Ballons are extremely distracting

I find the balloons extremely distracting. I am the type of person that must look at animated things on pages. It makes the site very difficult for me to use. I appreciate the sentiment, and I'm happy the site has been around as long as it has, but the balloons don't need to be a month long thing or however long they are planned for. At the very least please give me a setting to disable them.