Earthquake

Want to have an educational discussion on what happens to cause an earthquake? Do you want to do it in an intimate setting - say with just you and one trembling 9 year old? Would you like to do it with a snoring husband in the background? Is 4:35 in the morning a good time for you?

Too bad - you missed it. Wes-Man and I got to have this discussion though after we had an earthquake during the night that measured 5.2. At that time, sleep was done for the night and all that was left to do was try to get him to stop shaking.

As soon as it woke Bill and me, him yelling, "What's happening?", I was calmly answering, "I think it's an earthquake, I'm going to Wes." Wes met me coming down the bunk bed ladder, wild eyed and ready to be carried back to my bed.

In retrospect, and with absolutely NO data to back up my theory, I am thinking we must have had an earlier rumble yesterday. All 3 of the porch posts that I had just installed in February cracked yesterday. Top to bottom cracks in every one of them. These posts were supposed to last 10 years and they made it about 8 weeks.

I was irritated about it yesterday but didn't want to deal with it till today. I was more irritated it about it today because I thought, "there was no way Lowe's was going to believe that they were cracked before the earthquake" and then I had a light bulb moment. I was thinking they must have cracked because of "something." So today, I'm not irritated at all. I'm very grateful that if the only damage we had was 3 porch posts, we came out all right. So even if we didn't lose the poles to a tremor, I'm gonna be grateful.

Funny how a little thing like an earthquake can put things in prospective for you.