a new year

Last night I was honored enough to be present for a first annual Mobile tradition.  Much like the Times Square Ball drop of NYC or the Peach drop in Atlanta, Mobile wanted such an event to bring in the new year.  So Mobilians began to think, what are we most proud of?  What do we want to be remembered by?  That's when City Councilman Fred Richardson came up with it- the moonpie. 

"It cuts across

 economic status.  It cuts across race. 

 The Moon Pie brings people together.  If I had picked some other object, it could have divided the community.  But the Moon Pie, nobody has anything against the Moon Pie... They [the critics] see it, and many of them don't like it, but they can't stop it.  It's coming whether they like it or not!"

Fred Richardson

 So the planning was underway.  Richardson contributed $9,000 from the city's discretionary fund for the construction of a 12-ft tall, 600-lb electric pie.  Makes sense.  Why not spend taxpayer's money on something completely pointless when our economy is in the hole and our kids don't get to go to music class because there's no funding for our public schools?

 And not that that wouldn't have been PLENTY, but Chattanooga Bakery, the inventor of the Moon Pie in 1917, concocted the world's largest, 55-lb, 45,000 calorie pie for the event.  Look at the beauty.  

So how was my experience?

We got there around 11:30, and unfortunately the edible moonpie was gone.  We did scrape some remains from the bottom, but determined it wasn't safe to eat.  

 See that itty bitty yellow dot in the background? That would be our grand electronic moonpie high in the sky.  And its not that small because I was at the back of a huge crowd, or because my camera can't zoom.  They had it so far away, it just looked that tiny.  You couldn't even read what it said, and it did NOT look like a moonpie.

I'm so proud to call Mobile my home.