I Love a Parade!

The annual Fargo-Moorhead Holiday Lights Parade snaked its way across the two cities last night. What's apparently usually an exercise in frozen toes and picking thrown candy out of snowbanks was a totally pleasant experience this year, with the temperature in the high 40s and not a snowflake in sight.

We stood on Broadway about two blocks from the courthouse and watched the world go by. Tootsie Rolls were the currency of the evening for the most part, though the Fargo Marathon was handing out tee shirts (which we did not get) and little foam beer cozies (two of which we nabbed). How cool is that? These guys understand marathoning.

The parade was heavy on the utility equipment; I thought it was particularly appropriate that the electric company's vehicle was lit spectacularly:

You figure that truck's got a hell of an alternator. The city snowplow that went by got big cheers. People know which side their bread is buttered on around here. The plow was a massive beast – I imagine it gets the job done just fine.

The parade featured more local businesses than I expected; here was H&R Block's entry:

Most heartening was the fleet of eight well-lit red Miatas toward the end of the parade, a reminder of the little car we've left behind (a little car that has melted its difficult-to-replace differential while we've been away and faces an uncertain future)...

After the last of the floats went past, we walked up a block for the really fairly impressive fireworks show the city put on atop the US Bank building. The kids sipped hot chocolate we bought from a woman selling it from a folding table on the sidewalk in front of her apartment. Very handy.

The weather has been odd  – this afternoon, it was 60 and sunny here while it was 38 and miserably rainy back in Rockville. But reality looms. We're supposed to get a little snow here late on Thanksgiving night, and we're expecting lows in the teens over the weekend.