Another stupid meme! Blame Graumagus
From Frizzen Sparks:
What’s the most interesting thing you set fire to when you were a kid?
Well, what we set fire to isn’t interesting, but the fire was. It was getting on toward the 4th the year I turned 11 I think, when my stepbrother Josh pulled a boner and took one of those “Dancing Flame” fireworks (the ones that spin really fast and burn different colors) and threw it up into the air after he lit the fuse.
Sure enough, the thing took off and flew into the field across the street, landing at the base of a pine tree, immediately setting the wonderfuly dry grass alight. We managed to get a hose on it before it got out of control, but it left a ring of singed grass in a perfect 20-foor diameter circle centered on that tree (which survived).
It looked like a UFO had tried to use the tree as a landing stanchion.
Later that same summer, though, we discovered the joys of lighting those little green army men on fire. If you get them burning on a board and then lift the board, little flaming droplets of plastic drip off and make a really neat noise as they fall.
Yes, this is what kids do for fun when you raise them in the sticks.
Hollerings