New Year’s Eve Downtown

Mack left it up to me to decide whether or not we would join the freezing masses gathered in Churchill Square on New Year’s Eve, and though the -30 weather could have easily swayed me the other way, the fireworks won out.

We took advantage of the free public transit offered that night, hopping on a bus that dropped us off a block away from the action. We wove our way through the packed square, grateful for the hopping Caribbean tunes that kept us stepping to the beat, in an effort to bring the feeling back into our toes. As we sipped the hot chocolate that we had brought along, we couldn’t imagine how cold some of the people around us probably were – the twenty minutes we had to wait for the show to begin were unbearable.

The promised fireworks began just before the crowd was finished counting down to midnight, rising into the air just above City Hall’s majestic pyramid. Green and gold fireworks were prominent, as the show was partly to commemorate the University’s centennial, but someone has to explain to me how and why seemingly random country songs were chosen as the musical accompaniment. I was hoping for a choreographed and musically-timed display similar to the one used to celebrate the holiday light-up, so this show was a bit of a letdown. Moreover, the advertised ten minutes became a seven-minute wonder in reality. Mack captured some of the fireworks on his Flip (I have to admit, the show looks better from where I’m sitting right now, mostly because I’m warm).

One of the photos I took that was slightly less blurry than the others

In the end, it was much too cold for me to enjoy the fireworks – I think I learned my lesson, and my threshold for winter fun.