Today, our city’s annual week-long Yankee Homecoming festival culminated in the traditional parade, which runs right past our front door. The celebrations — dozens of food stands, outdoor concerts, two road races, a bed race, and other special events — draws locals, tourists, and former ‘Portions. As the name suggests, it’s a Homecoming for an entire town, and a perfect excuse to stroll around eating ice cream for seven nights running.

The majority of the parade consists of about seventy-five (no exaggeration, just a realistic estimate) fire engines rolling slowly down two miles of street, sirens blaring the whole way. The following clip from last year’s parade should give you a good idea of the din, which persists for about half an hour:

Now here’s a clip showing what Aitch was doing during the entire fire engine serenade:

Unbelievable, eh? I put him down for a nap about a minute and a half before the first truck started wailing. Aitch’s room is at the front of the house, yards from the street. (I did eventually go upstairs and remove the blanket from his face.)

Ironically, minutes after the parade ended and the siren cacophony had finally died down, a fire alarm went off at the house across the street, and two of the seventy-five engines had to circle back to respond–the two, I imagine, that drew the short straws at the post-parade festivities.

Thus ends Yankee Homecoming for another year. Now the Yankees go home, and we have to start cooking our meals rather than eating from food trucks every night. We’ll miss the ice cream.