Earth Shaking

While in class today I felt the building move a little and I turned to ask my co-workers if that was an earthquake. One was quick to say it wasn't an earthquake - the building's been doing that all week,  and the other pulled out her iPhone and confirmed that it was an earthquake 77 miles away. Two, in fact. The one with the correct answer lives where many of the earthquakes occur back home in Oklahoma. The other one must be smoking crack or on the same cough meds I was on last year. The dude from California didn't even notice the building moving...

Weekend Wrap

This weekend was a bit jarring and violent for my tastes.  The 2 earthquakes - especially the Big One Saturday night - were unsettling and I could not let my mind relax last night when trying to go to sleep. Remember what happened the last time I was relaxed and thisclose to sleep? Every time the house creaked or a neighbor threw something in their polycart or a kid got up to pee, my heart was racing and bracing for another earthquake.

It wasn't a horrible weekend in toto (just the time periods before sleep). Saturday morning, we hustled to Emi's soccer game which is held in the coldest/windiest part of town, and I was single momming it while Scott was working (home game). Poor little birthday girl's nose was running like a faucet so we dropped Emi off and hung out in the Disco reading and playing until halftime when we ventured out to deliver post game root beer. We thought it might have warmed up enough to hang outside, but not so. I got out of the car periodically to toss out our breakfast trash and the squillion wipes used on the Little Ones' noses but that was it. After the game (Emi's team won!), we headed home for lunch and naps and laundry.

The day got better progressively. Emi parked 2 cars in our drive earning another $20 for her bank account and I made some wonderful pumpkin delights that we all feasted on. Ketiesha came over to work on Emi's hair while the game was on (we won that game too but we lost a key player to a torn ACL). While Ketiesha was over, one of our kitties was doing this weird thing where it looks like she's wiping the window (obviously begging to come in) and I was convinced that she knew that Ketiesha was a cat person, but in hindsight, maybe she knew that there was a big earthquake coming.

The Longest Day

Yesterday was The Longest Day for me, bookended by terror. Ok, maybe I exaggerate just a bit, but it was definitely bookended by some scary moments. From the time we woke up a little after 2am with the 4.7 earthquake to the time we tried to go to sleep after the next earthquake a little after 11pm, I was busy with many activities such as shuttling the eldest to her soccer game and baking bread.

It was a very satisfying day despite the fact that I had 2 snot-nosed kids confined to the car during the soccer game due to very cold temps and high winds AND the fact that I didn't get a shower in until after dinner last night. Bygones.

We were laying in bed watching SNL. I was luxuriating under my giraffe duvet cover (sans duvet currently) almost in an alpha state with my side of the heated mattress pad on 2, my eyes were rolling back into my head...I was drifting off to slumberland when I heard the rumble of the traffic leaving the stadium. Except it wasn't the traffic and the house was shaking and swaying. We were suddenly out of our bed freaking out then walking around the house checking on all of the sleeping kids and dogs.

Emi slept through this one, a 5.6 magnitude earthquake - the biggest in Oklahoma history, and when I went up to her room, I could feel the house swaying from North to South and back. It was very unsettling to say the least. At least the news broke about this earthquake immediately and some of my FaceBook friends reported feeling queasy and seasick. I felt this way too and my very tired eyes wanted to go to sleep but my mind was worried that the house would shake again and that we hadn't done enough to educate the kids on what to do doing an earthquake (namely not to panic). We are more than versed in what to do in the case of a tornado.

I was trying to brace myself for any aftershocks but if there were any, I slept right through them...

A check of the house and yard revealed some earthquake damage:

We will survive!

Shaken AND Stirred

I'll be honest, earthquake was not my first thought when Emi came into our room a few hours ago. Something stirred me from sleep - maybe the house settling? - it sounded like a chandelier shaking (but we don't have any chandeliers) just before she shot into our room. She was audibly shaken, saying "Daddy, I can't sleep. My bed is shaking!" Oh Lord, this is just how it started in The Exorcist! We followed her back upstairs to her room and saw a sleeping Kirby laying on the floor close to her bed. So whatever it was didn't disturb his slumber.

We inspected her bed - nothing but toys and trash and man, she really needs to clean her room. We checked outside and the garage (her room is above the garage and the door opening would have shaken her bed) but she reported no noise, just her bed shaking. We checked the time and thankfully it was only a little after 2am (not the unholy 3-4am) and asked her about her dreams. She said she was dreaming that she had it all, a very good dream and then she woke up to a shaking bed. {freaky!} We convinced her that she probably shook her bed herself and woke herself up but she still wanted to sleep in our bed. Daddy stayed in her bed and she came back to bed with me.

My heart was still racing and my mind was wandering so I decided to check out FaceBook and TV (nothing) to see if there were any unusual activities going on that might corroborate Emi's accounts. And wouldn't you know it, a 4.7 earthquake just after 2 (with an aftershock of 3.4 20 minutes later). After I let Emi know what happened, I went to Emi's room to let Scott know that it was an earthquake and not demons so he could get some rest....whew! I think we need to lay off of those horror movies so my mind doesn't instantly go to demonic possession in every situation...

So Where Was I...

...when the EARTHQUAKE hit?

Yipes! I was at my first physical therapy appt...actually lying there on the table while the therapist was massaging my back! The 2 story building shook for about 30 seconds and I thought it was just some helicopters flying by on the way to the airport. I imagine it would be just like the beginning of a Stephen King story.... Soon after the quake some of the therapists came back in to the building saying the tremor was felt as far away as Dallas and Clinton and was definitely a quake, not an explosion.

While the therapist was still working on me on the table I watched the news and learned that you can't really feel the quake unless it's over 3 on the Richter scale. The preliminary magnitude of this quake was a 4.3, then upgraded to 4.5 and the last I heard it was upgraded to 5.1! Maybe not a big deal if we were in California, but here in Oklahoma (aside from Jones, OK) we are not used to quakes.

My Little Ones were fine although they thought someone ran their car into the house. Scott was fine but was walking around campus so he didn't feel the quake. Emi was in the Gifted class in the portable classroom and reported that a lot of the soda bottles they were using to experiment with pH fell down as the building shook....

What a trip!

Later someone posted on FaceBook something about aftershocks sometimes being more intense than the original quake...almost 12 hours later and no tremors...

My lower back was in heaven for a bit when the electrodes were emitting heat and pulsating my tight muscles. Then there was the exquisite pain as the therapist was "picking" or "digging" at my back muscles. I explained to both therapists who tagged teamed me that my butt felt like someone frogged me in the cheeks and in my house, I can't be sure that that didn't happen. So they did their magic and showed me some really good exercises to help me heal up my tweaked lower back.