Comments on: REMEMBERING THE EVENTS OF SEPTEMBER 11TH

By: gustheloveablechimneysweep

gustheloveablechimneysweep — Sat, 12 Sep 2009 00:38:38 +0000

sticking together is what good waffles do.

By: Boatdrinks

Boatdrinks — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 22:51:24 +0000

I worked a job that had enough travel I got around most of the US at that time. Ironically, I was on my first trip to Oklahoma. I had bugged my colleague so we stopped at the Oklahoma center bombing memorial on the night of the 10th. We walked around for 20 minutes or so. I remember just thinking “why would someone do something to kill so many Americans? For such a bizarre purpose?”
I woke in my hotel, was answering email and had the TV on Bryant Gumbel’s crappy CBS morning show when they broke into the coverage to show the first crash’s effects. I watched the second plane hit.
My colleague tried to get it together and eventually made our business call. While at the facility, we didn’t actually do much; we ended up talking to everybody about what we had seen. Then someone showed up and said a tower was down. Then a while later they said the other was down. I could not wrap my head around it until I saw the replays at lunch in an Applebees.
Getting home with a grounded air system turned into a nightmare; I flew out of Little Rock on an absolutely silent flight as the first flight left Friday. There were Red Cross personnel heading to NYC, and military people called up and on their way who knows where. And a lady in Atlanta who told me about her vibrator as we stood in a hastily put together extra security checkpoint after deplaning our first flights. Then she pulled it out to show me and ask me if it would pass the security check.
WTF lady, you are as old as my MOM!!! I don’t want to look at your toys!

By: JOSH

JOSH — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 19:46:14 +0000

@theDoon: Trabue.

You guys at Obetz had it rough. NO RUNNING ON THE BELTS!

By: HBick

HBick — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 19:12:23 +0000

I was in 8th grade, in Spanish when I found out. My teacher, Mrs. Diltz (we called her dildo because she couldn’t understand, silly mexicans), this kid came from the dentist, he was all wide eyed, and couldn’t tell us what going on because his braces got tightened and he was a pussy. He had to write it down for us, I remember where I was sitting in that god awful building and the smelly kid next to me.

Side note, the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in OKC that is no more, I was 19.4 miles in the burbs in 1st grade. The day just started, and the windows on the south side of our building (19.4 miles north of downtown) were all rattling, and two of them shattered. I know what those people went through, waiting for a day maybe two hoping they are alive, then on day 3 or 4 just hoping they find the body of your loved ones.

This world sucks, and that’s why I started drinking at lunch today.

By: theDoonAbides

theDoonAbides — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 19:04:28 +0000

Punte, did you work at Obetz or Trabue?

I worked Nights at Obetz and was eating breakfast/showering when they hit (and you’re correct, no terrorist attack would ever stop the big brown machine). Odd feeling the rest of the day.. never have been able to look at a plane flying across the skies the same.

By: Cinderblock

Cinderblock — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 18:36:11 +0000

I worked in an office on 49th and Third in Manhattan, and just got promoted the day before and was settling into my new corner office when one of my coworkers burst in to tell me the news. I thought it was a little cessna or something, not a Boeing. My office mates, including myself, were nearly all 22 year old’s fresh out of college save for a couple of interns. We watched the towers billow smoke on the TV before going downstairs to look at it on the ground floor. When we got back upstairs Tower 1 fell. My roomate was working IT somewhere on the 50th floor of tower 1 so I nearly vomited my lower intestine when I realized that he was likely killed. Fortunately he had gone to vote in some city election that day and got to the building just as people were jumping out of 40 story windows.

There were a shitload of people emptying the buildings and flooding the street like after a football game. I remember telling my coworkers that we were better of staying at the office because given all the shit that just happened, there could be a crop duster with poison gas ready to dump some shit on the crowd.

By: Punch Rockgroin

Punch Rockgroin — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 18:34:36 +0000

I could have sworn it was Saddam who did it.

By: The Sports Machine

The Sports Machine — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 18:10:32 +0000

The important thing is we caught and killed Osama bin Laden, the man behind this nefarious plot.

By: BiggieLaing

BiggieLaing — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 17:58:14 +0000

Great finish to the article. On a serious note, even though I’m Canadian, 9/11 had a direct impact in my life.

I was in New York from August 27th-September 2nd in 2001 to watch the 3 game series between the Blue Jays and Yankees. We chose to stay in New York for a couple extra days (series ended on the 30th) to see the sites. That was my second time being at the top of the WTC’s and obviously my last.

We headed to Toronto to see the 3 game series against the Yanks and stayed in Toronto (cousin’s wedding) until we left at 7:40est on September 11th. While in the air on our way to Calgary, the captain come over the air and told us that we would be landing in Winnipeg. No reason was given. We were removed from the airplane when we landed at approx 10am. The airport was dead, with everyone fixated on whatever tv was on. It was only at that point that we realized what had happened. 8 years ago today and I remember it as if it was yesterday.

By: Punch Rockgroin

Punch Rockgroin — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 17:54:23 +0000

I usually have the radio set to wake me up with whatever my flavor in entertainment suits me… at that time it was talk radio. I remember having sorta fuzzy dreams about something happening in New York… something about towers. I only truly realized what was going on when my mother called me crying, asking if I had seen what was going on. By this time, the first tower had fallen, I was spared the grotesqueness of having to watch the planes hit live.

For the next few hours, I sat in stunned silence, only to realize that I had to go to my part time job working at a Conoco station south of Fort Collins.

Driving down there, the scene was surreal, as for a weekday the streets were pretty much bare of traffic. I realized as I got to the station why there was no traffic on the streets. Cars were lined up for blocks, trying to get gas. Chaos, people shouting, crying, impatient, afraid that prices were going to skyrocket. I had just a few weeks before brought in a little Black and White TV to watch football on Sundays, because I had the soul crushing shift of 5am to 2pm, and set it up right next to the register, for me and those in line. It was an odd mix, the noise of outside, with the stunned silence of inside.

We ran out of gas around 7pm, shutting the station down 5 hours early. There were still cars for blocks when that happened, full of angry and frightened people.