About ten seconds after the house began shaking I was beginning to think, “Man, this is a big one.” And then it really did get big. There are a few disadvantages to living in a frame home where only a garage and small library are on the lower floor; one is that being on the second floor amplifies the shaking during a quake. It was severe enough to knock a few pictures off the walls, and I’m told it lasted about 45 seconds. It seemed a lot longer.
As soon as it quit I went outside to discover that people walking their dogs didn’t even know anything had happened, and were wondering why everyone was running out into the street. We told them, of course. I think the reason it was not felt more outdoors was that, unlike the one a few months ago which was sharp vertical bumps, this one had no vertical component; it was just horizontal shaking.
I finally found Molly, our calico cat, on a top shelf in the closet, looking utterly freaked out.
Magnitude 7.2 is a huge quake, twice the size of the Haiti one, and yet damage has been minimal. Maybe all this “big government regulation,” like building codes, has some value after all. There have been many quakes following the first, some of which would have seemed pretty big before yesterday. I was awakened by one this morning, and another shook us as
I have been writing this.
And it's cloudy with rain today. Remind me why I live here, again?
Update: Monday, 10:05am
Best comment so far, at another blog, "I’m surprised that no patriotic Americans shot the earthquake as it sneaked across the border from Mexico. Where are the Minutemen when you need them?"
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