Happy Finnish Independence Day!

Today is Finnish Independence Day.  I'm still trying to figure this out, but from the best I can tell it is like a combination of 4th of July, Veterans Day, Memorial Day, Thanksgiving, and Oscar night.  The entire day is spent in celebration of Finland declaring their independence from Russia in 1917.  (I think.)  They have parades, dignitaries go hang out in cemeteries to honor the dead soldiers, they wheel out the remaining veterans (apparently there are about 2 left) to clap at them, and then 2,000 special people are selected to attend the President's Ball.  At the ball, they all wear super fancy dresses (usually by Finnish designers) and tuxedos, queue up for their chance to shake the President's hand, and then the Finnish equivalent of Joan Rivers and Steven Cojocaru run commentary on what everyone is wearing.

It is basically 2 hours of this:



I'm about an hour and a half in, and I have seen:

• Several women whose dresses look like they drifted right in from a figure skating performance.
• One girl who had her hair in one of those pompadour-style ponytails, and had pink rhinestones lining the sides of her head like racing stripes.
• James Lipton!?!  No, sorry.  Fakeout.
• The infinite patience of President Tarja "Conan O'Brien" Halonen, who has to shake the hands of 2,000 people.