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While I was shopping at Patrick Henry Mall today, the place was suddenly evacuated. I'd just walked into GameStop, but before I could even make my usual vain inquiry to the clerk about whether they'd gotten any Wii's in today's shipment, a loud announcement came over the sound system. A deep male voice intoned, "ATTENTION! ATTENTION! AN EMERGENCY HAS BEEN REPORTED IN THE MALL! PLEASE PROCEED TO THE NEAREST EXIT!" So that's exactly what my mother and I did, along with most everyone else... though some people ignored the alarm completely. We passed a hair salon on our way out, and there was a chic middle-aged Asian woman having her hair styled; and neither she nor the stylist made any attempt to leave. They just continued as though nothing out of the ordinary was happening.

When we got outside, there was no one to inform us of what was going on-- no security guards, no police, nothing. We sat on a bench outside of Borders for about ten minutes, and when we saw other people going back into the mall, we decided the crisis must be finished. When I asked the clerk at Borders about the alarm, she said it was just a test. You'd think they'd actually bother to tell people when they're conducting a fire drill, and not let them think some actual emergency was in progress... but at least there wasn't anything drastic going on.

In comparison, the guy at Barnes & Noble a couple hours earlier who shouted something into his cell phone about "I'm not going to get my a** above my shoulders... ******** you!" loudly enough for not only myself and my mother (who had her Walkman on, listening to the classical station from Norfolk), but also the people at the two tables beside us, to hear clearly, seemed entirely normal. xp