It's not the same without them.

This weekend is a long weekend to celebrate the Queen's Birthday. Traditionally in Canberra, the Queen's Birthday long weekend was when you were allowed to set off fireworks in your backyard or at approved events in the community.
Growing up we had a bonfire in our yard one year as Dad had cut down a tree that had been putting roots into our drain and blocking it. Bonfires were often held at different peoples houses or in the green space between suburbs. When I was in Scouts we used to hold a big bonfire in a suburban park and all the local residents would come along and set off some fire works. Everyone would enjoy seeing each others fireworks and we'd have a good time.
As I got a little older, at least old enough to purchase my own fireworks, my mates and I would purchase as many as we could and then we started modifying some of them to give a bigger bang or, shoot the parachutes higher. I seem to remember my favourite firework being called the "Double Parachute with Crackers". The crackers were Tom Thumbs so I used to open the firework to get the Tom Thumbs out and then I'd combine two or three of the charges that actually launched the parachutes into the one firework. Sometimes it would launch them extra high, other times the extra charge was too much for the cardboard tube so it would explode more than launch anything.
We managed to get in contact with someone who could get their hands on professional grade fireworks one year and we stocked up on lots of fireworks that were significantly more powerful than what we were used to. We weren't using them to hurt people and we were always careful to make sure that we didn't set fire to anything. Unfortunately the type and size of fireworks were actually illegal for us to be using without the correct permits so we had to be careful about where we used them and how many we set off as we didn't want to be caught with them.
I remember one time we were out in the middle of an oval next to a shopping centre. The carpark at the shopping centre was fairly full but we were a long way out on the oval and were setting off a couple of the bigger display fireworks. At one stage we got some cheers and applause from people in the carpark so we thought that we'd probably attracted enough attention, however, we decided that we would set off something called a "Thrashing Thunder". I think it may have been some form of Roman Candle, it basically shot nine explosives into the air, it had a short sharp and really loud bang, with just a small flash of light.
So, we set off this "Thrashing Thunder" and when the noise from the firework stopped echoing around the place we started to hear this ringing or beeping noise and we didn't know at first what it was from. Looking over at the carpark, there were roughly half a dozen car alarms going off, maybe more. It was then that we decided that we were done for the night and it would be best if we moved on to somewhere a little quieter.
Unfortunately, the year or two after this they completely banned fireworks in Canberra as they claimed that they were too dangerous. We all still have our fingers, sure we got the odd firework that didn't go to plan but that was part of the excitement.

Bomber
I may have blown my goatee off one year, but it grew back.