fizzle, sputter - extinction

It's officially 2011~

I knew it the moment a shower of sparks popped out barely 500 meters to my direct right, shocking me for a moment, our neighbors' screams doing nothing to calm me down. At that time, I had been the only one left awake in our house. 11-ish, my father suddenly complained that he was feeling sleepy, and went off to take a 'nap' in the nearest unoccupied bedroom. Rosaline, after two straight evenings of standing guard during her grandmother's funeral, was barely awake while we were washing the evening's dishes. Manang Em rushed to her hometown earlier, presumably to watch Miss Gay Bobuntugan 2010, leaving us three inexperienced chefs to fend for ourselves the night before New Year's. And my mother, of course, is pining a continent and a half away, my only contact with her having been Facebook chat. Pathetic holiday, altogether. I suppose it sounds blasphemous, but I really don't see much in Christmas anymore. I'm sorry, dear Jesus, but seriously... you weren't born in December, were you?

Scared that a firecracker might suddenly swoop into the house and set my mother's prized curtains on fire, I closed all the windows I could reach, and even turned off all the lights. I even considered not waking my father up, even though it's his habit to make a racket (I kid you not) while welcoming a fresh year. And for some time, I actually thought I would spend the turn of the year alone, sitting in front of my laptop, waiting for my latest Torrent attempt to load. But then my father woke up, grabbed a red shirt, and started pounding on the car horn to make noise without his highly detested pyrotechnics.

I suppose, in the end, you can't escape merrymaking, whatever mood you're in.