Symphony of Lights

Tonight we met up with some folks to celebrate a friend's birthday by going to see the Symphony of Lights in Columbia. It's an immense display of Christmas lights along a mile-long pathway in a park, and you drive through it and marvel at the pretty colors. It's a big annual event and the proceeds go to Howard County Hospital. We actually got to walk through it because it's the opening weekend and we were part of the "Dazzle Dash" - yesterday they had a race, and today was just a walk, but we still got to wear numbers pinned to us like marathoners. It was a lot of fun! We've driven past it dozens of times in the years I've been living here, but we've never actually gone to look at the lights. Walking through was nice because we were up close. Some of the displays even move!

It was cold and my feet are tired, but it was a good night for a good cause - doubly good, if you include the birthday!

They were playing happy Christmas music during the pre-walk festivities, and I ended up frantically calling my Dad. Why? So I could tell him that Christmas has officially started and I win because I heard Feliz Navidad first. It's a silly thing that started a few years ago, where whoever hears the song first on the radio or at the mall "wins" and calls the other to tell them. Sadly, anticlimactic this year because Dad couldn't hear the song in the background noise and so was a little confused when I called to tell him I won. Oh well, when he got it, he laughed, so it's all good.

May the Christmas season begin!