A Freaky Halloween...

...but not like you are thinking. I mean we were freaked out and scared for our lives - not like scared - BOO! I got you. But Literally scared that we were going to get crushed to death by a crowded of surging and fighting people.

Michele, Christina, Carolyn, Andy, Cassie, Martin and I all headed down to the traditional Halloween Parade in the Village. We thought we found a Sweet spot to watch it on the corner of 19th. All along 6th Avenue there were barricades blocking the crowd from the street and the parade and on the corner that we ended up on there was also scaffolding set up. Carolyn and I got in between the barricades and the scaffolding and we had a great view. The rest stood right behind us on the other side of the scaffolding.

At the beginning of the parade the police were doing a decent job of crowd control (because trust me there were soooo many people there - i heard a report of over 1 million people there) and we got to see some pretty cool stuff in the parade - some of the stuff was just amazing.

Of course little Willis went with Carolyn and I to the parade and he was dressed up as a Ghost.

After awhile of viewing really cool stuff, the crowd started to get restless and the police on our corner had no control of the situation whatsoever. They decided to let a bunch of people cross 6th Ave (the parade street) - so these hoards of people were crossing thru the middle of the parade. Then the police decided to stop the people from crossing so the people were just standing there totally blocking our view from behind the barricades. At this point the crowd behind us started to get even worse. The whole time we could hear some guy cursing and yelling about people pushing but Carolyn and I being in the front we had no clue what was going on. The two of us were kind of seperated from the rest by the scaffolding. Andy told us later that the guy was back there the whole time just throwing punches and eventually someone retaliated....

Befor the retaliation - Carolyn felt things were getting out of hand and she called over a police officer - he just shrugged his shoulders at her and said there is nothing I can do. Seriously, not even a minute later a massive fight/mini-riot on our corner broke out. Carolyn ws already over the barricade and I followed quickly. We were semi-safe from the madness. I was just standing there looking at Christina and Michele squished against the scaffolding with panic on their faces and tears in their eyes. Andy was trying to block them and protect them as much as possible and he was right in the thick of it. I stood there yelling at them go under the scaffolding!!! And finally they were able to move and they got out....

My heart is racing right now thinking about it and typing about it. We were all scared shitless.

The situation just got out of control really quick and the police had no control over it. Poor Andy got accused by a police officer of being part of the problem and all he was doing was trying to shelter Michele and Christina.

Andy and Carolyn took off and Michele and Christina and I headed north on 6th Ave trying to get a glimpse of more of the parade, on our way we got stuck in the middle of 2 fights with some ghetto ass guys...So we bounced, made our way over to 7th Ave (which was just as crazy) and headed home and made it home safe. But All of us were shoken up, freaked and scared....

talk about a a scary and freaky Halloween.

(it really is too bad - because the stuff in the parade was really awesome - maybe next year we can figure out a better way to watch it...)

oh - i forgot, on the bus ride home i was a block away from my stop and BAM an egg hit the windshield - the bus driver swerved and slammed on the breaks. i think it scared the shit out of him. scared the shit out of me....