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What were you doing on iconic days in recent history?
Danny_Girl
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It's said that everyone remembers what they were doing on certain days that go down in history. Is that true and what were you doing when the stories hit the media?
Margaret Thatcher resigning - remember it clearly, was at work and everyone stopped what they were doing, nobody could believe she had resigned.
Princess Diana's death - feeding my 2 week old baby in the mddle of the night, switched on the tele and could not believe what had happened. Woke my husband and we spent the rest of the night (and next few days) watching be story unfold. Possibly hormones or the realisation of how awful it would be to leave your children behind when they still needed you but spent the larger part of the next week or two in tears.
Sept 11th. Looking after my 4 year old and his friend of he same age. Had just settled them in front of the tv watching Bob The Builder when my husband phoned to get me to switch over to the news as Internet at work was hanging with everyone trying to access news sites. Didn't realise the importance at first and was mightily pissed off at him. He finally persuaded me to switch over just as the second plane hit. If I live to be 100 I will never forget that sight.
Anyone can remember what they we're doing or felt on these days or other important days?
Margaret Thatcher resigning - remember it clearly, was at work and everyone stopped what they were doing, nobody could believe she had resigned.
Princess Diana's death - feeding my 2 week old baby in the mddle of the night, switched on the tele and could not believe what had happened. Woke my husband and we spent the rest of the night (and next few days) watching be story unfold. Possibly hormones or the realisation of how awful it would be to leave your children behind when they still needed you but spent the larger part of the next week or two in tears.
Sept 11th. Looking after my 4 year old and his friend of he same age. Had just settled them in front of the tv watching Bob The Builder when my husband phoned to get me to switch over to the news as Internet at work was hanging with everyone trying to access news sites. Didn't realise the importance at first and was mightily pissed off at him. He finally persuaded me to switch over just as the second plane hit. If I live to be 100 I will never forget that sight.
Anyone can remember what they we're doing or felt on these days or other important days?
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September 11th 2001 - was watching it on the telly in the morning and saw the second plane hit 'live' so to speak at 9.16am after the first one half an hour earlier at 8.46am - which I didn't see after switching the TV on in between the two times.
Twin Towers: Came home from uni to see the footage just after second plane had hit.
Unusually for me, nursing a hangover, the phone rang sometime mid afternoon. My old school proper Londoner step-dad (a glass cutter for 35 years in the Costa Del Peckham)..phoned me and started talking utter 'nonsense.'
Given the fact he's also a bit of a loon, I initially dismissed it as one of his more elaborate 'timeouts'..and was idly wondering where he was going with this one.
Sadly, I switched on my Virgin box, and then all tired thoughts of comedic value evaporated.
Back then, I still had a VCR hooked up to my system, and stuck in a VHS 4 hr cassette on LP from the start.
Not sure why I did that, as my hangover was very real. I think a part of me knew that this was something I needed to remember...or some such befuddled thought process.
Anyways. 8 hours approx of BBC News live I taped...as it all happened, and actually beginning before the towers collapsed.
I still have the cassette - and the old VCR player - gathering dust someplace.
It's one of those experiences I'll never forget..and none of it for good reasons.
So destroy the tape I haven't watched in years..??
No. That tape is important to me. I just don't want to watch it, and it'll be here when I die. Can't explain the logic, mostly because I don't have any to offer..but regardless - always been my position on it.
9/11 - after work I went down to Brighton to see Rockbitch live. Missed the train back home so sat in an all night cafe of the seafront witching the news.
Diana's death put Sky new on when I got up
9/11 got in from work made a sandwich put sky news on just before the second plane hit I screamed hubby came down from his office and we sat together watching it all unfold
One thing I always wondered is that when I was queuing up to use a phone I was talking to a chap who was on the way to Vancouver for his sisters wedding. She was grounded back in the UK and the rest of the family was over in Canada.
Diana's death - I woke up and put the TV on, and ITV had a news special on. Then I woke my mum up and we just sat in my bedroom in silence watching it.
9/11 - I was at school. It was the end of the school day, and as it had only just happened, so they hadn't said anything to us at school. My parents were on a work trip to Las Vegas, so my brother and I were staying with my godmother and her husband. He picked us up, and I remember his very random way of telling us was, "Don't worry, you've not done anything wrong, but there's something I need to tell you. The Twin Towers have collapsed." We then went to their house, and their son-in-law was there with their daughter. At the time, he worked for Cantor Fitzgerald, who were on the 101st–105th floors of One WTC, so he had no clue if anyone he knew or regularly spoke to on the phone had died or made it out.
9/11 - watched the entire thing unfold, live and uncensored (the falling bodies, filmed from some distance I think) I must have been on a relevant channel. Was at home with my baby.
Diana's death - unusual for a Sunday morning (I think it was?) to hear my elderly neighbour's voice in the street below, talking to another neighbour in front of my house. When I listened I thought I heard her say summat about Lady Di dying in a car crash. Couldn't really believe what I was hearing so turned on TV.
London bombings - again, was at home watching news and my best friend was working in the Houses of Parliament at the time so I spent the afternoon frantically trying to text her but the texts weren't getting through so we had an anxious several hours before we knew she was OK - think concerned friends and relatives jammed the texting or something.
I also saw the space shuttle Challenger disaster live on TV. Must have not been at work or something, at the time. They had the cameras trained on the families, and I'll never forget some of them seemed to burst into spontaneous applause when the explosion happened, as if at a firework display. Presumably not registering what they were seeing which was hard to make sense of. Have never seen that again.
9/11. I was at uni and we were drinking in the student union. They put it on the TVs and left it on. We ended up having to ask the barman to change the channel to put the Liverpool Vs Boavista Champions League game on. It was a 1-1 draw. Went home quite drunk and our mad housemate was borderline hysterical and ranting about it being the start of world war three and the end of the world.
September 11th was more embarrassing. I had a day off and was sat in my underpants playing Civ II at 1pm. I'd just declared war on America and had sent my planes over to bomb New York and Washington. About an hour later I went to make myself a cup of coffee (still in my underpants) and turned the TV on :eek:
Princess Diana - I walked downstairs and was told and went "oh well" and went back to bed I had been out the night before and I really couldn't care less, I still can't, yes it was sad but she should have worn a seat belt and not got into a car with a drunk driver.
9/11 - I had just finished the the lunch-time shift in the pub I was working in had just walked through the door and a friend called to tell me to turn the TV on, I did and saw the 2nd tower being struck live on the TV, the Newsreaders husband was actually out in New York and I give her credit for carrying on so professionally.
7/7 - I was baking a friends birthday cake and had the breakfast news on and they said there had been an explosion on the tube caused by a power fault or something along those lines. It wasn't until the rest of the trains and the bus went that they actually said that something was terribly wrong. It was very surreal going to London that weekend (a lovely warm summers weekend), a lot quieter than it normally was.
The Challenger shuttle I was at home, we had been doing a project on the Challenger expedition at school, so we were all keen to watch it. Then in 2003 I was in a pub on Waterloo station (we had gone in to use the toilet) when the Space Shuttle Columbia exploded, everyone was just staring at the tv screens.
7/7 I was in in year 9 and in ICT. The ICT teacher had a phone call from his daughter saying bombs had gone off in the Tube. That day some of the school was in London. Everyone at the school was petrified. We all got onto the the news websites and we didn't actually do anymore work in IT after hearing the news. Just kept on refreshing the news sites and many of us had family or friends in London. My uncle worked around the corner where the bus exploded. Another awful day I will never forget.
Diana, just like the OP I got up in the night to feed my 9 day old baby, saw the headlines about the crash but didn't hear about her dying until I got up about 8 a.m.
9/11 I got back from taking my son to nursery abs flicking through the channels saw a plane had crashed into WTC. I was glued to the tv after that... watched as the 2nd plane flew into the other Tower.. Had to go back out to get my son from nursery, by the time I got back after doing some errands one Tower had fallen. Such a horrible sad day that was. I still get emotional when I think of it now.
On 7/7 I was at home with my Mum. That's all I really remember.
Diana's death - the in-laws were visiting, and we came downstairs to find the news on. Strange day - everywhere was quiet. Never bought into all the public wailing and gnashing of teeth
Dunblane - at work. Spent a while trying to get hold of a friend who lives there to make sure they were OK
9/11 - at work, but followed it on the internet. No one got anything done. Still get very annoyed by the fringe loonies out there
7/7 - pretty much the same
When Diana died I had no idea. We got up, had a cup of tea and went to Halfords. The shop was empty and they were playing really doom and gloom music. We even commented that it was music to slit your wrists to. We drove home, I then put the TV on realised what had happened - but I was hours behind everyone else.
Dunblane - I went home to my Mums for lunch that day as I worked locally and it was on the news. My appetite disappeared and I spent 40 mins watching the news with my Mum in shock.
9/11 - was watching tv when my brother phoned from his work to find out what was going on in New York, watched it unfold on news channel the rest of the day
7/7 - was on holiday in Gran Canaria could hear the news from the pool bar
Glasgow Airport attack - was going on holiday that day fortunately flying from Manchester, heard about as soon as we landed in Fuerteventura
Dunblane - would have been in 1st year of secondary school, not sure if we were told or not
Your child must be the same age as mine as I was up with him and heard about it more or less as it happened. I was more upset with the fact that Liverpool were due to play at home that day and it was cancelled because of her death - to this day I have no idea why they thought it necessary.
Most of the other things mentioned, i would imagine I was in work.
Think I was getting ready for school at the time.
- President Obama's election - watching it on the news channel on TV at night.
- William and Kate's wedding - it was a day off uni so I was at home doing some final year project work. Was annoyed at the day off because I wanted to see my lecturer about it and if I remember right it was a Friday so I had to wait until the next week.
So I hobbled into Currys next door, and elbowed my way through the crowd standing RIGHT in the doorway watching the big flatscreen display telly facing the doors - JUST as the second airliner flew into the tower.
My lad is 16 will be 17 in August....... I can't see why it was necessary either! Looking back it was a weird time. The radio stations only played sombre music for days.