All Souls procession

Tonight was the All Souls procession through downtown Tucson. It's one part Day of the Dead, one part political protest, one part freak show – but it's 100% Tucson. You know – I've talked about it before.

This is the first year we've been there from start to finish. The start of the procession was lead by masked figures sweeping the ground. Apparently our streets are filthy and they were afraid of getting the little glowing man dirty.

Or it could be symbolic of something. I'm not sure.

This is the urn – the centerpiece of the event. The urn is filled with photos of and messages about / to the deceased. People are encouraged to come up and throw in their notes as it passes by. The urn is then taken to the artsy (OK, this is Tucson - the artsyER) part of town, hoisted up in the air and set ablaze by the aforementioned little glowing man.

At first, Kaylee wasn't sure about all of this. Lots of strange people in makeup and masks - and none of them were handing out candy.

But pretty soon the sheer number of puppies and drums got her into the mood. She even started to get excited by all the skeletons in the crowd.

We ended up marching along with the procession near one of the groups of drummers – bounced and jumped and danced on my shoulders the whole way ... and I'm going to feel it in the morning.

This is what it's all about. Tucson is a city of pyromaniacs.

In the upper left corner you see what's left of the urn. On the right – those are acrobats suspended by another crane twirling in the air with fireworks and flares.

Basically, EVERYTHING is on fire. Hell, there's even a giant torch (like the thing in hot air balloons) that is only there to add MORE fire.

Maggie – this is officially where you start kicking yourself for not being able to make the trip this year. Awe-some.

A new favorite family portrait. Even though we all have red-eye.

Try to look at this photo and not hear Kaylee saying "cheeeeeeeezzzzeeee."