Lex Libertas

LOTD: Fireworks

As many of you may know, I'm not a big fan of "days." By that I mean all those holidays and other special days. I don't really understand why people get so worked up, and it's suddenly ok for people to do normally socially unacceptable things, because it's "Random Day" Day. I know I may sound like a curmudgeon, but I think it creates an atmosphere of artificially eleveated hopes. When a "day" doesn't turn out to the best day of your life ... ever, you feel crushed. Horrible cycle. Especially when they're all just randomly chosen anyways.

That being said, three of my favorite days of the year fall right after societally sanctioned "days," and for very real reasons. The days after Valentine's Day, Easter, and Halloween are the best in the whole year, even better than my birthday. The reason is because on these days after "days," all the "day"-themed candy goes on sale. Those awesome "I love you" rock solid candy hearts, Peeps (my favorite among favorites), and candy corn all magically become worth only one quarter of what they were one day prior. I go nuts and stockpile like a militia member for the coming war against the UN.

A similar thing happens here in Russia after New Years, all the fireworks go on sale. Now, we're not talking just pansy little firecrackers or noise makers, these are weapons grade fireworks. This was given away when I saw little kids set some off for the first time. Instead of the standard, light the fuse and stand back, they lit the fuse and took off running. The explosion afterwards (about the size of a small tactical nuke) flattened several trees and a passer-by. Our roman candles shoot up a couple of feet; theirs go up fourty or fifty meters, and hail down enough burning phosphorous to disable a tank.

After the Soviet Union collapsed, the country went into anarchy (just like a game of Civilization) wihle the mechanisms for privatization were put into place ... by the mafia. This "privatization" was similar to the process that created the nobles in the Middle Ages. Whoever was strong enough to take and claim business (or land and peasants), did, and ruthless (in the good way) market efficiency began to set in. This left a lot of old, nationalized business wondering what to do.

For example, in order to privatize Aeroflot (the national air carrier), the government basically said to every major airport "whatever planes are on your field, except the military ones, are yours. Have at it." Hence, the St. Petersburg airport, named Pulkovo, took their planes and started the airline "Pulkovo."

I imagine that something similar happened with military manufacturers. One day the local plastic explosives factory decided that since the government wasn't paying for claymore mines anymore, they had to find another way to make money. A young engineer came up with idea that instead of overhauling the factory for a new purpose, which would cost a sizeable amount of money, they could continue making the same product, remove the shrapnel, and call it a firecracker. Voila, the birth of Russian "noisemakers." I was in a room on New Years when someone set one off and I couldn't hear for five minutes. Perhaps that's an exaggeration, it was more like four minutes. I can see the same scenario for a phosphorous grenade turned roman candle manufacturer.

In any case, I picked up a couple of noisemakers at the "buy two get eight free," post-New Years clearance. I plan on "celebrating" my friends' return from Murmansk. I'm sure they'll appreciate a festive wake up at four in the morning, though I'm afraid they might develop Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder as a result.