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"Reporting live..."
06/07/2003 Entry
For several hours now I've been waiting to see when I would be let back into my department. I was spending a quiet Saturday in the computer cluster putting together the next edition of E-LIST when suddenly a public safety officer entered the building and told me to log off and get out. (He may have been a police officer. I can only tell apart their cars, not their uniforms.) I started closing all the windows I had been working on. He then yelled at me to hurry up and get out. I thought "hmm.. if this is a real emergency then I don't really need to log off completely, I can just leave".. so I did.
Once outside - in the pouring rain that continues its weeklong streak - I looked around to notice several officers from both the univ and the township. I went to the neighboring building to which I luckily have a key. I asked another officer what was going on, but he wouldn't tell me anything.
A few minutes later I realized that my friend Dirk who had been just a few offices away from me was nowhere to be found. So I grabbed my cell phone and called his office. He answered. I told him he may want to leave the building. I was shocked they hadn't found him. (He wasn't exactly hiding.) Luckily, I did not suggest to him which way to leave the building, in fact, I signalled where I was and he followed. I only know in retrospect that this was preferable, it is no thanks to anyone sharing any information with me.
To add to the excitement, another friend had a flight to catch but all of her stuff was still in the building. After being hung up on and being yelled at, she finally was able to talk to someone long enough to explain the situation. (Somehow, mentioning the building name got pretty harsh reactions out of people.) She is now on her way to the airport so that part worked out fine.
UPDATE
 The TV cameras were here but just as I was about to blog that, they left. A person got arrested and the building's open again.
It sounds like there was a person in a room threatening to do something.
It turns out Dirk and I passed by the room when she was already there in the morning. When we came in earlier via the back entrance I commented on how annoying it was that someone was smoking inside. I smelled smoke, but saw nothing. Dirk said it must've come in from the outside, but I hadn't smelled smoke outside. When I returned to the building I noticed that the whole first floor was smelling of cigarette smoke. It turns out the woman had been smoking in that room for quite a while.
As I suspected, public safety won't tell us any details. So much for a quiet and calm Saturday in Princesstown.
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