Ah, the 4th of July. Proof that vast majority of Americans really are psychotic pyros at heart.

I did my semi-annual visit to my brother’s house tonight. It’s almost tradition, considering I’ve gone for the past three years or so. And it generally ends up being rather fun.

I mean… family… plus explosives… plus lots of beer.

How can that possibly go wrong?

It was fun, however. The food was excellent, the company was good, and I generally have a blast seeing my brother. We’re not totally dissimilar, and have a few of the same interests. Plus there’s that whole mutual upbringing we have going on, where we can sit back, drink a few beers, and shoot the breeze about how messed up our family is.

Though I’m fairly certain that’s pretty typical for most families these days.

The casualties were fairly low this year, as well. No major aerial shells were shot directly into the audience. One of Pete’s car rebuilding buddies was lighting typical ground bloom flowers and throwing them into the air, however. And two of those came very close to hitting me, as I was helping light fireworks. One of those did fly directly into the audience.

But… you know… nothing major.

Pete also wanted to show off his new toy, an XBox360. I was fairly unimpressed. The graphics are nice, and there are some interesting games for it, but my issue is still that they all seem to be first person shooters. Most of which I can play on my PC anyway. For Pete, though, that’s a major selling point, as his computer is getting a bit long in the tooth.

The amusing thing was how Dawn and Kayla were completely glued to my Nintendo DS. Pete and I would be trying to head-shot each other with sniper rifles in Call of Duty 2, while Dawn was furiously trying to figure out how to get past the level she was working on in the New Super Mario Brothers game.

I found the whole thing thoroughly entertaining… especially with Dawn’s random cursing at no one in particular.

So yes. 4th of July. Patriotism? Rubbish. Just let me blow stuff up.