traffic jams
wednesday, june 5, 2002


as usual, i was running late this morning, but i certainly wasn't running 30 minutes late. yet, that is about how late i was to my first class. before linnorm and i even hit the cross roads in front of the campus we ran into the worst traffic congestion. at first i thought perhaps all the students who don't usually make it to class were finally showing up since finals are next week (you'd be amazed how classes enlarge on test dates. people you've never seen before suddenly show up in significant numbers - doubling the size of some classes). but when we get to the light, the police have the road into the campus blocked off and are diverting traffic. no sign of any kind of accident, just empty road to the next light.

huh?

so, we began the quest to get to the campus. we knew continuing to follow the rest of the cars would be a bad idea, so we turned off a street earlier. . . and hit another traffic jam. twenty minutes of wondering around (and hitting traffic jams, closed roads, and dead ends) later, we finally pulled over and i called one of the offices on campus to find out what the heck was going on. they didn't know, but apparently while we wandered looking for a way through, they reopened the campus entrance.

so i get to campus over 30 minutes late.

and found out the prof had only just managed to get into class maybe 5 minutes before i did.

it turns out there was a bomb threat.

a bomb threat on our campus? this makes no sense. this really makes no sense, unless someone got fed up with the campus' lack of concern over whether the various degree programs actually meet student needs. someone suggested maybe a student didn't want to take finals, although this is the week before finals, so i'm not too sure about that.

you have to understand, there is absolutely NOTHING worth blowing up around here. the only military base has been closed for about 10 years, (they were supposed to turn it into something else, but i think the city/government/whoever is still arguing over that because nothing's been done at all. course, that has nothing to do with anything, really...) this city seriously could disappear off the face of the earth and no one would miss it...well, except the route 66 people. we get inundated every summer for that.

anyway, false alarm. i'm not blown up. the school isn't blown up. as far as i know, nobody even claimed responsibility.

somebody probably saw a package on the ground somewhere and panicked.