I’m Awake… I’m Awake!!!



Well, it’s pretty bad when we not only get California weather in DC, but we get the earthquakes too!!!

It was a little 5.9er felt like mostly S-waves, and probably lasted 15 seconds…


We were sitting in class (again, dammit), and about 60 miles from the epicenter when it let go.  My coffee cup started dancing, I picked it up, looked across the table at one of the other folks (TAD here from California) who was doing the same thing, and we both said Earthquake at the same time!


The instructor didn’t know what to do, so we ‘suggested’ evacuating, since the building we were in was build in 1938…


We got outside and everyone was trying to figure out if  ‘something’ big blew up (or got hit), or that was REALLY an earthquake…  I sent a quick text to my daughters to let them know no problems, and then watched as everybody tried to use their cells at the same time (and about 1 in 30 actually got through).


As typically happens, the system was overloaded in about a minute, and everybody was getting more and more frustrated.  About 15 minutes later, we go back to class, only to be booted out at 1500, since the powers that be weren’t ‘sure’ the building was safe, AND as we found out, they kicked EVERYFRIGGINBODY loose at the same time… 


Roads were a @#&* mess, it took me 1 1/2 hours to go 16 miles home… sigh…  


And the phones didn’t really come back up until about a hour after the quake happened…  Initial reports, no serious injuries, no deaths, we were shaken but not stirred.


AND I got @#^% homework now… sigh


Mudbug made this comment over a Troublesome Times and as far as I’m concerned, he wins the Interwebz today!


I always wondered what would happen if all of the Founding Fathers rolled over in their graves at once… interesting.

Comments

I’m Awake… I’m Awake!!! — 25 Comments

  1. I was shaken (Not use to it here) My walls and floors stated shaking my first thought was “Is my kid jumping on that friggin bed again) I was shocked when it wasn’t him causing the house to shake this time.
    Glad your ok~ My nephew works in VA and they had to evacuate too.

  2. This just in:

    EARTHQUAKE STRIKES VIRGINIA: OBAMA SAYS BUSH IS TO BLAME

    Minutes after a 5.8 earthquake struck northern Virginia today, an administration spokesman issued a statement from the President;
    “What we saw today was the direct result of the prior administration’s neglect and mismanagement of environmental and geological issues. The effects of the Bush administration’s eight years in office was so devastating that our two years in office have been inadequate to reverse the trend of geological catastrophes that are directly attributable to the Republicans’ unwillingness to address and remedy pressing environmental issues. We hope every American will join us in our fight to prevent future cataclysms of this nature from destroying our national environmental heritage, and suggest you write your congressperson today to demand they support the administration’s efforts to bring meaningful compromise and reform to our geo-environmental policies.” [From POTUS Blackberry on the fourth hole of the Hampton Greens]

    Congresswoman Maxine Waters also issued a statement commenting that racism was apparent in this latest tragedy because the earthquake struck where [she has been told] “large numbers of black people live in rural Virginia, and just across the Potomac in D.C., just like here in California, where we get earthquakes all the time, and you don’t see any earthquakes in Minnesota or Wisconsin or Montana, do you! It is New Orleans all over again!”

  3. If it were really California weather you’re be at 73-degrees and under a blanket of coastal fog!
    Don’t worry there probably won’t be a bigger one, but just wait until a month later when a fat person going down the cubicle-path sets off an internal alarm!

  4. LL made me laugh beer out my nose!

    I’m usually not bothered by stuff but I’m built against a mountain side. House started shaking, and it got worse and worse and I bailed into the yard. It was only when all the dogs on the block started barking and I heard some neighbors bailing out of their houses that i realized what was going on. Scared the @$!* out of me!

  5. SS- Yep, and by dumping everybody out at the same time, traffic was TRULY gridlocked!!! 🙁

    LL- GOOOOOOD one 🙂

    Paw- Thanks!

    Lila- Yep, WIDE awake 🙂

    DC- After 8 years in CA, and multiple trips to Japan, it takes a pretty big one to get my attention… And it was in the high 60’s this morning!!!

    PH- Nothing wrong with that, it’s NOT a pleasant experience!

  6. Glad you’re okay.

    Newcomers to Anchorage always ask why 30-year-old buildings look ancient; after a winter and a few ‘quakes, they figure it out for themselves. Weather & tectonics are hard on structures.

  7. Glad you’re okay, and glad I’m in in rural VA. I thought it was the big guns going off on base at first, but they never shake the building for *that* long.

  8. According to obama, the epicenter of today’s east coast earthquake was situated at the convergence of Bush’s Fault, Congress’s Fault, Teaparty Fault, and Itsnotmy Fault.

  9. Of course washington is an epic faultline… and now the washington monument is tilting.

  10. DB- But I was ‘enjoying’ my nap! 🙂

    Rev- If they LAST 30 years up there, that is like 210 years in the lower 48 🙂

    Nancy- Some people ‘thought’ that was what it was…

    Tim- Yep 🙁

    Mikael- Yep 🙂 I’m not sure the monument is ‘actually’ tilting or that is somebody’s wishful thinking…

  11. Felt it up here on the North Coast, but since we have our own little “Shake Zone” just up the road from the Nuke Plant, wasn’t too worried because they didn’t sound the sirens, and I do have a “Back Door” I can use if I have to. Reminds me, I need to check the Canadian/Dollar Exchange Rate…

  12. best earthquake headline:

    “Quake rattles east coast, D.C. Government offices shut down early. U.S. experiences a brief economic recovery.”

    BTW – glad you’re okay. I was in CA a couple of decades ago when a ‘small’ quake hit. It definitely gets your attention. Look out for aftershocks tomorrow.

  13. @LL…

    So what your really saying is that according to Obama…

    …this new geological divide causing the earthquake today will now be known as the “Bush’s Fault Line”…

    Dann in Ohio

  14. Text messages can often get through when the cell towers are all jammed with calls during a “disaster”.

  15. That was fun! Let’s do it again.

    I agree that the worst part was the overreaction.

  16. BP- I thought so too 🙂

    Les- DON’T, unless you have a strong Scotch handy… sigh

    Tim- I liked that one too! We had two small aftershocks last night.

    Dann- Yep… deflect, obfuscate, run away…

    Dave- Yep, and that got a WTF? back 🙂

    Bob- Thanks!

    Andy- Yep… sigh

    TOTW- I made up for it today 🙂

    Danny- Yep 🙂

  17. I think that’s how it feels to be in the general neighborhood when they light off a Daisy Cutter.

  18. LL- You don’t get the ‘big’ mushroom cloud and the airflow from the blast effects though 🙂