Two Days After

Thursday afternoon. I’ve taken one of my increasingly-frequent breaks to watch Miss Lucy and The Simpsons.

The disaster coverage was bad enough, but the victim and survivor stories are too much. I just can’t watch them without starting to tear up, especially the ones about people who went back to their offices based on an “all clear” announcement from the World Trade Center security staff. What the hell were they thinking? And when they played the Bay Area man’s last answering machine message from his wife on the 93rd floor, I’d had all I could stand.

 

There were bomb threats in the Financial District and at the airport today, although only the cops seemed to be taking them very seriously. There were idiot fratboys walking around trying to be funny by yelling “boom”. There were sirens everywhere, and people were looking up at the slightest noise.

Even in “tolerant” San Francisco, I watched people suspiciously eyeing a woman of apparently Middle Eastern descent as she walked out of the cell phone store. No one said anything, but you knew what they were thinking, and it didn’t have much to do with her tight skirt.

Tonight for me, it’s back to pushing the new fall season on The WB and UPN. Tomorrow I get to go have some more blood drawn. Oddly enough, I’ve been feeling much stronger and healthier the past few days and sleeping much better. I guess other people’s suffering has managed in some way to divert my mind from my own comparatively insignificant maladies.

The Day After

It’s 5:00 on the day after and for what seems like the very first time since yesterday morning, the local TV stations have paused long enough to offer a weather report. I’d usually criticize such non-stop attention to one topic (like during the presidential “election” last fall), but I can’t this time…

Now it’s 10:00 and I still don’t know how exactly to react to all this. I don’t think I’m in the minority. I’m having a hard time summoning all the anger that so many other people have demonstrated, although it appears briefly here and there. I’m still more trapped in fear and anxiety about what happens next. And I think I’m still focusing on the horrendous physical tragedy rather than the frightening and even more serious political implications…

And I’m wondering just what makes people so self-righteous and arrogant and callous as to think that their opinion of a country’s policies justifies the brutal murder of thousands, maybe tens of thousands, of random innocent people. And being relieved that most people in the world are not psychotic and therefore don’t have such strong “faith”…

I’m worried about bigots (here and abroad), and about terrorists (the kind who hijack planes and kill people, and the kind who cause panics at gas stations in Oklahoma City), and about the next group which thinks ramming a plane into a building is just a spiffy way to make a point now that you mention it…

Words fail me. Maybe some random thoughts while I continue trying to figure out how I’m reacting to the past two days:

  • I still can’t call New York City, although I have received one call FROM there.
  • San Francisco buses and the stores are eerily quiet. If you’ve ever ridden a 14-Mission bus, you’ll know that it’s usually not a particularly peaceful experience, but it was last night.
  • By lunchtime, it was almost impossible to buy a newspaper here.

And on TV coverage, while I’m at it:

  • ABC is far and away doing the best live coverage of the broadcast networks, while CBS seems to have the best taped reports. CNN seems to have the edge over MSNBC on cable.
  • You knew this was something big when MTV and VH-1 replaced their programming yesterday with a feed from New York City’s CBS station (but not from the network itself, oddly enough).
  • Where did Fox dig up their news crew? Could they possibly send them back to whichever small town talk radio station they came from in exchange for some real journalists?
  • At what point did Dan Rather surrender all his dignity and credibility to Peter Jennings and become so jarringly painful to watch?

Mid-morning

It’s creepy even in San Francisco. People on the street look troubled, the McDonald’s on Bryant next to the police station is almost deserted, and downtown is supposedly shutting down for the day…

And still CalTrans keeps pouding those fucking pile drivers for the freeway retrofit. The backdrop to the horrifying news is a constant loud pounding sound which makes my building vibrate each time. What the hell are those idiots thinking?

And my god, what must it be like in New York. I’ve had a couple of pieces of email, but I can’t get a phone call through right now…

Firsthand sightings at Ultrasparky and Andy’s Chest

Randomly Friday

My dad said it. He said the Jesse Helms mantra, even though he was half joking. I knew I’d hear it at least once this week, even without access to North Carolina TV coverage…

I may leave town tomorrow. If not, I’ll tell you the unlikely story of how I may soon be a member of the United Auto Workers…

Also, please be advised that my increasingly shitty internet connection is my current excuse for not answering email nor actually visiting exciting websites this week. My backup excuse is tons of work, so (in theory), I’m actually CREATING exciting websites. Wish I could upload them…

Adios, Jesse

So who’s gonna miss this hateful, ignorant son of a bitch and his perpetually constipated visage when he leaves the Senate? Not me. Maybe in a few years I’ll at least get over that twinge of dread and embarrassment I feel when I tell people that I’m from North Carolina

All my life, I heard the mantra repeated over and over again: “you may not agree with Jesse Helms, but you always know where he stands”. Well, yeah. Big deal. There was never much question where Hitler stood either. And it’s amazing how often he and Jesse could be found standing in just about the same exact place. I like to think that when they die, they’ll continue to be in pretty close proximity too…

Priorities

Would I sound like a bitter, sarcastic Socialist if I noted how proud I was to live in a country where it’s a higher priority to make sure that the institution of marriage is protected from abuse by homosexuals (or to ensure the right of large corporations to sue individuals for libel) than to guarantee its citizens universal health care?

Yeah, I guess I would…

Trent’s Words

Maybe Trent Lott (who’d always be good for a laugh if he weren’t so powerful) should choose his words more carefully. Quoted in an AP article today he states that the “American people, and the people of Vermont for that matter, did not vote to put the Democrats in control of the Senate.”

Interesting. Brings to mind the somehwat commonly-held opinion that the people of America may not necessarily have voted to put a Republican in the White House either…

Funny how these things work out…