My Parade

This is my version of the parade with all the flowers. Bear in mind that my version of things is always a little bit different than the typical one. My sister actually got to go and see the rose bowl parade and of course I watched the parade in order to try and find her in the crowd of 90,000 people. I missed the first 2/3s of the parade because I was so busy scanning the crowd. I had to watch on TV and evidently they edited out a lot of the featured floats. I know I didn't see a "Cirque de Soleil Comes to Los Angeles" float. California newspapers reported on it and had images like this:


...and like this (from KTLA.com)


Of course I don't have pictures of the most beautiful float - the Chinese racing dragons float. Nor do I have images of the Dole float which won one of the big prizes, but the press drawing looks like this:


I was also able to find an artist's rendering of the Natural Balance float on line. (Why do I care, you ask?) Because it features Tillman the most famous bull dog in the world, of course!!


This float broke a record for weight and advertised itself that way. The back half of the float had diving dogs jumping into a huge (heated) pool of water, but the star was Tillman and friends who water boarded down a slide on the float's fore.


Yes, I did take a few photos once I got through gawking at the crowds. Mine are details of this and that.



There were a lot of houses and buildings in the parade. I have already forgotten which float is which. This one clearly has a Western theme.

This one is the Uno float. Somewhere in those bleachers are my sister and brother-in-law.


They are both wearing black, so I'm sure you can spot them right away!


Here are a couple of closer shots so you can see them better.


See, they are in the middle under the presenter's booth.



This was a pretty nice float:


but not as exciting as Tillman.


My favorite part was this guy on the bull.


And what is a parade without Pacman?

Pacman not only had his friends with him, but also shot out streamers which can be seen at the sides of the picture.


It's not a parade without marching bands and there were many. I graded them all on how they turned the corner. I think this is TCU and as you can see, they did an excellent job. There were bands from far away Wisconsin and Pennsylvania (who almost didn't make it because of the weather and even from Hokkaido.



This float had a western theme too, the ponies were colored with ground coffee beans (among other plant materials). I just couldn't bare to include the float devoted to Ronald Reagan, sorry.


Here's another perfect marching band. Ya gotta love the feathered hats!


This is a shot of the rose bowl from the blimp.


I liked this float about Tea with Friends. I can't remember who sponsored it, but the dragons were the stars of this years parade.


I hadn't given up looking for my sister. She had to be in those stands somewhere.


These were firemen with old-time fire equipment.


The horses were gorgeous.


This final float was dedicated to the firefighters of 911.


Of course I had to look for my sister one last time. I'm pretty sure she is in this shot. See her next to the guy with the beard?


New Years is a time to look back at one's past mistakes and adventures, to thank those who have been there for us and to look forward to the days ahead as we try to be better people.


I hope you all had your black eyed peas and collards this year! We could all use some luck in the year ahead!