Jamie goes America all over their asses.

Dear Australia, 

On the 4th day of the the 7th month you are dead to me...it's time to let America shineeeee!  

Sincerely, 

Jamie

On this year's glorious indepenDANCE day we had a traditional american bbq at our place, with all the essentials: food, beer, and explosives.  My American house mate Lindsay and I decided that since we have to be Australian every other day of the year, we were going to make the Australians be American for one day....or least try our hardest to make them.  haha.  It turned out to be a really great day!  I spent the morning in the kitchen preparing the american fare: burgers, homemade potato salad, homemade baked beans, watermelon, corn on the cob, potato chips, patriotic jello salad....the whole 9 yards!  People showed up in the arvo and the festivities began.  Throughout the arvo/evening we had about 15 people come, which was just perfect.  The food was a hit and the American beer (woohoo miller)

 flowed like wine.  The Townsville show was in town that weekend (kind of like a fair/carnival) so we actually got to see fireworks!  We walked to the top of a hill in our neighborhood and watched the tinyyy show in the distance.  It wasn't as exciting as the normal show, since we were 8kms away, but Lindsay and I were thrilled.  My friends (who we may or may not have forgotten to mention how big the hill was) at least pretended to be amused.  We tried our own fireworks show, but all we had to work with was sparklers, poppers, and glow sticks hahaha.  It was the most PG 4th of July ever.  I guess thats what you get in a country where fireworks are illegal, except for one state on one day of the year...bizarre.  But, with that said, we had an absolute blast taking long exposure photos with the 

sparklers.  Amazing how entertaining it can be!  We tried to make a sparkler bomb (shaving off all the sparkler bits and putting the powder into and empty popper case) but the case melted before it could shoot up...so it was a no go.  Oh well, we still had fun trying!  After our pyrotechnic attempts we continued with the fire theme and lit a bonfire in the backyard to endulge in some good ol' American s'mores.  mmmmm!   They dont have proper graham crackers, and a lot of the marshmallows are strange as well...so s'mores are non-existant in Oz.  However, I did some research and found some good substitues and they. were. amazing.  mmmmm! 

 The Australian had absolutely no skill in roasting a marshmallow though, it was embarassing.  No matter how many times I yelled a them the ALL insisted on stick the mallow straight into the flames.  Pshh... amateurs. 

As much as I would have LOVED to be home in the states, blowing up watermelon with my family, this was the best Australian 4th of July I could have asked for!