Last night while I was busily cursing (mostly silently) at neighbors shooting off illegal fireworks and terrifying my already (ineffectively) sedated dog, I kept one eye on a live streaming webcam with a view of greater Denver. It was fun watching fireworks percolating all over town, like little splashes of bright water erupting from a sparkling pond.

Then suddenly, in the middle of all those dark trees in the foreground, giant dandelions of light started blooming. I have no idea which show it was; I’m not familiar with south Denver. But it was a nice reward for watching. To top it all off, there was occasional lightning flickering in the clouds at the upper left. Try as I might, I could not catch it in a screenshot, much less fireworks and lightning in the same shot. But I tried.

It’s a shame there’s no color here, but this camera switches to black-and-white after sunset. Note the other flashes you can see in far “right field,” along the horizon.

Not long after the show in the foreground ended, another one started up at Mile HIgh Stadium, just beyond downtown in this view. It looked like somebody was nuking downtown:

Meanwhile, here at home, it sounded like somebody was trying to blow up the little playground behind my house. But by the time my third call to the police finally got through, the scofflaws were gone. The last explosions were just after midnight, and I never did get my poor dog to go out. We started out several times, and each time some distant pop would send her scurrying back inside.

Thank goodness the Fourth is over for another year.