Day 5 - Mana From Heaven

Today was a great day. We were asked to come into work at 1:30. This frustrated me a bit, because I am so anxious to get to work, but once we got there we really got down to business. Today there was a large group orientation and most of it was them telling us to not screw up. It was intimidating, but totally understandable. What we are doing is very personal and confidential. We are reading letters from people that are for the president.

Therefore, although I will still write a lot on this blog a lot, I will not talk much about my work.

We got done with work and walked outside to find the streets wet... it had rained. It was a miracle. It cooled things down about 10 degrees. It was much needed, earlier today it was flirting with 100 degrees... with the humidity, that is unbearable. On top of that, I am walking around with a shirt and tie and black suit.

It has been a relaxing night, I ate a big dinner of rice and chicken, I went to 7-11 and got a mt. dew, and now I have to take a test online. (I am taking a class online this summer, it is Natural Disasters. The class isn't too bad, it just requires a couple of hours a week.

Yesterday after we got out of work early, I came home and changed then left again. I got back on the metro and went to the Pentagon.

There really isn't to see at the Pentagon, there are no public tours or a visitor center. However, I knew there was a really neat memorial for the 9/11 attacks.

There is no public parking at the Pentagon, so the only way the public can visit the site is through public transportation. Due to that, not very many tourists make it there.

There were only a handful of other people there. It is an awesome site. There is definately a spirit there. You can't help but think of the victims and families affected by the attacks.

The entrance

Names of those who were killed (184)

Ugly self portrait

Entrance to the memorial, date and time of the impact of the plane into the pentagon

This monument is very unique, there were these lines of years...

These are benches. There is a bench for each person lost, their names are inscribed. Water is running underneath and at night the water is illuminated. The benches are alined on the year lines according to when the person's birth year was. 

The people's benches who were in the airplane are sloping toward the pentagon, while those who were in the Pentagon and lost their lives have their benches sloped away from the Pentagon. The benches are angled according to the trajectory of the airplane that impacted.

View of the Pentagon from the memorial. The Pentagon is of course the headquarters of the military. It has five sides, five stories, and five rings. It is HUGE. Apparently it is still one of the largest office buildings in the world. This pic shows where the plane hit the building. There is no evidence of a difference of the building. (That sentence doesn't make sense)

When rebuilding, they pulled a charred granite block from the wreckage. They decided to keep that block as a reminder. You can see it above. Inscribed in the block is "September 11, 2001.

This was an awesome site. There was a similar feeling here as there is at Arlington National Cemetery.

Good News!!! My package came! If you don't remember, I sent myself a package with my bedding, towel, pillow, toiletries, etc. I was using borrowed stuff until it came. So yesterday (Tuesday) it came! It was like mana from heaven. I slept well last night in my own clean sheets and blankets.

(the pic is me kissing the box... if you couldn't tell.)