So, the Mrs. and I went with some friends to dinner (thanks Mike, for picking up the tab) at California Pizza Kitchen at Arden Fair mall. (Go for the Jamaican Jerk chicken pizza, it’s great: chicken, peppers onions, jerk sauce and of course, bacon. The waiter didn’t appreciate my aside when I asked him how the Jamaican Jerk compares to the Haitian Asshole.) Anyway, we wound up taking so long that we were sitting with a ringside seat when the Cal Expo fireworks went off. It was rather entertaining, watching 4th of July fireworks from the window of a chain mall restaurant, entertaining and relaxing.
The point of this, though, is to chronicle what we saw on our way out of the Arden Fair parking lot:
OK, so we emerge from our cilantro scented cocoon and try head out of the parking lot, finding our way completely jammed, worse than Arco Arena after a Larry the Cable Guy concert. Let me just say this, the parking lot of Arden Fair mall was like a scene out of Thunderdome: People roaming around in a drunken shamble, setting things aflame, small children without clothing dancing around guttering fountains of fire, silhouetted by the arc lights and night sky, crawling low slung cars with booming bass and screeching tires.
I think Mrs. Eats said it best when she asked, “Since when did it become ok to tailgate at the mall and set shit on fire?” Really, when did this start? Have people been doing this for years and I’ve just missed out, sheltered at my suburban barbecues? All I know is that we witnessed some very unsafe practices when it came to the lighting of incendiary devices, and I’m sure more than a few people spent the remainder of their night in the ER or the pokey.
But, then again, it raised the question, do people congregate at the mall on other holidays that I’ve been missing out on? Memorial Day? Veteran’s Day? Arbor Day? At what point does it become more convenient to hang at the mall than at your own home? Maybe this is a new trend in celebrations. Why have Christmas at home when you can just celebrate at the mall? Save all that time shopping and just take the kids to the mall on Christmas and eat a ham from Honeybaked and buy your lady something nice from Zale’s and then you might not have to answer those difficult questions like, “Daddy, since we don’t have a chimney in the apartment, how is Santa going to get in?” There is a Santa Claus, Virginia, and he’s waiting for us at the food court.
The Sac Rag 
I was over there at the same time dropping my husband off at the movies to meet a friend (wow, that sounds like he’s 8 but there was an intricate car-pooling plan in place) and he too made a Thunderdome reference! It was crazy. But it also made me wish, yet again, that I had a pickup truck. Still I’m wondering why does anyone pay for fireworks at CalExpo when you can view them for free from the mall?
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I’d have been a lot happier if the people who live behind me were at the mall. They were launching illegal fireworks (the big ones) into the air over our backyards. I spent the whole night expecting to put out a fire on my back lawn.
The fire department showed up on our block at one point and we told them about the firworks, to which they promptly did nothing. To be fair, I could see fireworks going up over the houses throughout the neighborhood.
I’m getting old and cranky before my time, but I don’t seem to remember this much stupidity when I was a kid.
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“Hey Carl, I think you live on my street!!” hardy har
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And like Whole Foods, the parking lot crowd was most diverse — people from all walks of life were setting off both traditional and organic/free range fireworks and tailgating from all types of vehicles.
The best quote of the night was from our host, who when spotting a tailgater inspecting the short fuse on his illegal mortar with his cigarette lighter, said, “Wow, I’ve never actually seen a Darwin Award happen in real life!”
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A kid from my high school got suspended for lighting a firecracker in a school toilet, which is a rad way to get suspended if you ask me. He ended up at Catholic school if I recall correctly. He also stole me a street sign with my then last name on it. Ahhh, yes. We were so much less stupid than the current generation.
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Wow. This is all making me feel hecka-old. 🙂
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You’re absolutely right, Carl. There wasn’t as much stupidity when we were all kids.
Were you out there with your garden hose at the ready to put out any rooftop fires? I would have been — and I’d have been wearing my hardhat and eye protection too. A kid from my high school got his eyeball blown out with an illegal firework, and that’s no urban legend.
You know you’re REALLY getting old when people are driving too fast down your street, and you find yourself shaking your fist at them and yelling, “Slow down! This is a neighborhood!”
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I think the stupidity or ignorance is just more rampant than it was when we were younger. Plus, we actually went outside to play, knew how to construct real sentences instead of IM-speak, wore pants that fit correctly, were not obese, and were not parents already. I’m sure there are plenty of good kids out there, but they’re not the ones most of us see in public.
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Yeah, I was actually at a party in midtown and decided it was time to go out front when illegal projectile fireworks began to be fired from the backyard over my head onto the roof of the house of the host of the party.
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