Fireworks light up Wrigley Field after the game between the Chicago Cubs and the St. Louis Cardinals in Chicago, Ill., July 4, 2026. (Matt Marton-Imagn Images/Reuters)

Happy lazy day-after-Independence-Day! It's not a national holiday, but it should be and already informally is, like the day after Thanksgiving, or New Year's Eve when you're 21. I hope you enjoyed yours as much as I did. We made the best of some fairly rotten Chicago weather during the day to grill out, watch The Great Escape for the first time ever, then enjoy some post-thunderstorm fireworks from our roof.

Then — ah, city life — it was time to gird my ears for the after-party of “homebrew fireworks” that continued on all around us well into the damp but ...

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