Happy Birthday America!

We celebrated the Fourth of July by continuing our traditions this year.

While we missed the parade in Marietta, I watched some of it on TV.

We joined Sharon and Tom at the Cobb GOP Barbecue along with every elected official and every wannabe politician in the county. We also learned a lesson, while you might get a chance to win a fabulous prize by buying a raffle ticket (or 17 of them as I did), it also means that you have to wait until the end of the event to see if you win.

We enjoyed the first few speakers -- Sen. Saxby Chambliss, Rep. Tom Price and Rep. Phil Gingrey -- before the first round of the drawing. But by the time we got down to part-time-deputy-assistant Dogcatcher candidates it was getting close to four o'clock and we were still keeping our fingers crossed that we might win something. Then they called the band back up for another set.

Despite the wait, we didn't win. But we learned a lesson, don't buy the raffle tickets if you want to leave early.

There was a major theme to the speeches tough, from every level of candidate, and it went like this:

"I know that John McCain wasn't my first choice for president, or even my second choice, or my third choice (one state senator admitted that he wasn't even his fourth choice, but that guy dropped out of the race) but he is now our choice for President and I support him and urge you to support him too."

This came on the same day that an Ann Coulter column asked the question, "How drunk do Republicans have to be to vote for McCain?"

So we march to victory in November holding our noses and reminding ourselves, "It's for the Supreme Court, it's for the Supreme Court."

Politics out of the way, we traveled toward a home near the square for our second barbecue of the day. There were even politicians there (mostly judges). We had a good dinner and met some new friends.

We decided to leave just before the fireworks, saving ourselves to time in the post-party traffic jam.

We watched the Marietta light show from our deck and even had a competing show coming from Charlton Forge nearby. (Yes, the photo is of Marietta Square fireworks, but it's from last year and I didn't take it.)

Happy Birthday America. It was a great Fourth of July.