I just realized that this coming Monday is Independence Day! I haven't had the time to do a thorough fireworks search yet, but my results thus far are showing that most of the best fireworks were already covered during last year's fireworks recommendations, which you may want to reaquaint yourself with. There are a few notable newcomers being offered this year, though.

1. You won't need a flare gun to be the stupid motherfucker who burns the place to the ground with Deep Purple shooting fire in the sky.
2. Chernobyl? You'll be saying Cher-yes-byl to the three-mile meltdown of Nuke Power.
3. Move over Swift Boat Veterans For Truth, and make way for the Swift Boat Exploders For Awesomeness.
4. Bring a little potato famine, liver poisoning, and neverending bloody conflict into your backyard with the Luck Of The Irish.
5. When it's time to engulf your home, trust the flammable agents of Century 21.
6. Tankinator.

Like I say, this survey was not exhaustive, but so far it looks as though no one had the good sense to develop the fun and topical Exploding Toad this year. Also, I've never heard of this trend before, but most of the fireworks sites now have a "wedding sparklers" section. I haven't made up my mind whether I like or dislike this idea yet, but it is a lot less cruel to animals than releasing doves (which are domesticated and quickly die in the wild - most professional companies use homing pigeons, which return to their cage, but lots of people just buy their own doves). Throwing rice, by the way, is just fine for birds, that story that it will expand in their stomachs and kill them is a myth. It's just messy and people can slip on it, but that's also true of bubbles (and either doves or pigeons, probably, if you know what I mean). Oh, and finally, Cityrag has some good tips on where to buy yourself some patriotic pyrotechnics in the New York City area.