Summer is the time for barbeques, hunting, harvesting crops, (in the videogame Harvest Moon) and backyard wrestling! But when you get bored because you live in Iowa or Greenland, what is there to do? The answer is simple! Go someplace fun! Namely, someplace fun that allows the legal bartering and detonating of…

Fireworks can be a fun, safe activity for children of all ages, but it usually isn’t, as it involves gunpowder. The following is a quick guide for the beginning firework enthusiast. Just follow these simple rules and you’ll be detonating the town like a crazed coalminer in no time. (That would make a great movie, wouldn’t it?)

The first thing you’re going to need is the fireworks. You cannot have explosions without them, so be sure to buy them. The best place to buy fireworks is your friendly neighborhood Indian reservation. Indians are the best at making fireworks because they frequently used them in the olden days to scare buffalo herds off cliffs and also to create mystical smoke shapes which appear out of camp fires like you see in the Disney movies. Be sure to ask the Indian selling the fireworks if you can browse the ones “behind the wigwam” as they are hidden and not commonly sold to amateurs due to their particularly explosive properties.

Great care must be taken when selecting the fireworks you need for the most unique and exciting show. Be sure to spend at least $200 if not more because it will take a lot of tries to hit the low flying airplanes. You’re going to want loud firecrackers for sure to explode plastic soldiers and glassware with. You’re going to want at least 200 bottle rockets so you can strap the fuses together and light about 20 of them off at the same time. (But beware, some of them will ignite before the other fuses have gone off and the weight of 20 bottle rockets makes them fly very short distances, and then they will spin around on the ground and possibly point in your direction, so ducking is recommended.) You’re going to want a couple of mines and a lot of mortar tube fireworks.

Mines are the ones that explode showers of sparks. They are also a modern warfare device used to make areas impassable to enemy troops and civilians. Make use of both of these definitions! Bury one on the beach, get a long fuse, and hide behind a piece of driftwood. When some tardmander surfer dude comes walking by with one of those seashell necklaces on, let her fly! He will surely learn quickly what people in the third world have to deal with. If only you could use one huge firecracker to create a tsunami and murder the surfers.

Be sure to paste crickets to your bottle rockets for the ride of their LIVES!

You’re going to need a proper shrine to launch your fireworks from. Obviously you’ll need a vast array of American flags, including several hundred tiny flags which you can steal from a veteran’s graveyard, and a large flag to use as a launch pad. The most useful decorations you will implement are crying eagle decals. Attach at least five crying eagle decals to nullify the terrorist instincts of the explosive firecrackers. Stick decals to your trucks, shirts, towers, and beer kegs. This ensures that the evil fireworks will not fly into your possessions.

Speaking of kegs, they are the single most important thing in using firecrackers! Drink at least 8 beers before doing firecrackers to ensure that you won’t feel anything if one flies into your chest or if you run away quickly, trip, and scrape your knee on a rock. Drink only cheap, manly beer. Never settle for quality beer. America is the land of freedom and true patriots (ie people who make less than $15k per year) know how to party. And never, never drink anything girly like Smirnoff while doing fireworks. Fireworks are a man’s sport, and drinking Smirnoff while setting them off would be about as lame as some hip dude coming up to you and flashing you the “peace” sign and saying “yo” and you doing some crazy wannabe gang symbol with your body and saying “no, bro. Greenpeace.”

So! You’re ready to set off the big mama fireworks, I see! Well, congratulations, and godspeed. First you’re going to need a two to six inch mortar which is usually included with the set. If you don’t have one, use a toilet paper tube. Secondly, you will need a target. Here is a list of targets you will need depending on which climate you live in:

Coastal: A beached whale or sea-lion
Meadowlands: A goat
Hollywood: Tom Cruise
Neighborhood: Children

Hold the large mortar tubes at a 45 degree angle. If the fireworks do not ignite, look into the tube to see what the matter is, but be sure to wear safety goggles, as there could be a funnel web spider inside. If the fuse lights and the firework launches correctly, you will be rewarded with a hearty explosion and the knowledge that your $10 went to a good cause.

The most important piece to your firework collection is a roll of approximately 2,500 black cat fireworks. It will take you about one half hour to find the fuse, or it may not even come with a fuse. DO NOT light this mammoth firework without a fuse. DO NOT light the little piece of string holding the firecrackers together. All 2,500 WILL explode at one time and you will be thrown back, causing muscle trauma, especially in the neck, and possible facial melting. You’ll also just make a gosh-darned mess. See the first picture in this article with all the red strewn about the beach? That’s proof that lighting the tether string of a pinwheel of 2,500 firecrackers is not a good idea. The only good thing to come out of it is a seagull might come and eat one that didn’t go off, and then it will somehow explode inside the seagull, which would be really cool to watch. Otherwise, it just litters the beach, which is something that Greenpeace would be angry about, I think.

Finally, you must consider the police when setting off fireworks. But I say, go for the root of the problem. There isn’t a very good chance police will be around when you’re exploding firecrackers, but there is a spectacular chance that some religious nut with a little yippy dog and children will hear them and call the cops on you. The solution to the problem is simple. You already have a plethora of fire inducing paraphernalia, right? So burn all houses in the area down! Everyone will be forced to leave or they’ll be crying so hard they won’t notice the fireworks.

Fireworks are a great way to express the true patriot inside you, have fun, and create terrific stories of bodily injury to tell your children. Stay safe, people of the Internet.

–justin “No E” milligan