Dec. 30-31, 2010

He's back! On the evening of Dec. 30, around 9:00 sometime, the lights came back on! The neighbor's truck is back in the driveway, and it appears that we're back to normality. I expect a quick change to "Happy New Year" late tonight, but that'll be another post. For now I'm just happy to see the lights back again.

Dec. 10-30, 2010

CRISIS!! Ever since the early switch to "Merry Christmas" (complete with Christmas music) the house has been dark. That's twenty days of the complete absence of anything. It's completely unheard of right in the middle of one of the two biggest holidays (as far as the lawn is concerned) of the year! His truck is also gone, or I might have called the police. I suspect he just went on vacation.

One thing has become absolutely clear to me. I've become so conditioned to the lighted displays in his yard that I just don't feel right without them. Despite the impression you might get from this blog, I don't actually spend much time looking at the displays, but the orange glow and the flashing lights have become so much a part of living in this house that it was really strange to see it go dark for weeks almost three weeks.

Of course, I've still been taking pictures, often at night. Here's the unlit yard.

Dec. 8-9, 2010

Shock! Inexplicably, the Christmas countdown has disappeared, and he's moved straight to the "Merry Christmas" which, based on past holidays, shouldn't appear until Christmas Day. Very odd. In addition, there is now non-stop Christmas music blasting from the house. I wasn't home for Christmas last year, but a friend who came to check on the cats observed this same phenomenon, but only for Christmas Day. I'm a little confused by this departure from the norm, but I'm willing to go with it for now. In addition to the picture I've included a video...enjoy the music.

Nov. 30-Dec. 7, 2010

From here on out it's all Christmas...almost. If you look carefully at the front of the yard you can see a bunch of American flags and a Pearl Harbor Day decoration. Also, we now have a countdown to Christmas. Below, a night picture with the lights on.

Nov. 25-29, 2010

It's Thanksgiving and it looks like he's decided to leave the "Happy Thanksgiving" message up for a while. I'm not complaining. It's my favorite holiday.

Nov. 12-24, 2010

The Thanksgiving decorations are drowning in a sea of Christmas. I have to admit it makes me a little sad. I love Christmas, but I love Thanksgiving too, and I'm not a fan of Christmas taking over two months. Anyway, there are two things I'd like to point out about this photo. First, on 11/24 he changed the wording to "Thanksgiving Eve" (not shown) which I've never heard of, but I guess it makes sense. Next, if you look to the far left of this picture you can see the neighbor hard at work on his display.

Nov. 3-11, 2010

This is the approach to Veteran's Day, but I'd also like to point out that Christmas decorations are already starting to go up. Thanksgiving is being overshadowed by Christmas even on my neighbor's lawn display. It's like a giant metaphor.

The buildup to Veteran's Day culminates in the message, "Veteran's Day - Father". This seems to confirm that his father is a veteran, most likely of the Air Force. (see early August)

Nov. 2, 2010

It's Election Day and it looks like he's also getting ready for Thanksgiving. The pilgrims are up and so is the turkey. Also, a tee pee.

Nov. 1, 2010

This is one of the more serious lawn displays. It's tough to see, but the American flags are back up and the text reads "All Saints Day Father". It's not exactly the same as last year, which featured plywood angels, but the point is quite clear. His father is a veteran and deceased. Kind of gutsy to throw that out there on your lawn like that, no matter how supportive or loving of a son you are.

Oct. 23-31, 2010

Finally Halloween has the yard to itself. It's a little disappointing that the decorations have remained so sparse for such a major holiday, but I guess Halloween isn't a favorite over there. Since there was really no change from the 23-31, I'll leave it as one post, but there are some subtle changes in wording. On Oct. 30 the main text in the lawn read "Halloween Eve" and on the 31st it said "Happy Halloween" (of course). Both are pictured below.

Oct. 13-22, 2010

I thought we were going to be Halloween all the way through the end of October, but here's a surprise. The American flags are back up except this time it reads "At Norristown Public Library / Holland Job Fair" with a small white cardboard sign giving the date and time (Oct. 23, 1pm) and a countdown. This reminds me a lot of the "Something Big Coming" stuff from this spring. Holland is his last name, so I assume he's sponsoring this job fair somehow. Altogether very confusing. I briefly thought about going to it just to see what it was like, but other plans came up. Probably for the better.

Oct. 11-12, 2010

Columbus Day has arrived without much fanfare, but we do get the Happy Columbus Day message. It's a little difficult to see in the dark, but I promise it's there in front of the castle and the pirates.

I included Oct. 12 in this post because it was sort of a turnaround day. The Columbus Day stuff came down, but nothing was put up in its place. Not for long...

Oct. 1-10, 2010

I should have seen this coming. A Halloween countdown went up on Oct. 1 and decorations have steadily increased daily since then. Even today it's still not all that elaborate, but I suspect that will change once Columbus Day gets out of the way. Make sure you zoom in and read the individual tombstones. Some are fairly standard: Count Dracula, Wolf Man, Frankenstein...and then there's "Billy Bone", a monster I must admit I'm not familiar with. Incidentally, the dates on the tombstones seem to be arbitrary. I was kind of hoping it would be a clever nod to the publication dates of these books. Not even close. Also, who's Billy Bone? I googled the name. He's an English soccer player who spent most of his career in SE Asia. Not very spooky.

Look for more frequent updates on the Halloween display, but probably not on the level of Easter.

Sept. 24-30, 2010

Not much has changed over the past week. Halloween is still coming, and there have been a couple decorations added periodically during the week, but nothing to warrant a lot of excitement or attention. Columbus Day is still coming. This picture is from 9/30.

Sept. 22-23, 2010

Autumn Begins! Also, notice half the yard is occupied by American flags. I can only assume this is for an impending Columbus Day display. This picture was taken on the morning of the 23rd. It was taken pretty early, and the lack of any lettering on the American flag side made me suspect that things were not finished for the day. So I took a picture when I got home from work that night...

It's tough to see, but we've now made the transition to "Halloween Coming". Even harder to see is that the "Columbus Day Coming" signs have gone up in the American flag portion of the yard. Excellent.

Sept. 13-21, 2010

Autumn Coming! There's nothing particularly notable about this display, but I still feel the urge to point out how the yellow shamrock on the left is lighter than the one on the right. This is because of an incident over the summer which saw one of his yellow shamrocks destroyed, and a piece of it ending up on my lawn. Anyway, this is "Autumn Coming". I'll save the exciting stuff for the next post.

Sept. 12, 2010

Without any warning at all, we have Grandparents Day! I looked it up: it's the Sunday after Labor Day every year. Now this isn't particularly noteworthy (unless you're into Grandparents Day), but I thought this was a good opportunity to give an example of one of the quirks of these photos.

On certain days, the time of day when I take the picture affects what you see on this blog. I've gotten used to my neighbor's updating patterns by now (he usually changes things either around 11pm the previous night or before 9am the next morning) but he doesn't always stick with that.

This morning when I got up the yard was still set for 9-11, which is perfectly reasonable since I got up at 7am. But when it hadn't changed by 10am, I decided to take my daily picture. Then, later in the afternoon I noticed he'd changed over to Grandparents Day. Of course, I had to take another picture. I'm lucky I noticed it, because I presume if I hadn't I would have missed it entirely.

Sept. 7-11, 2010

Once Labor Day is over it's time to gear up for the anniversary of 9-11, officially known as Patriot Day. Curiously, he never mentions Patriot Day in the lawn, instead opting for the (in my opinion) lesser decorating style of writing messages on posterboard. Compared with his normal work, it just looks messy to me. It's nearly impossible to read the signs in the picture so here's the text:
Far left: The passengers of Flight 93
Middle: September 11, 2001
Right: The world loves the people of New York

On a personal note, the time of year is rapidly approaching where I will not be home during daylight hours. It'll make taking pictures difficult, and the results won't be as nice as over the summer, but I'll still be able to get a pictures every day, maybe showing off the lights at night a little more often.

Sept. 6, 2010

It's Labor Day, and the neighbor is wishing us all a happy Labor Day. No cardboard workers, though.

Aug. 29-Sept. 5, 2010

Disability Children's Day is over and now the whole yard is devoted solely to the coming of Labor Day. All the standard patriotic decorations are up, including "Uncle Sam on stilts". You can't see it in this picture, but there's a light show at night. It doesn't hold a candle to Christmas, but it's the best (only) Labor Day light show in the neighborhood.

August 28, 2010

It's Disability Children's Day!!! I still can't find even a hint of this holiday anywhere but on my neighbor's lawn, but I'm not inclined to argue with him either. It also means that tonight (probably in the dead of night like he sometimes does) we'll go to the full-blown Labor Day display.

August 22-27, 2010

Finally, some Labor Day love! It's now sharing the yard with Disability Children's Day (which is still bothering me). Everything else stays the same.

August 19-21, 2010

The setup is almost identical to the previous one, but there's a hint of Labor Day on the far left (the other side of the driveway). Have to admit I'm getting a little nervous about Disability Children's Day. I have no idea when it is, and we're starting to get pretty close to Labor Day itself. There's really no need for me to feel anxiety over my neighbor's lawn and if the holidays will come in time. Must relax.

If you look at the photo for 8/21, you can see that something is definitely in the works. The shamrocks have been moved to open up the whole right half of the yard.

August 13-16, 2010

I was mowing the lawn today when I came across a piece of something in the front yard. I picked it up and realized it was a piece of a yellow shamrock from the yard. On the back it has his name and the date he made it (2008). I looked at his yard and sure, enough, the yellow shamrock to the left of the words is broken. After checking back in the photos I can see that this happened on August 13, just two days ago.

But here's the best part...I went inside, did some work, ate breakfast, took a shower. Then when I went to take the picture, the broken shamrock is GONE! I assume he's making a new one and it will be up by tomorrow.

8/16 - As predicted, the replacement yellow shamrock is now in place. You can tell it's new because it's a slightly different color (visible on the picture). He made quick work of that!

August 2-18, 2010

This is a new one. Last summer during August there were a couple weeks where there was no display. This year he's found a holiday: "Disability Children's Day" is coming. I've been unsuccessful in tracking down exactly when this holiday is. The sign seems like a grammatical error, so I've tried a bunch of different likely combinations with no success. I'll have to wait until it's actually the day, and then I'll have better clues.

August 1, 2010

Air Force Day! There are a couple notable things in this picture. First of all, the display has been improved since last week. Second, the word "father" appears again. This was definitely not present last year, which leads me to believe that a) his father served in the air force, and b) died within the past year.

The last thing worth mentioning is my water heater sitting on the side of the road. Thankfully we caught it before it flooded the basement, and it wasn't too much of a hardship to go without hot water for a day in August when it's up around 100 degrees outside. Definitely glad it wasn't January.

July 26, 2010

The Air Force Day display is up, but appears a little anemic compared to others. Then again, I wouldn't want to venture outdoors in this heat to do anything either.

July 25, 2010

It's Parents Day! Also, my new lawn has died. It makes me sad. I'll replant in September I guess.

July 5-24, 2010

This is a milestone for me. As of July 9, I've lived in this house for exactly one year, which means I'm going to start seeing familiar decorations.

The first is Parents Day. Did you know it existed? Third Sunday in July. I remember that was the decoration when I first moved in. Interestingly enough, the "Air Force Day coming" that is on the right side of the yard is different from last year. Oh, he put up decorations for Air Force Day last year, but not until after Parents Day. I wonder why?

Also, one afternoon I went to take the picture and there was a woman walking past the house with a little boy. He was having so much fun running through the decorations. He didn't hurt any, and she quickly got him off the lawn once he started touching them, but it was fun to watch. Here's the picture (July 14):

July 4, 2010

I have to admit I found this a little sad. For all of his grand displays, all there is for Independence Day is a posterboard sign that reads "happy fourth of July". Accurate, yes. Inspired, not so much. Don't know why.

My brand new lawn is dying in the heat + no rain.

June 22-July 3, 2010

Fourth of July is coming and the flags are all out. The doughboy is back atop the hedge as well, and the Uncle Sam on stilts.

An interesting side note...I went on vacation for several days during this timespan, fairly certain that I wasn't going to miss anything. Alas, I was wrong. A friend of mine who'd stopped by on June 28 called to tell me that there was a "Happy Birthday Jimmy" sign out front. So upset I missed it and don't have a picture, but now I know what to look for.

June 21, 2010

...and summer begins! Interesting to note that the "father" sign from Father's Day is still up, but I took this picture around 6:30am, so he probably just hasn't gotten to that yet.

June 20, 2010

It's Father's Day, and the words have changed accordingly. Summer is still coming...for now.

June 15-19, 2010

The flags are gone and Father's Day has taken over the yard. In somewhat of a departure from the usual pattern, the "Summer Coming" part of the yard is integrated with the main display. Usually they're completely compartmentalized. If you look closely you'll see two angels above the hedge. In between it says "father". Yet another indication that his father has passed away.

June 14, 2010

It's Flag Day. I know it looks the same, but a change is a change, and I shall post.

June 2-13, 2010

It's almost not worth a separate post, but on the far left, across the driveway, the shamrocks are back up. This time...Father's Day Coming!

June 1, 2010

It's so convenient when patriotic holidays follow each other. All he did was swap out the lettering, but we all now know that Flag Day is coming!

(as a side note, I really do look forward to Flag Day every year)

May 31, 2010

It's Memorial Day and the neighbor does not disappoint. Along with all the flags and stars, there's an "Uncle Sam on stilts" in the front yard. There's also a small figure on top of the hedge who appears to be a leprechaun at first until you look more closely and realize he's supposed to be a soldier...looks more like a British doughboy than an American soldier, but it's the thought that counts.

May 16, 2010

With Armed Forces Day in the rear-view mirror, all he had to do was switch out the lettering. Watch out folks: Memorial Day is coming!

May 15, 2010

It's Armed Forces Day! I was only able to get this nighttime photo, but you can see everything pretty clearly.

May 11, 2010

Like I said, the blank canvas wouldn't last long. Armed Forces Day is on its way. If you're anything like me, you had to look it up. I'll save you the trouble. It's the third Saturday in May. That makes it May 15 this year.