In my typical groggy morning haze, as I laid in bed hitting the snooze button, I thought to myself “Hmm. Wait a sec. There was some reason I wanted to actually get up at 7:00 today. What was it? Hmm. Gosh, what was it? Geez. Oh, I can’t remember, I’ll just hit the snooze again.”
And that is why I didn’t remember (until I walked outside) that this is my favorite day of the entire year to drive to work. Why? Because it’s the Friday before the last full weekend in August, which means it’s the beginning of the Ballunar Festival! It doesn’t officially begin until tonight, but this morning is what you could call the “warm up flight,” when all the hot air balloons take off for an early morning jaunt around Clear Lake. Thus, despite forgetting to get up early enough to watch them filling and launching, I still walked out of my apartment to the sight of dozens of brightly colored hot air balloons gliding overhead in perfect quiet, save for the occasional burst from the burner.
They looked so beautiful in the morning sky as they floated over towards Friendswood. I pulled over on the side of the road just before I got to work to take some pictures, and waved at the pilots gliding overhead. Some were higher than others, in fact, one balloon accidentally came down in the middle of the road(!) before its momentum carried it off the pavement and into the field beside the middle school.
Becca is volunteering on a chase crew for one of the balloons; I will be so incredibly jealous if she gets to go for a ride. I’ve always wanted to ride in a hot air balloon. But alas, I’m moving this weekend and couldn’t commit to a chase crew. Hopefully I’ll be able to do it next year.
I remember this morning last year. Carter was visiting and was asleep on my couch, and Nick picked me up for work, because he hadn’t left for France yet. We drove down the road in his convertible with the top down, and me snapping pictures as fast as I could. I couldn’t help myself and called my apartment to wake up Carter, and tell him to look out the window. I don’t know if he looked. I don’t think he was nearly as excited as I was, not to mention he was half asleep. But that was fun. When I get excited, I have a hard time keeping it in.
Ah, my favorite day. Coming to work beneath a sky filled with balloons just makes me happy. This is going to be a great day.
(In fact, I won’t even get too upset over last night’s game, except to say: Damn the Braves bullpen. Damn them.)
