Blaze of Glory.

This warm and sunny afternoon begged the Litton girls to come outside and play, and we happily obliged. While we were getting our dirt on, Poppy appeared, driving up in his backhoe. He stopped briefly to let me know he was going to do some work near the treeline on the back of our property. This made me happy because (a) it looks like crap back there, (b) Scotty would never have time to do this himself, and (c) Scott Sr. is a perfectionist, so I knew it would look pretty darn good after he'd finished. I mean, this is what he gets paid the big bucks for and how blessed are we to have such a profesional in our immediate family? Woo-woo! 75% of what's good/right/lovely on our land is due to him. So this is me, singing the praises of my father-in-law, whom I love dearly. And just so y'all know, he'll never see this so I'm not kissing booty here.

Moving on. After assembling a huge pile of various trashy items--NOT left by us, but rather from construction workers over the past few years--such as old siding pieces, plastic buckets, wooden crates, various construction castoffs, Debbie Cake wrappers (or to the unsouthern, "Little Debbie" wrappers), roofing shingles, bales of hay and Pabst Blue Ribbon cans (not ours--we have more discerning tastes) he asks for matches. I'm all, "Cool--a little fire. The girls will love this!" Less than 2 minutes after handing them over I begin to rethink my words.

The burning of redneck rubbish begins. Right next to a pretty Redbud tree. Oh well...
The previously breezeless day gives way to a bit of wind and the fire grows.
In less than 2 minutes we go from a little yard/rubbish burnage to towering inferno.

THEN, amazingly enough, SMOKEY (aka "The Smoke Monster") shows up. I completely disregard the climbing flames and begin searching for Ben. Darn him, he was controlling that thing the entire time. (And if this is Lost on y'all, too bad. You should be watching Lost!) I didn't see any flashes nor hear any clicking, so I'm certain my fate is safe. RIP Eko.

Meanwhile the Litton Girls decide they wanna catch this show sitting on the sidelines, totally heeding Mommy's incessant cries (yells) of, "DO NOT GO NEAR THE FIRE! POPPY IS NOT GOING TO DIE!!! THE TREES ARE NOT ON FIRE! YES, ONLY WE CAN PREVENT FOREST FIRES! WE'RE NOT GOING TO BE ARRESTED! SIT DOWN!" And yes, the situation warranted all caps. Because as you can clearly see in the photo the girls were just as afraid as I. Ahem.

About 5 minutes later Daddy showed up and sprang into action, connecting a couple of hoses to the nearest spigot and getting his Volunteer Firefighter Action Figure on. He, too, was saying (not yelling), "Stay away from the flames, girls." Not in all caps, because he is calm like that. I suppose this stems from him being a physician and all...gotta maintain your cool in potentially frightening/stressful situations. Whatever.
Our blaze of glory was shot down in less than 10 minutes, and Poppy continued his work in the yard, completely nonplussed by the almost-out-of-control flames. He's a Young Gun. And yes, we've been singing the song all evening long...officially putting in our request for it on Rock Band.