about her seat, the wind, how hard it was to climb the embankment, how scared she was about having to go back down said embankment, whether she'd be able to see the fireworks, the colour of her socks etc. Her mother did a great job (smell the massive amounts of sarcasm associated with this sentence) by reassuring her that "Mom had her back", and that "She wasn't going to let anything happen to her" and my personal favourite "Pinky promise". Talk about feeding the girl's fears. What ever happened to "You'll be grand - cop yourself on!", I say. Probably the most hilarious part of it all was that mom kept getting dad to repeat the reassuring phrases. He was clearly well into it. Brought me back to the FastShow days I can tell ya !
Anyways - eventually 9 o'clock came. Behind us 3 massive balls of fire went off and that was it. Turns out some computer nerd had messed up the timing sequence for the OB fireworks display. That's him on the social security for the rest of his life, while in front of us the high school flood lighting switched off only for us to be wowed and amazed by one spark every 10 seconds or so. Ooooh I thought (again I must confess that I'm being a tad sarcastic), while those around me uttered that all too overused phrase "Awesome", which can apparently mean anything from "well that's pretty sucky" to "fantastic" depending on intonation.
Strangely enough within about - ooh let's say 3 mins we decided we were sufficiently impressed and decided to battle the embankment. I made it down alright. Alma did too ... after a little improvisation and what looks like giving birth to a Desigual hand bag.
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