Backwash
LCH

LCH

Randomness in its true form--not unintelligible, just inconsistent.

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9.29.2001
 
Writing because I feel guilty..great way to go about doing stuff, right? ~rolleyes~ Argh..

Let me see how this turns out..I'll be back. I hope. ~lol~


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9.18.2001
 
so I haven't written in awhile. I think I just got overwhelmed.

For those of you who don't want this to turn into an awful war that will kill even more innocents..Click here.



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9.13.2001
 
So..I heard in a chat room that they can see the smoke from space. I asked how him how he knew that, and he sent me here. Freaky.

And, another blogger was there as well.


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AMERICA TALKS WAR

Say what? No way! Didn't..I mean, it can't be! That's what my very own Charlotte Observer said as the headline on the front page. Talks war? Us? And NATO is standing behind us as well.


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9.12.2001
 
A fellow blogger witnessed the events of yesterday.

And blogger is working, I think.


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I don't think that blogger is working..oh well. I'm posting anyway.

Most air travel is still grounded..just those flights that had to be detoured are being let out. Lockdown freaks me out.


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Even though I'm mad, I'm not going to blame the Muslims that live the United States for the actions of those terrorists. I may be in a minority though. I dearly hope not. Here is a link off of the Daily Oklahoman. They also have a list of victims thus far.


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At my house, we're thinking about laminating our newspaper..or at least the front section. 23 pages on the terrorist attack. Freaky.


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9.11.2001
 
Everything changes now. We are in the middle of a major historical event.


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The President has spoken twice now. Said that the US will hunt down and punish those responsible.


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We've been watching it in class since about 9:45 am. That's 2nd period. I'm still in school. We're still watching it. I can't believe that this is happening. I can't believe it. For once I'm glad that I live in a small town. No worries for where I live. But my heart goes out to those who are involved with this. 50,000 people work in the WTC. Plus many people visit it every day. I can't even begin to imagine how many people are dead because of this horrible attack. I know that at least 266 people are dead. That's from the plane crashes alone. But I don't know about the WTC. I think everyone got out from the Pentagon, but I don't know how many are injured. I posting from my third period. It's nearly 1 pm. I sincerely hope that I will be able to keep watching this next period.

They are saying that this is an act of war.


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Reactions Of States to Attacks
.c The Associated Press


Precautions taken in various U.S. states in the wake of the terrorist attacks:

The Federal Aviation Administration shut down airports nationwide.

CALIFORNIA: State put on high alert. State's Emergency Council convened as Gov. Gray Davis requested heightened security at all state buildings.

COLORADO: City and state officials stepped up security around government buildings. City opened an emergency preparedness office in the basement of City Hall, where representatives of police, fire and health agencies, public transportation officials, Denver International Airport and utilities were gathering.

FLORIDA: Security heightened at federal courts. Walt Disney World evacuated and closed its parks and shopping and entertainment complex.

GEORGIA: All flights at Hartsfield Atlanta International Airport, the nation's busiest, stopped. The CNN Center, world headquarters of Cable News Network, closed to the public, although journalists at CNN and The Associated Press remained.

ILLINOIS: Sears Tower shut down, state government buildings in Chicago and Springfield closed. National Guard on state of heightened alert in Illinois.

KENTUCKY: Southern Governors' Association canceled annual fall meeting so governors of Arkansas, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, Tennessee, Kentucky and West Virginia could head back to their states.

MARYLAND: Officials tightening security throughout the state. Security heightened at Andrews Air Force Base. Baltimore-Washington International Airport taking arrivals not departing flights.

Minnesota: Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport shut down. IDS Center in downtown Minneapolis, the tallest building in the state, evacuated.

NEVADA: Security increased at casinos on the Las Vegas Strip, at federal buildings across the state and Nellis Air Force Base near Las Vegas. Flights suspended.

NEW JERSEY: Airports and river crossings to New York City closed. Traffic reported snarled on the New Jersey Turnpike. PATH commuter trains canceled. At Newark International Airport, officers with shotguns blocked the road leading to Port Authority offices and the air traffic control tower.

NEW YORK: Security clamped down across the state. Security increased at border points. Gov. George Pataki canceled his New York City events. NEW YORK CITY: Elections called off. Airports closed. Trading on Wall Street suspended. United Nations building evacuated. Offices throughout Manhattan closed. Children in Manhattan kept in schools because their parents could not get to them. Subway lines shut down. Cellular phone service crippled. Regular phone service congested. Evacuations from Wall Street to the United Nations. Lower Manhattan closed to all but emergency vehicles. Bridges and tunnels into Manhattan closed. Rockefeller Center property managers urged tenants to go home.

NORTH CAROLINA: Military bases prepared for possible change in status. At Raleigh-Durham International Airport, spokeswoman Mirinda Kossoff said a strategy meeting was planned with the Federal Aviation Administration.

PENNSYLVANIA: Philadelphia International Airport closed. National Park Service officials meeting to determine whether the city's high-profile tourist attractions like the Liberty Bell and Independence Hall would be closed.

SOUTH DAKOTA: Commercial flights from Sioux Falls, Rapid City, Pierre and other South Dakota cities grounded.

TENNESSEE: Department of Energy's nuclear weapons and research complex in Oak Ridge put under heightened security. All flights from Tennessee's major airports grounded. Planes were allowed to land.

TEXAS: Some office buildings evacuated. Flights out of Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport canceled and Austin-Bergstrom International closed. City Hall in El Paso closed.

VERMONT: Federal buildings in Montpelier and Burlington open. State's lone atomic plant placed on heightened security.

VIRGINIA: Navy installations throughout Hampton Roads, home of the world's largest Navy base, placed under an increased security condition called Threatcon Charlie. Threatcon Charlie is implemented when an incident occurs or when intelligence is received that some form of terrorist action is imminent.

WASHINGTON: Airports and military bases throughout the state boosted security. Outgoing flights canceled at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport, but planes allowed to land. Federal Court House in downtown Seattle on high alert.

WEST VIRGINIA: Chemical plant security heightened. Flights out of Charleston's Yeager Airport, West Virginia's largest, suspended.


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9.09.2001
 
I just got word of this last night.

KABUL, Afghanistan -- Afghanistan's ruling Taliban has brought eight foreign aid workers accused of promoting Christianity to court for the first time.
"They just entered into the court building... before their arrival, diplomats and their relatives also reached the court room to witness the proceedings," the reporter said.

He said security surrounding the detainees was tight.

Accompanied by armed guards from the Taliban's ministry for the promotion of virtue and prevention of vice, or religious police, a van holding the two foreign men and six women was driven through the gates and into the compound of the four-storey court building.

The accused were taken from the van, when the six women could be seen covered with shawls in accordance with the Taliban's strict dress code for women, Reuters news agency reported.

The trial began its fourth day on Saturday after a day's break because of the Muslim day of prayer in Taliban-controlled Afghanistan.

Twenty-four staff from German-based Christian relief agency Shelter Now International -- 16 Afghans, four Germans, two Australians and two Americans -- were arrested five weeks ago on charges that could carry the death penalty.

Western diplomats acting for eight aid workers have been frustrated up until now by their lack of contact with the accused and the secrecy that has surrounded the trial.

Afghans warned off foreigners
Families have not had access to their loved ones since last weekend when the workers were moved to another jail.

As well as the eight Westerners, 16 Afghan aid workers working for the same organization -- Shelter Now International, based in Germany -- have also been arrested and charged with the same crime.

The Afghan Foreign Ministry has not indicated when the Afghans might face trial.

Their cases are being dealt with separately from their Western counterparts.

In the past two weeks the Taliban have shut down two other aid organizations accused of preaching Christianity, expelling their foreign workers.

On Friday, the Muslim Sabbath, Taliban Chief Justice Noor Mohammad Saqib warned hundreds of the faithful in Kabul's largest Mosque to beware of foreigners, saying they were using charity to entice Muslims to Christianity.

The detainees have been identified as SNI country director Georg Taubmann, Katrin Jelinek, Margrit Stebner and Silke Durrkopf, who are all German; Australians Peter Bunch and Diana Thomas; plus Americans Dayna Curry and Heather Mercer.


And..from Excite

Accused Preachers Plead Innocent

By KATHY GANNON, Associated Press Writer
KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) - Smiling at her mother, Dayna Curry mouthed the words "I love you" before leaving the Taliban court where she and seven other foreign aid workers pleaded innocent Saturday to charges of preaching Christianity in devoutly Muslim Afghanistan.
Heather Mercer, 24, the only other American on trial, clutched her father's hand throughout the hourlong proceeding in a stark room decorated with verses from the Muslim holy book, the Quran, two swords, a calendar depicting a U.S. missile attack on Afghanistan and a leather strap used for public floggings. Occasionally she fiddled with the giant blue shawl that covered her head.

Saturday marked the aid workers' first appearance in court and in public since their arrest in early August. They face jail and expulsion if convicted.

Chief Justice Noor Mohammed Saqib told the defendants, who also include four Germans and two Australians, that they have the right to a lawyer. The lawyer, Saqib explained, speaking very slowly and deliberately, can be Afghan or foreign, Muslim or non-Muslim.

His comments suggested the trial, in its fifth day, could last at least several more days.

On Saturday, the aid workers were driven to the Taliban Supreme Court in a white van accompanied by a truckload of turbaned Taliban soldiers, armed with Kalashnikov rifles.

Six of the aid workers are women, all of whom were draped in giant shawls in accordance with Islamic custom.

"Please leave me alone," said Curry, 29, when reporters asked whether she was afraid.

The proceedings were held in Saqib's office. Seated on chairs lined up in front of Saqib's wooden desk - piled high with books, files and the white flag of the hard-line Islamic Taliban rulers - the aid workers were first asked to identify themselves by nationality.

First the American women stood. Mercer gave his daughter a gentle nudge to stand. Then the Australians raised their hands, then the Germans did as well.

They filled out forms they didn't understand, written in Persian. They whispered among themselves and finally asked a Taliban translator for assistance. The forms simply identified them by name, father's name, birthplace and education.

For an hour Saqib, speaking through an interpreter, tried to explain the legal process. But in the end it wasn't clear if the defendants understood.

The aid workers complained about their isolation and the lack of information they had received.

"Relatives have come all the way from America and Australia and they have been given barely five minutes to talk to (us)," said George Taubmann, one of the German detainees. "We have seen the diplomats only once."

"A lot of us don't even know why we are in prison," he said. "We have heard we were accused of all these things. It is simply not true. We have not converted anybody. We are shocked about all the accusations. We have not had a chance to defend ourselves."

The aid workers were arrested in early August, and their Christian-based organization, Shelter Now International, was shut down. Sixteen Afghan employees of the group were also arrested, but they are to be tried separately.

The Taliban have issued an edict making jail and expulsion the punishment for a foreigner caught proselytizing. The punishment for an Afghan Muslim who either converts to or preaches another religion is death.

Since Tuesday, Saqib and 14 other Supreme Court judges have been sifting through boxes of evidence of their alleged proselytizing, including Christian literature translated into local languages. The Taliban's religious police say they confiscated the materials from Shelter Now offices in Afghanistan's beleaguered capital, Kabul.

Saqib said the first phase of the legal process involved the examination of the evidence. Next the aid workers decide whether they want a lawyer or if they will choose to defend themselves.

Deliberations to decide innocence or guilt, it seems, will be carried out by a group of eminent judges and Islamic clerics, but the final decision and punishment rests with the Taliban's reclusive leader, Mullah Mohammed Omar.

Western diplomats from the United States, Germany and Australia pleaded with the judge for greater access to their nationals.

"I honestly beg you to give us greater consular access so they can be sure they know their legal rights and can defend themselves," said Helmut Landes, consular officer at the German Embassy in Pakistan.


Whew. If you're a Christian, if you believe in God, please pray for them.




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9.08.2001
 
Don't worry, I didn't die. :) Although, that trip was certainly interesting enough. This one girl got thrown out of the raft in the worst part of the river. The part nicknamed "The Meat Grinder," because of all of the sharp rocks that tear people up a lot. Another girl got thrown off and sucked underneathe the raft. Everyone, except the people in her raft, saw where she went. She was beating on the underside, they just didn't hear her. Luckily, they got her up in time.

I wouldn't ever tell them this, but if I had been in their places, I wouldn't have handled it that well. I would have freaked out or something. They didn't freak out, at least not much. I don't think that I could have done that.

So I haven't posted in a week..because..hmm, your guess is as good as mine.

We won our football game this past Friday. It was the first one of the regular season. We were playing one of the only two teams that beat us last year. We clobbered them, 56 to 13. We even got a story on the front page of the newspaper. It's pretty cool. They didn't mention the band, but they never do anyway. Plus, they didn't have any reason to. It was just the Pep band..(which I happen to be a member of). Everything went fine that night, except obviously some stupid people from their side decided they didn't like how the score looked..so they decided to take it out on the band. Wonderful. Someone, or some group of people started throwing rocks our way from behind the stands. Oh well. No one was hurt, so it doesn't matter, I guess.


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9.02.2001
 
So, I'm going rafting tomorrow. Down the New River..which isn't that bad..

You oughta see the DEATH CLAUSE though.. creepy.. :

I, on behalf of myself, my personal representatives and my heirs hereby voluntarily agree to release, vaive, discharge, hold harmless, defend and indemnify USA Raft, Inc. and its respective owners, agents,officers and employees from any and all claims, actions or losses from bodily injury, property damage, wrongful death, loss of services or otherwise which may arise out of my use of whitewater equipment or my participation in whitewater activities. I specifically understand that I am releasing, discharging and waiving any claims or actions that I may have presently or in the future for the negligent acts or other conduct by the owners, agents, officers or employees of USA Raft, Inc.

I HAVE READ THE ABOVE WAIVER AND RELEASE AND BY SIGNING IT AGREE. IT IS MY INTENTION TO EXEMPT AND RELIEVE USA RAFT, INC. FROM LIABILITY FOR PERSONAL INJURY, PROPERTY DAMAGE OR WRONGUFUL DEATH CAUSED BY NEGLIGENCE OR ANY OTHER CAUSE.


Yes dear readers..I got to sign that.. oy..


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