Okay, I’m still trying to figure out this whole deal.
It’s NYE, they have a big honkin’ ball all lit up that takes a minute to drop from 23:59:00 to 00:00:00.
I recall old-timey ones which basically looked like globe-bulbs arranged around the surface of the ball.
Today, they make such a big stink about The Ball™ being crafted from thousands of swanky crystal triangular slabs, whether Waterford or Swarovski or whatever.
This year, each slab is made from Waterford crystal, etched with pineapples(!).
No, I’m not kidding.
Now, I bought crystal broaches and such as presents, and they ain’t cheap (ohhhh, trust me on this). So I imagine each slab costs a bundle.
What do they do with each slab after dismantling The Ball™? Is it (cynical me) just an eleventy-billion-buk taxpayer-funded subsidy to Waterford/Swarovski/etc., or something?
So, with thousands of big-buk crystal slabs that even those right underneath The Ball™ wouldn’t be able to make out as individual pieces even if it crushed them to death… why?
I mean, if they wanted to, they could melt down clear b00ze-bottles into similar-sized triangles, for a miniscule fraction of the cost of these, and no one’d even care, or notice. Put a happy-face on it, even. Say it’s ringing in an Eco-New-Year by recycling or whatever.
Yeah, I know all the fancy patterns and such, but the idea about yearly crystal slabs, not exactly cheap, still eludes me.
And I still like the idea of recycling b00ze-bottles.
At first I was thinking, make-once-reuse-yearly, but each year is different. So unless, in this case Waterford, donates those crystals for The Ball™, someone’s paying big bux, no, huge bux, for a 1min thrill that not even people with telescopes aimed at The Ball™ would be able to discern.
I don’t really get New Years in general. I don’t really understand the whole ball drop thing either but, I assume it has something to do with tourism and bilking some rich guys out of money. Just a guess, no facts whatsoever were used in that assumption.
I know in my area lots of ammunition and beer will be used for celebration. Other than that I get off the roads before 2200 and stay home.
When we bought our house, I found a .45 caliber hole in one of the metal awnings, all flanges pointing down.
I understand the local police and fire folks wisely park under overpasses for the minutes around midnight, because of the amount of shooting up in the air at random causes a high risk of being hit by falling lead. Or whatever they’ve replaced lead with, I guess.
"Where Do Bullets Go When Guns Are Fired Straight Up Into the Air?
The saying "What goes up must come down" is an appropriate starting point. If you fire a gun into the air, the bullet will travel up to a mile high (depending on the angle of the shot and the power of the gun). Once it reaches its apogee, the bullet will fall. Air resistance limits its speed, but bullets are designed to be fairly aerodynamic, so the speed is still quite lethal if the bullet happens to hit someone. In rural areas, the chance of hitting someone is remote because the number of people is low. In crowded cities, however, the probability rises dramatically, and people get killed quite often by stray bullets."
Thanks for letting me know what I was intending to say. I’m deleting the posts cause this is pointless. Something something polished glass with lead is a great marketing gimmick.
