Kelley did not much enjoy tonight's fireworks, although we had a great time messing around for a couple hours waiting for them to start, up at Ithaca College. As soon as the first ones exploded she dove for cover and buried her face and ears in her blankey and/or our shoulders. Poor thing. Not that she was terrified or crying, but she wanted nothing to do with them.

We got a special treat, though. One of the fireworks - gorgeous to be sure - took a really, really long time to come down. It just hung there, apparently by design, and didn't go out even when it landed. Some of the still-lit embers alighted atop a small campus building and set the roof ablaze!

The surging flames drew the attention of the crowd fairly quickly but it took several long minutes for the fire dept. to make their appearance. When they finally arrived the crowd burst into cheers and applause. It was surreal with a small but blazing fire atop a building in the foreground with gorgeous fireworks bursting overhead.

The pumper made short work of the roof fire with a large truck-mounted water cannon but three more trucks arrived with lights flashing and siren blaring anyway, to add to the spectacle. They stayed past the end of the show and Kelley enjoyed going over to see them.

We checked the local news online when we got home and found out that two additional fires broke out up at IC tonight as well, so perhaps that caused the delay for trucks to arrive at ours. It will be interesting to find out at work tomorrow what others could see from different vantages, like their decks or hillside views across the valley.