England and USA disagree

October 17, 2002 10:15 PM

England and USA disagree on the death penalty. Jordan is back in the NBA. The New Yorker interviews Radiohead. Men like action babes. A foster girl dies alone. Bob Dylan doesn't dig newfangled music. A bunch of folks of questionable coolness try to cash in on Marvin Gaye. Find this historical distribution of your surname. Rabbits still don't make sense. The date? September 10, 2001, possibly the most forgotten day in American history.
posted by oissubke (37 comments total)

The links I posted above are a cross section of MeFi from that not-so-fateful day. What else can you find out about September 10th? Do you remember anything about that day?
posted by oissubke at 10:19 PM on October 17, 2002

That post is brilliant. I don't remember what happened Sept. 10 in 2001 or 2002. Thank you oissubke. Thank G_d for Bob Dylan.
posted by insomnyuk at 10:23 PM on October 17, 2002

Talk about eerie - Tom Friedman's NYT column on the morning of 9/11/01 reporting from Jerusalem. His closing line: "There are so many walls going up around here you can't tell anymore: Who is jailing whom?"

In his collection of essays and columns published this past summer, he talks of visiting the PATH station underneath the WTC at some point during the cleanup process, and seeing a newspaper inside a damaged train car open to his column.
posted by PrinceValium at 10:23 PM on October 17, 2002

I went to a coffee shop in downtown Tulsa that night and wrote in a journal some random stream of consciousness stuff about my parents hiring a cleaning lady to come twice a month. On the way home from that coffee shop, I was listening to the BBC world news on NPR and heard about the confirmation of the leader of a major Afghani anti-Taliban group being assassinated and how that would hurt the opposition forces there b/c he was a major uniting factor. Then I watched a re-run of the premiere of Blind Melon's "Behind the Music". My mom woke me up about 7 hours later with "You may want to turn on your TV. Something interesting is happening". This was between the time that tower 2 and tower 1 were hit. I turned on CNN about two minutes before seeing the Second tower hit live. Very eerie. I think I'll always remember what I did the night before.
posted by Ufez Jones at 10:26 PM on October 17, 2002

The MeFi link I remember from that day was about ceiling fan baseball, a) because I thought it was an odd idea, and b) because it apparently introduced the emoticon to our hallowed halls. Or walls. Or bridges. Or whatever we have here. That surely has never been forgotten. //>>:

(my first attempt at an emoticon)
((not too successful, apparently))
posted by LeLiLo at 10:28 PM on October 17, 2002

I was at my parents' in Memphis with my wife of (at the time) one week, having just driven back from our gulf coast honeymoon. We were frantically sorting through wedding presents, considering how likely we were to use them in our smallish apartment in Pittsburgh before we could get back down south with a car, and precisely how much we could cram into our bags for our early Tuesday morning flight.

Thanks for the post. You're right, the rabbit bit is still odd.
posted by Vetinari at 10:32 PM on October 17, 2002

I remember that link to Jordon's re-entry (chuckle) into the NBA being up for hours, and then poof, all the Sep 11 stuff edged it out on the Yahoo front page.
posted by trioperative at 10:33 PM on October 17, 2002

I believe I was checking the internet for reviews of Love and Theft on the 10th, and working in a deli in Richland, Washington. And I began reading Moore's Utopia, I distinctly remember, because I got up early to finish it on the 11th and was reading about the perfect society all through that morning, and didn't learn about it until I logged on to Metafilter. This is a good thing to think about, oissubke, though I didn't think it was at first.
posted by Hildago at 11:10 PM on October 17, 2002

On the last innocent day of my life, I made the last innocent post to chowhound.com's Los Angeles message board, approving of the Korean cuisine served at the restaurant Kobawoo.
posted by apollo3000 at 11:38 PM on October 17, 2002

Three Johns met on the Daily Show. John Flansburgh, John Linnell and Jon Stewart.
posted by eyeballkid at 1:31 AM on October 18, 2002

hm. I think I was reading algebra or something.

anyway, the site full of rabbits earns my respect. Wierd japanese home photography rules. Who can deny the power?
posted by kaibutsu at 2:55 AM on October 18, 2002

That was the night of the first Metafilter Chicago meet. We got a little drunk, I got home, stayed up a little late surfing and posting, then slept in. Until my phone rang.
posted by dhartung at 3:00 AM on October 18, 2002

The Television Archive has online streams of TV coverage from September 10 to September 17.

I can't for the life of me remember what I did on September 10.
posted by waterfrog at 3:54 AM on October 18, 2002

i remember looking curiously at the adverts for salman rushdies new book, fury.
posted by sgt.serenity at 3:59 AM on October 18, 2002

On the last innocent day of my life
god. you know, i keep forgetting that there are people around who didn't watch the daily body counts from vietnam on the evening news every day. i feel so old, and well, far from innocence... and now this post has actually brought tears to my eyes. thanks for the shot of reality, oissubke. good work.
posted by quonsar at 4:24 AM on October 18, 2002

thanks for the shot of reality, oissubke. good work.
and that should have read 'thanks for the excellent link concept, oissubke, and thanks for the shot of reality apollo3000.'
posted by quonsar at 4:27 AM on October 18, 2002

heres the book cover , released just before sept 11.
posted by sgt.serenity at 4:29 AM on October 18, 2002

On the night of Sept. 10, I was phoning people, trying to find out if anyone wanted to go out drinking the next night, which is my birthday. On Sept. 10 it seemed like a great idea. On Sept. 11 we didn't feel like it anymore.
posted by Fabulon7 at 5:19 AM on October 18, 2002

My wife made this post to a blog we use to communicate to our very far-flung family: "According to Daddy, Gigi made her first sentence. He was showing her his baseball cap, putting it on his head, on her head, saying "Dada Hat". Gigi repeated "Hat Dad"... I'll let the jury decide..."
posted by ?! at 5:23 AM on October 18, 2002

This is cool. I remember Sept. 10, 2001 because it was my birthday. The next evening, it finally hit me that this huge event had happened the day after my birthday. The two days seemed years apart.
posted by puffin at 5:33 AM on October 18, 2002

Not to completely derail the thread, but I cant believe that no one posted the link below the Bob Dylan Story about Simpsons cereal. Whats worse is that there are no damn Krusty O's. Apparently, nothing is sacred after all.
posted by CoolHandPuke at 5:48 AM on October 18, 2002

I was extremely hungover and sad because the day before was the last archery event of the season.
posted by goddam at 5:58 AM on October 18, 2002

I was in Dubrovnik, Croatia, watching a local band perform in front of the cathedral, hearing them invite members of the audience on stage during the interval and taking the chance to sing one of my favourite Croatian songs in front of nigh-on 300 rather bemused Dubrovcani.

Dubrovnik felt like such a haven the next day, even remembering what the people had been through there practically a decade before. I know I was awful glad to be in a quiet Adriatic port and not London town.
posted by CatherineB at 6:14 AM on October 18, 2002

I spent the day at the bedside of a dying woman I loved and admired very much. She was 84 years old and had Alzheimers. There were a couple of fleeting moments when it seemed like she knew her family was there. I hope she did.
posted by Tarrama at 6:36 AM on October 18, 2002

On Spetember 10, I remember repeatedly checking on the status of an Order with Amzon.com. I was waiting for a collection of George Orwell essays and a Collection of poems from Billy Collins. The next day was my birthday, and when I returned from work the next day and saw the package, I just cried. Odd, of the two writers that I received that day, while I enjoy both, I only think one is still very relevant (but that is another post).
posted by Verdant at 6:42 AM on October 18, 2002

My friends from Toronto arrived with their little baby on Monday evening. It was little Rachel's first overnight trip away from home or the hospital (she was 2 months old). They were here because the father worked as a private investigator and had to work on a case in the local area. The mother and baby decided to accompany him and stay over as well.

I remember thinking that for the 4 days/3nights they were staying with us, we could play board games and rent some movies. When Tuesday morning rolled around, that hope disappeared in a flash...
posted by grum@work at 7:19 AM on October 18, 2002

Sept. 10, 2001 does seem like an eternity ago. I flew to Atlanta (from Boston) that day for a tradeshow, watched the Denver Broncos Monday night game (Ed Mcaffrey's broken ugly broken leg). I was looking forward to going to an Atlanta Braves home game on Tuesday and thinking it would nice to see a team in the pennant race, rather then my beloved Red Sox tanking it again. Somehow, none of that mattered as of 9am the next morning.
posted by MediaMan at 7:21 AM on October 18, 2002

I went to see Built to Spill by myself and was oddly disappointed by it. Then stopped by Second City Detroit about 1 am where folks were rehearsing for a writing class show I was working on that was supposed to premiere the following night. Got home very late, very tired. Didn't make the next day any easier.
posted by ice_cream_motor at 7:28 AM on October 18, 2002

It seems like the entire summer pre-9/11 was fairly light as far as news went. I remember Fox News running Chandra Levy watch day 96, 97, 98 99....etc. Also, the media was making a huge deal about the wave of terror engulfing the nation from shark attacks...even though there weren't more shark attacks going on than normal. Looking back on that after 9/11, you get the sense the media was really stretching for stories.
posted by split atom at 7:40 AM on October 18, 2002

I remember the 10th very clearly, as I was stressing mightily over a project at work, came to the office late on the 11th (hence missing my normal morning surf session) and, with no idea of what was going on for a good 15 minutes or so, churned out a slew of e and voice mails to people at our mid-town Manhattan office, wondering why no one seemed to be around.

For the few minutes I felt like a complete rube, before we busied ourselves trying to find friends who worked at 7 WTC and my sister-in-law in DC, I thought about how odd it was to go from a work project to visions of death and destruction in a matter of seconds...
posted by jalexei at 9:15 AM on October 18, 2002

September 10, 2001 will always be a memorable day for me, even if the events of the following day never happened. (self-links)
posted by briank at 10:26 AM on October 18, 2002

Not exactly September 10th, but I remember driving to work near DC early on the 11th and thinking how beautiful a day it was -- sunny and warm, a perfect late summer/early autumn day.
posted by QuestionableSwami at 11:02 AM on October 18, 2002

What an excellent post.

I spent the evening of the 10th at a bar by the beach drinking with a good, good friend, visiting from Montana. Some excellent laughs, some decent beer, some hideous billiards. The conversation turned to foreign affairs, and his girlfriend said something along the lines of "our foreign policy is going to bite us in the ass someday".

I can't even remember how I felt about it then.
posted by apostasy at 11:26 AM on October 18, 2002

My brother and I were home in the Detroit area for a few days and had to leave that evening. That day we hung out in the backyard, playing with the dog and just soaking up the home atmosphere--sounds silly now, but it really was perfect weather. We were at our childhood home for the last time before we took separate paths for a while, really spending our last few hours together with our mom having a nice, chill time.

Then we were dropped off at Metro Airport and we just hung out and acted goofy. Notably, we breezed through security with nary a notice by staff. After some time just talking and joking and pretty much having a lot of fun in spite of ourselves, we hiked out to his gate, and then my 18 year old little bro was heading to college in Florida. I had my own flight to Oakland, and after getting back to CA and bed, slept. Everything was different when I woke up. The ordinary sort of day the 10th was would be one of the most memorable days I've ever had, strangely.
posted by marzenie99 at 1:09 PM on October 18, 2002

September 10th I went to the cinema and saw 'Moulin Rouge' and 'A Knight's Tale'. That evening I reviewed them in my weblog and wrote "Still a bit sniffy. I think this will be one of those colds which could go on until Christmas..."
posted by feelinglistless at 2:44 PM on October 18, 2002

On Sept 10, 2001, I got an e-mail from a producer asking if I'd finished my screenplay for her yet. The screenplay is still not finished, not because of bin Laden, but because I suck. I was also jazzed that day because Lore Fitzgerald Sjo:berg wrote me about a weblog post I'd made. It took me some time to reply to either letter.
posted by Yogurt at 4:28 PM on October 18, 2002

on september 10, 2001, my then-fiance and i drove from milwaukee to madison to listen to douglas coupland read for his latest book. i remember driving past the petit national ice rink, which had its flag flying at half mast because jane pettit (a local philanthropist) had passed away that morning. flags flying at half mast have always made me cry, no matter the reason.
posted by phooey at 4:38 PM on October 20, 2002