It is one of the last times that you can witness the twin towers on television.
Gretchen mentions her friends Bob, Carol, Ted, and Alice and recalls what they did for their senior ditch day. Bob and Carol and Ted and Alice was a 1969 movie about wife swapping staring Robert Culp, Natalie Wood, Elliott Gould, and Dyann Cannon as the titular characters, respectively. Interesting that film buff Dawson makes no comment on the coincidental names.