4th of July

I have to say, this 4th of July will be one I remember forever.  We met up with our friends at the Liberty Hotel for a barbecue in the the hotel's courtyard bar.  I love the Liberty Hotel so when our friends suggested this earlier in the week it was a complete no brainer.  The weather was perfect, there was a reggae band, and great company.

After stuffing ourselves with delicious lamb bites we headed to one of the other hotel bars, Alibi.  Note to self- it's very easy to get a table at Alibi, inside or out, on the 4th of July.  We stayed for about an hour.  We rushed outside just in time to see the Blue Angels flyover, which sounded similar to two Mac trucks colliding.

Around 8:00 we headed out over the Longfellow Bridge to find a perfect spot to see the fireworks.  In previous years we had been further down the river, by Central Square.  We had some pretty great viewing spots but this side of the river offers a lot more tree-free spots so we were excited for what was in store.  Off in the distance we noticed some pretty nasty lightning but we chose to ignore it, but not before I made a mental note of my quickest route to safety, because that's how I roll!

The concert started and we were ready for the show when all of a sudden there was an announcement over the loudspeaker saying that we needed to evacuate immediately.  Since I almost never mess with Mother Nature, having lived through a downburst and a low grade tornado, I was up and sprinting towards the MIT building across the street.  We camped out inside at a table (thanks to my speedy exit) for about 20 minutes before venturing back outside.  The lightning had ended, and texts from friends were telling me the show would start back up in about 20 minutes.

We headed back to our viewing spot and after a while the music picked up again.  There was this really awesome feeling in the crowd, as if we had all been united by the evacuation.  Word spread that the crowd on the other side had been evacuated to the Storrow tunnels, and I think we were all grateful to have had a big, comfy building to hang out in.  When "Sweet Caroline" came on the speaker everyone was singing and dancing.  The fireworks started and everything was great, for about 10 seconds until a torrential downpour started.

In most cases I hate being out in the rain but this just added to the memories so we went with it.  The fireworks were great, we were drenched, and it was awesome!  On the way home, JO and I talked about how we would talk about this 4th of July when we are old and gray!