The Silver Spring Penguin

The stinging cold and piercing wind didn’t keep thousands from hitting Saturday’s Thanksgiving parade through downtown Silver Spring.

Tissue-paper displays on flat-bed trucks floated up Georgia Avenue from Sligo Avenue starting at 9:30 a.m., when temperatures were in the twenties. Parade participants then turned right onto Ellsworth Drive, where local big wigs watched from shaded bleachers.

The cast of characters included a few regulars — the massive penguin balloon tethered to 20 beak-clad handlers, marching bands from local high schools, and scout troops. Local pols on the state and county level also showed, either on foot or from the back seat of a convertible.

But there were also plenty of Andean dance groups shimmying in sequinned costumes, members of the Maryland Youth Ballet tiptoeing in tutus, and a praying mantis (below) wildly shaking its ass for Brookside Gardens.

On one Christmas-themed display, a fan-inflated, wind-swept Rudolf tousled with another reindeer (or at least a dude in costume) on Georgia near Thayer Avenue. A few blows were exchanged before the inflatable deer submitted to its human float mate. No injuries were reported.

The annual parade was the eleventh sponsored by the county.