Silent Fireworks? And an age-old scam...

I changed hotels to one nearer my conference. This new hotel doesn't have gates or burglar bars, but has several security officers. As I was returning from the conference meetings this afternoon, there was a car stopped sideways blocking the entrance to my new hotel. Standing outside it was a lady in Sunday-go-to-meeting clothes. The car was a brand-new late-model Cadillac. Since I couldn't get into the hotel because of her car, I stopped. She walked over to me and said, "Oh, good, my prayers have been answered. My knight in shining armor has arrived. Can you please help me push my car over into a parking space here? I let it run out of gas. I'm late to an appointment. I'm so sorry." I heaved and ho'ed and pushed her car up the slight incline into a parking space, and she put it in park. She then got out and said, "Oh, please sir. I can walk down to the gas station, but I don't have my purse with me. Can I borrow ten dollars from you? I promise I'll pay it back." I've fallen for that one before, so I firmly declined, at which point she turned on the tears. I didn't think to ask why she didn't just go back into the hotel and get her purse, or what kind of appointment she was going to without a purse, but I did know that I wasn't going to be the one to hand her $10 that I'd never see again. I parked my car and came into the building. My room is on the third floor overlooking the driveway. I looked out the window, and as I expected, her car was back blocking the driveway, and another joker was pushing her car into the same parking space. She spoke to him a minute, and he reached into his wallet and gave her some money. He got into his car and left, and she got into her car, ... and let it roll right back out, smack into the middle of the driveway again as soon as he was gone. Immediately another car came up, the driver got out, pushed her car up, and reached into his wallet and gave her money. I called the front desk to report the situation, and before the operator answered, the car was back out in the driveway again. The operator said, "oh, it's her again, eh?" Apparently this lady does this to all the hotels as her livelihood. As soon as one hotel runs her off, she goes across the street or around the corner to the next one, all over Los Angeles. Let's see: $10 every two minutes, works out to $300 per hour, say, 10 hours per day, that's $3000 per day, five days a week, $15,000 per week, over $750,000 a year. Tax-free! Not bad money. After hanging up, I looked out the window. She was taking yet another bill from yet another sucker as the security guard came and ran her off. She gave the security guard the finger, climbed into her "out of gas" car, started it, and drove off. She'd picked up at least $50 in about eight minutes. Sheesh. Okay, so what about silent fireworks? Since our hotel is right across the highway from Disneyland, I came out tonight to watch the fireworks display. For 50 years, Disneyland has advertised a 15-minute firework display every night. I love the banging and booming and colors of a good fireworks exhibition. Well.... The fireworks started on time. I was only a couple hundred yards from the fireworks over Snow White's castle, but I didn't hear anything. Nothing. No bangs, no booms, no whistles, no screaming meemee's, nothing. They were pretty, and mostly made up of roman candles, but even the big starbursts were eerily silent. The only sound was the ooooh's and aaaah's of the people watching. Why no booms or bangs? I couldn't even hear any music, which generally accompanies Disney fireworks. Has my hearing really gone that bad? The hotel clerk explained. According to her, the city of Anaheim annexed the Disney property, over Disney's objections, into the city limits several years ago. Disney was built miles outside of town, way out in the boonies, in the 1950's, but over the past half-century, the area around Disneyland has become covered in hotels, restaurants, and tourist stuff. The Anaheim residents wanted to add a 10% city tax on hotel and restaurant revenues so that the city could eliminate property taxes. Then, once Disney and the hotels were inside the city limits, and paying for everything for the residents, the city passed a noise ordinance outlawing banging fireworks and loud music and other such nuisance noises in the "city" of Anaheim! Even though no resident lives within earshot of Disneyland. Disney can't do anything that can be heard off their property, even though for miles in every direction there is nothing but hotels and tourist places containing people who want banging fireworks set to music! Can you believe it? California. Sheesh.