2:48 PM|swallowing tacks has shut her computer down :( i understand completely.

10:48 AM|first off, thank god that i don't have kids right now... but if i did, i would be sitting them down in front of ABC tv because Peter Jennings is having a sort of forum or town hall...for kids. and it's really interesting... i am scared actually at how well spoken these children are... i mean, an 8 year old able to pronounce usama bin laden (actually they MOST likely know how to spell this jackass' name better than i can)... just really interesting. good to see they are doing this.

1:51 AM|hey there... well... life is starting to drift back out of the foggy haze that settled down upon me on tuesday...

starting to peel myself away from the scenes of wreck and ruin. in fact did so tonight. no CBS,NBC, FOX, ABC or CNN...

i had a date...

with the "grass skirt boy"! and on top of having a date with him, i had the extra added bonus of having a great time! *sigh*

saw my cousin danny and his girlfriend jen... we didn't know if jen's brother had made it out of the WTC, turns out he overslept that day.

thank god for slackers. that's all i have to say about that.

i also wanna give thanks for guys with round irish cheeks that kiss real swell *

12:15 PM|a good idea for a memorial

10:01 AM|my old boss, peter took some photos the other day from the end of our street in jersey city... you can view them by clicking the following links:

1_towers.jpg
1_towers2.jpg
1_towers3.jpg
1_towers4.jpg
1_towers5.jpg
jerseycity1.jpg
jerseycity2.jpg

this is an image that peter took... i am showing you the woolworth building where i used to work at xceed on the 25th floor. a block away. this building used to be the tallest building in the skyline for quite a while, then the empire state building was erected, and numerous others... now it's back to being one of the tallest.



they opened up the newark-bay extension on the turnpike so i can finally go up to my apartment. thinking sunday afternoon... maybe.

yesterday (as i was out trying to find small flags... there are none around) the muffler of the car fell off... actually i should say it was wedged between the car and the street. i was on the side of the road for 30 seconds trying to kick it off... when 4 different cars pulled up to lend a hand. i remember a few years ago being broken down on the side of the road for 2 hours while people drove by and just stared. no police came. nothing... and a simple muffler and hazard lights attracted do-gooders like moths to a flame.

is this act of terrorism a “good thing”? it seems to be bringing people together and causing them to care about others once again. it's heart-warming... yet sad that it has taken something like this to make people pause and think of others.

12:28 PM|an account from The Fine Line

9:10 AM|ok... now i am getting posts to my blog:
from Nicky RE: your post at 11.38 09/12/01 - The Age: Muslim school bus stoned in Qld. The middle eastern people living in the US are not the problem.

• i didn't want to keep my post on my main page. the response is on my guestbook

10:50 PM|today i did my duty and gave my O+ pint(s) -- felt like 756 pints.
(you can click the thumbnail for a full sized pic - sorry for any lengthy download time)

got there at Medical Center of Ocean County at 2:15pm. sat in the line outside til 4:46pm...a local paper took my photo... the people there were great...the volunteers plying us with water and juice, chocolates and sub sammiches... pizza for some, oranges and raisins for others...

filled out my questionnaire... passed. no sex with guatamalan guinea hens that moved to africa and did heroin in 1987.

then at quarter to 5 my mom and i moved to the inside line... a hotter ticket than disney world... then at 6pm, my mom found out she couldn't give blood since she had the operation...so she went home for a couple of hours... yes hours.

they were only taking the O type blood (+ & -) imagine if they had taken it all.

around 6:45 i was getting my blood pressure taken. 132/86 ... 70 pulse. not bad.... another local paper took my photo...

i saw my cousin jimmy there... he was getting mauled to death by this woman

then it was on to the "finger pricking" station... my most dreaded area. usually i faint. i didn't. but there was a query when my blood didn't drop in the vial... so they retested it... *phew* i was good to go... (actually the only jackass that i came into contact with ALL day...he was rejected at that point for having a cold sore...)

and then i was on the makeshift bed....

"wow! you have great veins!"
– {is it me, or does my right arm look like a leg?}

"thanks! i hear that all the time!"

mmmmm aprés bloodletting fooooood....

please god, let them be able to use this blood. please let them find more victims alive.

12:12 PM|

i remember a couple of years ago that i watched a program on how the world trade center was built.

they had to dig a hole for support that was 1/2 the height of that buildings.... understand what i am saying?

reporters are questioning "where most of the rubble and people are..."

i am sadly laying down my chips that they are trapped way in the underbelly of the WTC

11:48 AM|ok... i received this message in response to my roach post:

“Well, I think some will say that the roaches were oppressed and this was their last resort.”

ha. made me smile. needed that.

11:43 AM|yes. everyone else has this posted on their site. i am a lemming today:

"In the City of God there will be a great thunder, two brothers torn apart by chaos, while the fortress endures, the great leader will succumb.", "The third big war will begin when the big city is burning."
– Nostradamus, 1654

correction: it was a fricking hoax

11:38 AM|you don't look around and say "oh, well, so what if those roaches just tore open my loaf of Wonder Bread" you spray them with Raid. You kill them. You make them suffer.

and right now, i love roaches compared to these cowardly suicidal bastards.

(yes i am posting every 5 seconds it seems... i need to. i need to spew things and get it out of my system before i go down to the local dunkin donuts and beat the crap out of the middle eastern people that work there. yes. that's a horrible thought. that's why i am yammering non-stop and typing like a fiend.)

must get ready to go stand in line and donate blood.

11:25 AM|CharityWave.com... donate more than blood.

11:09 AM|let me just say that Hillary's speech kicks ass (bite me if you oppose my thoughts.)
*will put a link to it later if possible*

10:55 AM|no my mom had the damned teevee muted.... **fume**
i am going to go hijack the damned clicker now...

10:54 AM|bush is holding a conference... no sound on ANY channels. jeezuz.

10:07 AM|since i am not at my apartment and can't walk the 4 blocks to the hudson river to view the smoky horror that is seen from jersey city, the most i can do is post images of the headlines of papers that i scrambled around town for at 8am... the NY Times was sold out in 5 stores.

7:53 AM|woke up at 6:30am...(thankful that i can wake up. thankful that i could go to sleep. thankful that there are heroes out there sifting through all of the rubble tirelessly)

watching the news (of course.) watching all the interviews with rescuers... hearing about a man that would have made it if not for the body that fell on top of him, hearing about the rescue team that found a hand thinking it had a body to go along with it...it didn't. and started my day off crying because some volunteer search & rescue guy was being interviewed on the street and then faced the camera dead on and said:

"You will not divide us, you will only unite us more."

this quote was just sent to me by positive press:
“I think laughter may be a form of courage. As humans we sometimes stand tall and look into the sun and laugh, and I think we are never more brave than when we do that.” – Linda Ellerbee

i am not sure how much laughter i can muster today. but i suppose it is best to laugh in the face of this fat-assed bully who did this, stand up, dust ourselves off and say "you think THAT is gonna stop us? we've got the brains and brawn to take you down. you are no more than suicidal cowards that hold grudges."

and move forward. forward.

11:34 PM|an ex-boyfriend of mine from high school is possibly down there. hoping he was a slacker and stayed home today... or missed his train, or was stuck in traffic.

8:52 PM|2 more friends are okay... thank god. 1 unaccounted for.

7:48 PM|ok... i am crying right now because a hundred people in congress just spontaeneously broke out into "God Bless America"

NYC Firefighters... entire Fire Companies are missing. over 200 Firefighters presumed dead. this is sad.

the guy joe who i dated from may til july-ish is in the national guard and am sure he's been called up... but he is also a NYC transit cop. i hope to god he's okay one way or another

images:
http://www.turtlesweb.com/wtc

http://www.jeremyzevin.com/wtc/

words:
theresa.nu's words to calm and now the angry version

pud at fuckedcompany.com wrote an eloquent bit about the events

7:04 PM|well, i gotta tell ya' that i am glad they are sealing off NYC... tunnels could have gotten blown up... sporting events... tens of thousands of people that could be easy targets...

bush is speaking at 9pm EST

it is amazing that i keep seeing the deli i used to get coffee at, the pizza place i used to get really good pizza at, and i keep pointing to them like "hey, Famous Pizza...good pizza" - "Hey! Bits and Bites, good coffee" instead of "holy crap, the windows are all blown out in that joint...

they also have told all middle eastern people who wear traditional dress not to go outside so they don't get the bejeezuz allah kicked out of them

6:57 PM|red cross website... GIVE BLOOD

6:48 PM|you bastards.

5:06 PM|4 friends are ok (email & IM)... 3 unaccounted for...

5:03 PM|i am angry. very very angry. i am easing out of the "shock" and "disbelief" mode and i am fuming. cowardly bastards. my words are streaming and screaming together in my head over this day.

i had woken up at 7:30am... was watching FoxNews' Fox & Friends having a good laugh to start my day off, puppets mocking Sesame Street's Elmo, Teresa Witherspoon playing basketball with Planter's Mister Peanut and then Breaking News and the most surreal images i have ever seen appeared before my eyes.

I was unemployed the day of the WTC bombing back in 93... i was unemployed during the Oklahoma City Bombing... I was unemployed today during this one. Part of me wishes i was still asleep and having a nightmare. Part of me thinks that I am watching a horrible Jerry Bruckheimer film. Part of me wants to go back up to Jersey City and hunt down the relatives of whoever did this. the bmbing in 93 was traced to some sons of bitches who lived in jersey city.

and part of me never wants to live up north again. never want to find a job up north again. i want to just become an ostrich and huddle somewhere with my head tucked in the sand...

but i can't. we can't. that's what these cowards who can't settle differences with words want. try fucking talking. learna civilized language and fucking say "Hey, i really don't agree with you, sir, but perhaps we might be able to work it ou"

DON'T FLY A GAWD-DAMNED 737 into THE WORLD TRADE CENTER.... TWICE....killing innocent people who you think are "satan".

i was watching the teevee, and yes, my eyes have had a crying workout today. i admit it. but just when i thought i was numb for a moment, they showed a clip of debris... and you could see part of some man's cubicle wall with pictures of his family.

i lost it.

bastards. i am not exactly trying to be eloquent in my speech here. my mind is swirling. i should put the keyboard down and walk away before i start to sound like a racist.

2:05 PM|hey... tomorrow i am going to the Medical Center of Ocean County between 2pm-8pm to donate blood. wanted to go today to donate but they are organizing the donation today for tomorrow.

if anyone is in NJ or NY area, donate blood!

Blood Center of NJ

more donor sites

1:14 PM|i feel sick to my stomach over this. i am about to start smoking with my mom. no joke. here's the deal... 1 year ago this saturday, i was laid off by xceed - they were in the woolworth building... you can see it in the imagery now when the buildings are collapsing - has a pointy green roof.

a year ago i would have been in that mess and chaos.

if i wasn't laid off in june i would be stuck / trapped in NYC and on the verge of needing major therapy. i am depressed. people i know were on the 60th floor. no one has made contact with them as of yet. i know others that were in buildings that surround the WTC...

i was watching tv and they showed palestinians (spelling? do they deserve my correct spelling right now? no.) in the streets cheering because of this... bastards.even if you are not responsible for this, you should be killed for celebrating this... i feel sick and revengeful.

9:27 AM|oh jeezuz. i know people that work in the world trade center. please be ok.

12:09 AM|ok... i think something is going horribly awry either with my machine or my blog in general... i can't see it... auuuughhhh!!

well, i went to manasquan and walked the boardwalk for 2.5 miles, with lightning crashing on the right of me and a rainbow arcing on the left... 'twas so neat...

hmmmm... i have a cricket on my imac. what is with the bugs?! mom wanted me to kill it, but i heard a superstition that if you have a cricket in the house it's good luck... and i need luck. of course, the darned thing has been chirping incessantly for 3 hours... doubt sleep will be coming soon.

must not have brought TOO much luck... some but not a lot... grass skirt boy called me at 8:59pm... and the cordless phone went dead - mom *grrrr* leaves the damned thing off the cradle for hours on end... and i was outside with the dogs... she answered the cordless, even though the phone kept ringing... so i had a message from him... called him back 4 minutes later from the NORMAL phone and got his voice mail - dagnabit. stinking phone tag.

oh spoke with the guy from that company the recuiter said she sent my resumé to... funny thing... they haven't been hiring for a year... and they haven't posted anything for designers in a year and a half... and another thing... he has never heard of this recruiter, nor had he received my resumé... he did say he's gonna email me names of decent recuiters... yay!

hopefully my site is working... i haven't seen my blog since noon.

11:25 AM|so i am also starting to write for Grog Me!... this week's topic is celebrity crushes... check it out

10:48 AM|so... friday i spoke to my recruiter - reaching her is a feat in and of itself - she said 3 weeks ago she had sent my resumé to a really cool sounding company in nyc... friday she comes back to me with "oh, sorry, they said you don't have enough experience"

WHAT?

"well, maybe the clients you worked with were too small"

ha. don't make me laugh. i designed for the americanexpress.com site, fox.com, abc (print and online) just to name a few...

so this chick is stumbling over her words... and i am pissed.

now i did something friday afternoon that i would normally never have done.

i emailed the company that she was supposed to have sent my resumé to:

Well, hello there!

A few weeks ago I was told that my resumé was submitted to your company by ******** (not naming names for my blog) Recruiters. This morning I was told that you overlooked me because of my lack of experience as a web designer. The position the resumé was sent for was Senior Designer.

The reason I am writing to you is this: I am not sure how well I was represented to you by my recruiter. If you want experience I have it – 4.5 years designing online (clients include: ABC, American Express, Aveda, Fox Broadcasting all the way to “smaller” companies such as Cravath, Swain & Moore Law Firm, NJ.com and SILive.com to name a few.) and a total of 8.5 years designing offline (print and product design). So, when I heard my recruiter telling me that you “want experience”, I became curious since she said she “knew nothing else”.

Normally I would not go above my recruiter, but this is the first time working with her and I feel she might not be representing me as best she could. I have been an Art Director for the past 2 years at Digitas and before that Methodfive. Prior to that I was a Senior Designer at a studio called Fusion Design, where i designed both on and offline. Before entering into web design I designed handbags and catalogs for Nine West. My background is quite eclectic and I would have hoped that you might have given me a chance to meet for a personal interview.

If a personal interview is out of the question, please tell me more specifically as to the reason(s) I was passed over – I thrive on constructive criticism. Thank you so much. I hope to hear from you soon.

Best,
erin patrice bennett

so that was what i sent on friday... i received this email today:

Give me a call this afternoon or e-mail me personally. I don't recall saying any of these things to any recruiter.

Sincerely,

**********

ps---those people say a lot of things................... ;o)

i really hate that recruiter. i wish there was a nice honest one out there that would find me a job.

10:16 AM|my handbag was created by a company called little earth ... but i bought it on thursday in hoboken at a place called hand mad on washington street (hand mad is spelled correctly, it has one of those long A vowel doo-dads - but i can't find that in key caps :)

the url is http://www.littlearth.com - (one "e") blogger is being a jackass about letting me create a link to it for some reason right now... weird

12:26 AM|so i asked kerry to come with me to this "irish festival" in bradley beach at ascension church (really i am not throwing a bible around and going all religious on your asses today...) after finding this godawful place (ok... so i am going to hell) the thing was supposed to start at 5pm... we got there at 6pm - y'know, to give them time to get their grooves on before we showed up.

the lights were off and there were about 10 octagenarians sitting on the stoop speaking with brogues.

apparently no one informed the church that there was a "festival" tonight... so Ker and I went off in search of the Irish music we had a hankerin' for... went to the Norwood Inn in avon to see Joe Finn who is there on sundays... but apparently NOT this week. in fact NO ONE was at the Norwood. Finn is in Ireland this week... dammit, and i brought my kazoos with me, too. poop.

so we went to Harrigans, ate and watched football with about 40 sixty year old alcoholic men. typical shore fare.

12:46 PM|just made it back from church about 20 minutes ago... good mass... what!? erin goes to church?! yep. i do. roman catholic... i try to get there as often as possible, i am a bit lax about it though, i must admit... anyway today the priest began speaking about starting and finishing a project even if you are fearful that you are not prepared or aren't qualified to do it... he said to "just do it" - see my priest quotes nike ads and marvin gaye... so, i am hunkering down and writing & illustrating this darned children's book if it kills me...

9:44 AM|this site is a neat little thumbnail blog index...

9:14 AM|

at 5:30AM est, Tropical Storm Erin was upgraded to HURRICANE ERIN!!!!

Let me be the first to congratulate her!

**THIS JUST IN***
a message received from Tropical Storm Hurricane Erin:

"Yo, Yo, Yo! First I wanna thank God for making me regain my strength, without him this wouldn't be possible...
I wanna give a big shout out to all the folks that read gigglechick.com, you know who you are! Yeah!! My posse that wouldn't let me break apart and not lemme regains my dream to be a Hur-RI-CANE!!!! YEAAAAA-UHHHHH!!! so's i wanna give a big ups to Little Er, who is sittin' home in Jersey widder Moms... i'll be there soon, girlfriend! Peace out til i get there, Yo!"

(note from erin [gigglechick]: i had no idea Hurricane Erin was from Brooklyn originally!)

1:44 AM|um... the ghost of jim henson (bless his soul * bowing my head in remembrance) might be turning over in his grave right now... maybe... wish i were in toronto {link via squibnocket}

1:04 AM|just when all hope was lost, i received a note from susannah with word that my girl T.S. Erin is STILL ALIVE!!! bwahh hahahahahah!!!! SHE LIVES!!!! come on you crazy tropical storm, turn into a hurricane already!!!!!!

hmmm... to all my proofreader friends out there. *ahem* - a hearty apology to y'all for my crazy ass use of apostrophes and K's (there i go again with the ’s - whoops!!!) yes i was being all cute with the K theme... and the ’s after the K9’s... well... K9s just seemed like people down here at the jersey shore might start to scratch their heads over it. unfortunately the fine folks over at kinkos already printed those bad boys up...

and mary wins the "hey-i-am-looking-too-closely-at-erin's-photos" award *snicker*... yes, my new purse IS sitting atop my toilet. mom was asleep and i needed to use the flash, so i closed the door and flashed next to the flusher...

oh, and i just got back from seeing the flick Rock Star with Marky Mark (no i will not call him Mark Wahlberg - heh heh) I actually liked this movie! go see it!