Shelby has a nice blog entry on the 4th of July, which in part talks about fireworks. It reminded me of some adventures:

When I was young, perhaps 16 or so, a friend of mine and I went out in the backyard with some Roman Candles, stood back to back, took ten paces, and commenced to shoot rockets at one another. In retrospect, fairly dumb (my mom thought so) but at the time, great gobs of fun.

Later, living in Japan, I went to a festival where small boats we launched to memorialize those who had passed away. The boats were loaded with rockets and somesuch, which would occasionally launch into the crowd. It seems less fun then....

I also had an experience like that when I was younger. I remember friends of mine setting up a fire work on a tree so that it would run perpendicular to the road. Lighting it, and then trying to race on a bike along the road. Quite dangerous in retrospect

But I bet it seemed pretty darned cool at the time!

After my ill fated rocket duel, there was a hole burned in my shirt where one of the rockets had gotten me. I remember, just for an instant, thinking the whole thing had been a bit crazy. But only for an instant, and then it went back to having been great good fun.