The Weirdest Things That Drop To Ring In The New Year

Spencer is a giant stuffed possum lowered from the sky every year in Tallapoosa, Georgia. The event is the centerpiece of a night full of celebrations in the small West Georgia community. Tallapoosa was once called Possum Snout, which is likely where the marsupial reference comes in. Another small southern town, Brasstown, North Carolina, also does a NYE possum drop but in a more frightening manner - they use a live possum in a plexiglass case.

No, the Eastover, North Carolina, Flea Drop is not a regional brand of flea dip for cats and dogs. Instead, it's an annual tradition started at the town's incorporation in 2010. Locals learned the city used to be called Flea Hill, so they felt a huge flea replica would be a fitting tribute. At three-feet tall and 30 lbs., this flea is not something you'd want to find in your carpet or on your pet, which is maybe why Eastover shoots off a replica 1861 cannon once the flea hits the ground at midnight.

Since New Year's 1996, the city of Lebanon, Pennsylvania, has dropped a 200-lb slab of bologna at the stroke of midnight. "Lebanon is the home of the Lebanon bologna," Cheryl Batdorf, President of the Community of Lebanon Association explained. But fear not, the delicious lunch meat does not go to waste. After the drop each year, the bologna is given to a charity.

In Key West, Florida, the annual tradition is to drop a drag queen named Sushi from a huge, glittering high heel shoe. Sushi's given name, Gary Marion, has been performing the drag queen drop since 1996. He told CNN: "They said, 'We have an idea: Let's do a shoe drop…We made this shoe for you. You've got to sit in it for New Year's Eve,' and I said 'OK,' and that is how it started." In 2015, Marion married his longtime partner just before the high heel dropped to ring in the new year.

In 2007, the small town of Vincennes, Indiana, started dropping watermelons on New Year's Eve. As the seat of Knox County, Vincennes and the surrounding area contain over 7,000 acres of watermelon farms. An 18-foot watermelon replica is raised high into the air every December 31, and at midnight, 18 (!) watermelons drop from it. Sounds…messy.

Known as the Up the Cup New Year's Eve Celebration, those in Savannah, Georgia, bring in January 1 by dropping a six-foot tall to-go cup. The tradition is a relatively new one - it was started in 2013 - but it draws a larger and larger crowd each year. The to-go cup is a reference to Savannah's law that permits adults to drink alcohol on the city's streets so long as the booze is in a to-go cup.