It Was Just Like Times Square, Except Completely Different

Jason and I hit Main Street Durango last night for a BIG New Year's Eve night. 

After dinner we had some time to kill before The Snowflake Flake Drop.

What? You've never heard of The Snowflake Drop? 

Oh, well, we'll get to that.

My friend, Kylie, owns Joel's bar so we headed over there for awhile.

This picture just cracks me up.

Kylie is about 6 feet tall in heels, so she's bending over and I'm standing on my tiptoes. 

She's also wearing her sparkly "Thanksgiving dress", as she called it.  I said, "Jason would love it if I showed up to Thanksgiving in that!"

I, on the other hand, had on 2 shirts plus long-johns under my sweater since this was the temperature outside.

I know the picture is blurry, but yes, that says -14!

About 15 minutes until midnight we headed down to Durango's First Annual Snowflake Drop. 

It's exactly like the Times Square ball drop except:

There's no media coverage,

no ball (it's a snowflake!),

no Ryan Seacrest (or announcer of any kind),

and the crowd is slightly smaller.

Can you see me down there? 

That's me in front of the infamous snowflake that's about to be dropped from the tallest building in Durango! (the 3 story tall Alpine Bank building)

So Jason and I stood around with about 200 of our closest friends (who I'm guessing were all between the ages of 19-22) in -14 degrees. 

We found the whole thing seriously amusing and couldn't stop laughing at the ridiculousness of the situation, and the ridiculousness of us being out there!

(You know it's cold when Jason breaks out his hooded parka.)

Here's the snowflake about to drop.

And just check out the high quality and thoroughness of this operation.

 You'll notice one side of the clock is reading almost midnight, while the other is reading 10 minutes til.

The big drop! 

Jason was thinking it was going to drop to the ground.

Um, no.

And then Durango pulled out its big gun.

The train showed up to whoosh and blow its whistle.

Yes, that's the legendary train (and throngs of people from the huge Snowflake crowd) behind me.

Yep, another New Year's Eve for our record books!