Sunday, November 16, 2008

Huge Crowds Turn Out For Christmas Tree Lighting

Tonight Anne and I braved the dense smoke blanketing Glendale to walk to the Americana for the Christmas tree lighting ceremony. I'd imagine the possibility of rolling blackouts caused the Americana's operations manager some grief today. When we arrived we found the scene was absolutely mobbed. We made it into the complex and managed to drift through the masses to a spot fairly close to the tree (or "tree", after all of the trauma it's been through!). After 15 minutes of looking at a dark tree, we were getting bored and hungry, so we left to get dinner at In N Out. After eating, we walked south towards the Americana only to find police officers on the sidewalk turning hundreds of people away - the Americana was entirely full and no one else was being allowed in.

I'm sure business all over downtown Glendale was very good tonight. The streets everywhere were densely packed with pedestrians. After walking home, we watched the fireworks display from the kitchen window.

2 comments:

brian said...

With so many devastating fires ringing Southern California, it was probably ill-advised for the Americana to have a fire-works show last night.

Scott said...

The "fireworks during fire" story was picked up on several blogs this morning, but I don't get the outrage on this one. While the timing was obviously not ideal, the fireworks were obviously planned months in advance and were enjoyed by tens of thousands of people attending a free public event. In any case, the fireworks were set off at a reasonable hour and ultimately lasted less than three minutes.

In comparison, the fireworks for the Americana grand opening were delayed until 11:15 pm, were for the benefit of a private invitation-only event, and were far louder.