I have noticed that the area south of Canal street on the west side of Manhattan, the area closed off after the attacks, is filled with people in uniforms late at night. It's more or less normal during the day, cars were allowed back in this week and the ID checks have gone from constant to rare, but at night it's uniform city. Many of them seem to have only distant relation to protecting the area, for example state troopers from outside New York. They even have special clubs for them (places to drink, not things to hit people with).I don't know what it means. I assume they are here because they want to be, perhaps it's fun to hang out in a place where people really like you for once. Or maybe it's sort of a professional obligation to see it first hand.In the days after the attack, the area was only populated with local residents, officials and foreign journalists (there must have been US journalists, but I didn't see any). Plus a few disaster seekers doing various kinds of good as they see it (prayer, song, complicated political theories).It feels like some sort of biological progression, but I'm not sure from what to what.

Aaron, This is not really an answer to your observation but a related personal comment …as I had already said in some other threads I was working in One Liberty Plaza (next block to WTC) when this all happened … we were only on the second floor so we couldn’t see anything, we only heard and felt a loud explosion … after the first explosion we all ran down and stayed in the Lobby still not knowing what was going on … after the second explosion everybody ran away in a panic and so did I … I still didn’t know what was happening and I didn’t want to know what was happening … and unlike every single one of my colleagues I later talked to, I didn’t turn back even once to catch a glimpse of the towers … I just ran and walked all the way home uptown … it took me an hour and a half … once there, I didn’t even want to watch television … I guess somehow I wanted to pretend all that wasn’t real …since then I have not been back to ‘ground-zero’ once … actually the closest I ever got was Soho …we are now working in a ‘recovery site’ in Queens, but we’re scheduled to go back to One Liberty Plaza by end of December … none of my co-workers is looking forward to it. … anyhow … I just felt the need to share this with someone …

Some of us still haven't really and fully accepted the reality of what has happened. I still stare in disbelief whenever I see a recent picture of lower manhattan in a newspaper.

Omar, I'm glad to know I'm not the only onesince September 11 I've been shockedtoo shocked to even be scared

<<New York - chemical smell>>I have relatives [cousins] who just returned from a weekend trip there and they too noticed the strange smell as well as the astounding amount of dust. They are medical professionals, and although they didn't say, I think they suspected that they knew what the smell was.Still horrific.

I think they suspected that they knew what the smell was >>that’s one of the things that is worrying me, even forgetting about asbestos, there will be so many disease possibilities there …

I know how you feel. I feel like a complete **hole for complaining because we got 100% of our people evacuated safely, but when you smell the smoke (in midtown!) it brings back the same feelings of desperation and utter uselessness

I think they suspected that they knew what the smell was -- that's one of the things that is worrying me, even forgetting about asbestos, there will be so many disease possibilities there? >>I presume the smell is due to measures taken to make sure there will be no disease possibilities. I also just heard that the fires are still burning. It's all so horrible to the point of being surreal. I also heard that many businesses (I guess including financial) are considering moving out of Lower Manhattan permanently. People feel too insecure to go back again. That would be too sad if true.