Life on the Peninsula goes on while New York and Washington burn.

So many people tried to give blood, nurses had to turn them away. Some donors said it made them feelless helpless than just watching the carnage on TV.

The line outside the Blood Center overflows from the cushioned chairs, snakes down the hallway at Monterey''s Community Hospital and out into the parking lot. The Blood Center opened its doors at 8:30am, about two and a half hours after the first hijacked plane crashed into the World Trade Center. Now there''s a three-hour wait. In order to process the blood tonight, the Center needs to call it quits by 7pm, explains Jane Vargas, the hospital''s lab administrative director, as she turns hopeful donors away beginning around 4pm.

"You can schedule an appointment with us, or come back tomorrow morning--we''ll still need blood tomorrow," Vargas says. The Blood Center staffers are scheduling appointments into the week of Sept. 24.

Vargas says she''s given her come-back-later speech to about 30 would-be donors. As she says this, two more people walk up, a woman who shows her military ID card and a man who works nights and can''t make it back tomorrow.

"I hate turning anybody away," Vargas says.

The Blood Center and the traveling Bloodmobile have collected from more than 200 people today. At 4:30pm, several more are waiting in chairs, leaning against the walls and sitting on the floors. Some have family or friends who live in New York and DC, some are Peninsula locals, and some are tourists. All wanted to help out in the most immediate way they could.

Nineteen-year-old Kirstin Hinkel is one of the last ones in. "We''ve been watching the news all day, listening to the radio, and stressing out," she says. Then a local report about the need for blood donors came on the air, and it sounded a lot better to Hinkel then sitting at home feeling helpless.

Two days ago, Walter and Judy Miller were at home in College Park, Md., planning their vacation to Monterey. Now they''re standing in line waiting for the needle. The Millers were asleep in their hotel room Tuesday morning when the phone rang. It was their daughter who lives in Washington.

"She told us to turn on the TV," Walter says. They did, and they watched as every channel aired the videotape of hijacked planes crashing into the World Trade Center and fire billowing from the Pentagon, close to their hometown.

"We thought, what can we do?" Judy Miller says. They headed to the hospital. "You have this sense of helplessness and at least this helps."

Nineteen-year-old Sabina Charfauros, a UC Davis student from Marina, says she doesn''t have any friends or family in New York or Washington. "But we care about them just the same," she says, talking for her two friends who joined her at the Blood Center. Adds Heather Bowers, 19, a student at Monterey Peninsula College, "We''re so far away, it''s the least we could do."

The two went to Oldemeyer Center in Seaside, which was too full, and then hoofed it to Monterey. They arrived at 3pm. They called friends, encouraging them to come until the doors closed at 4:30. Two hours later, they are nearing the room filled with nurses, IVs and reclining chairs.

It was an unusual day for the police departments on the Peninsula, too. There wasn''t much traffic for a Tuesday--maybe 30 percent fewer cars were on the roads, according to unofficial estimates.

"Everyone is at home watching TV," says Monterey Police Department public information officer Randy Taylor.

"We''ve had a few more calls, a few inquiries about ''are the schools open,'' basic inquiries like that," says Captain Carl Miller of the Pacific Grove PD. For the most part, however, the public was relying on news coverage to tell them what they needed to know.

Along with police departments across the US, however, Peninsula police were at a stage of heightened security, meaning more cops are on the streets, in the communities and around the schools. At 9:30 Tuesday morning, the county activated its Emergency Operating Center, opening up communication and services between the various local police and fire departments.

"I think we do enjoy a better standard of safety just because of our location and our size, but we''re still a focal point," Miller says. "Everybody knows where the Monterey Peninsula is, we''re not a huge, urban area but we''re still a cosmopolitan area. People do feel secure here, but they should be cautious as well."

They say the community mood--and that of the police departments themselves--is somber, as citizens move between shock and numbness to fear and anger.

"Police officers are people, too," says Barry Pasquarosa, Seaside''s community liaison officer, between bites of a granola bar. It''s all he''s had time to eat today. "We share the same regrets about this loss of life, especially realizing that our fellow police officers and firefighters have perished. Even my mother, as I was going to work today, she looked at me and said ''Please be careful.'' And you could see it in her eyes."

When asked what the attack will mean for democratic civil liberties--airports free of Uzi-armed guards and the like--most local cops agreed that increased security in public buildings and public transportation is likely. But they aren''t happy about it.

"The general consensus around here is that if that happens, the terrorists win," Taylor says. "If we were allowed to predict the outcome, we would say no, there won''t be a detraction of civil liberties. That is not where we want to go."

In classrooms across the county, teachers fielded questions about the attacks, encouraged students to talk about their feelings, and debated the merits of an all-out war against terrorism. Some classrooms held a moment of silence and some said prayers.

At Seaside High School, students'' response ranged from shock and sadness to blood lust. Most said they feel safe, but they worried that Monterey''s military bases and schools make it a potential target.

By the end of sixth period, everyone had seen the news footage of the fiery explosions. Most had also seen the pictures of rogue states celebrating the attack on the U.S., which they found incomprehensible.

The kids for the most part said the U.S. shouldn''t go to war, but that they think whoever hijacked the jetliners should be shot, or tied to a crashing plane, or thrown into a burning, collapsing building.

"I was shocked that is was happening," says 16-year-old Curt Montgomery, sitting at an orange metal table in the cement courtyard. He says he''s been watching the days events played out on television in class. "Stuff like that doesn''t happen in the United States," he says. "They should have been on alert."

"Yeah, but we brought it on ourselves," replies senior Kurt Gonzalez, 17. "We''ve got a lot of stuff going on in other countries."

"I think it''s going to restrict things," says 15-year-old Jose Esquivel. "People aren''t going to be able to go places. Like, we like to go up in the mountains, and I don''t want to be searched by a ranger when we want to go there."

Roxan Gonzalez, 16, has a different opinion on what the attack means to U.S. security.

"It''s going to start World War III," she says, matter-of-factly. "I don''t think they should fight a war right now. But I think they will."

Sitting near a cement planter in the courtyard, a group of chatty teenage girls discussed the attacks. They''d been discussing it all day in class with teachers and at lunch with friends.

Sophomore Sonja Powell, a tiny 14-year-old cheerleader, believes the country is about to go to war. "It''s a tragedy and the Palestinians are celebrating and they are eating candy, all that candy."

"I think we should find out who is responsible and get back at them," says 15-year-old Louisa Garcia. "I think it''s very cruel, but I think we should do the same thing to them that they have done to us."

Tiffany Tyson, a 13-year-old freshman cheerleader wanders away from cheerleading practice and likens the attack to Independence Day, a comparison I hear often almost as often as movie recommendations for Pearl Harbor.

"But when you see all the people running for their lives, and it''s not a movie."

Seventeen-year-old Adam Harris says everyone at school is "pretty well informed" about the attacks. "Everybody''s wondering what''s going to happen next, and what we''re going to do about it. A lot of people said we should retaliate, but first we''ve got to figure out who did it. Then, the next step, I think we should go and do what they did to us."

He doesn''t want to see innocent civilians killed, but "if it happens, it happens."

Again the topic of anti-U.S. sentiment comes up.

"I have heard that other countries were celebrating," he says. "We do so much to help other countries and they are celebrating?

"When fights happen at school, it''s usually one against one, and then one against two, and then maybe two against three. If a fight happens, who''s going to help us? If war happens what is it going to be called--World War III?"