I hate earthquakes!

I find the above map of earthquakes from today and the last week so fascinating and scary at the same time. What a cool website - www.usgs.gov. See our big bad one from today in blue?

I hate earthquakes - but I would still choose them over any other natural occurrence. I was in the middle of typing an email today when the first of the two largest earthquakes hit and when they were over I went back to the email and shared some thoughts with my friends. Because what I typed cracks me up and I should use this blog as a journal more often (in addition to my constant, shameless showing off of my gorgeous sons), here you go - some excerpts from emails today since they are already typed and all I have to do is copy and paste. Whalah! Easy post!:

Holy cow! This email was interrupted just now by several sizable earthquakes! I hate them and I was just teasing Wendy about preferring earthquakes to Hurricanes. I still would choose earthquakes but I was in a really huge and traumatic one when I was eight so my heart is still beating really fast. I jumped up from the computer and plucked poor TMac up off of the toilet of all things and put him in the bathroom doorway and then ran and grabbed Tot from his crib since he was sleeping next to glass French doors (I really should relocate his bed) and ran him to the doorway. Poor TMac was standing there naked and probably thinking that his mom is crazy. Miraculously, Tot stayed asleep through it all and is now sleeping on my bed after hanging out in the doorway for awhile and having a serious question and answer session with TMac about earthquakes. I was especially diligent about practicing the earthquake drills when I taught elem. school. I'm still scared! I wonder what the magnitudes were?

_ _ _ _ _

From a friend - 5.8 at 11:42 am centered in Chino Hills and 3.8 at 11:51 am. I'm in Orange today and that first one made me jump out of my chair!

My response:

Thanks Angie! I was just going to look on the news but I hate watching the news so now I don't have to! They seemed a lot closer together than 9 minutes didn't they? That is weird. 5.8 is not too shabby! My former college geography teacher would have a lot to say today. In 1998 he was really warning us about the big one - 8.0 or bigger and that was 10 years ago!

_ _ _ _ _

Interesting. They downgraded it from a 5.8 to a 5.4. The attached article references the big one I was in when I was 8.

"The magnitude-5.9 Whittier Narrows quake in 1987 was the last big shake in that area. That quake heavily damaged older buildings and houses in communities east of Los Angeles."

I lived in Norwalk which was very near the epicenter and it lasted a really, really long time. My parents were stuck in their waterbed on the other side of the living room from our bedrooms and couldn't get out and we were all screaming for them. My little brother was under a year old and was holding a piece of bologna which got squished through his fingers and onto the wall because he was so scared. My parents were yelling to us to get in the doorways. I remember that the wood floor in my bedroom waved down into a large hole and then back into place, the bunk beds slapped on and off each other and the piano moved a good 3 or 4 feet from the wall. A Sparklett's water truck was making deliveries on our street and it spilled water bottles out everywhere. My dad was a self-employed plumber and made really good money that day going door to door replacing gas lines, etc. Am I remembering this right Mom? It's weird what memories come rushing back. I thought I would share my scary memories with you all! I'm not going to sleep good tonight.

_ _ _ _ _

There are my thoughts. It also really cracks me up that the news articles have quotes and interviews from people who were visiting Disneyland from other states. Some vacation story they will have to tell! Hey Disney execs. - you should build an earthquake ride in California Adventure. I am really glad that the San Andreas fault line got a relatively harmless release of pressure today. Hopefully the earthquakes today helped to stave off the big one which I am really afraid of!