After a cat nap of an hour or two — I’m not quite sure because, as in the earthquake, time seemed to lose all meaning — I’m feeling much less freaked out and much more contemplative.
When the earthquake hit I was alone in the house, and while my phone was busy with people calling (people could call me, but I couldn’t call out very successfully) I still felt alone afterwards. Of course, this was a shared experience and with about a million people in San Jose alone it was a broadly shared one. So going in to the office and chatting with people about that experience was helpful and a great stress reliever. From this point on, I can revise my earthquake anecdote for parties to be more on the comic side and less on the shock and awe side.
The day after started fitfully, laying in bed not sleeping; progressed to the office early before sunrise, then back home for a quick inspection and a nap. Still headachey from lack of sleep, I got up to get more work done, had a little interview with a major metropolitan newspaper (perhaps this was a Lex Luthor plot to gain valuable California beachfront property?) and now it’s time for an aspirin and prep for the mobs of kids that come through my neighborhood begging for sugar to feed their scary addiction. I’m sure that someone will decide that one or all of these events is proof of the oncoming apocalypse.
3:55pm: just had an aftershock.
3:58pm. It was a 3.7, all the other aftershocks have been 1s and 2s. This one swayed the house a bit, the kind of earthquake that lulled me into a false sense of security over the last few years.
4:40pm. Surveillance video of the earthquake at a convenience store. I also saw video from the Kragen auto parts store on TV today, but haven’t found a web link to it.
4:45pm. Found the link to the Kragen video at KNTV. Odd, now that I watch these videos they make it all seem far less upsetting than it actually was in real life, and don’t seem to convey the violence of it.
Here’s an audio recording that was in progress when the earthquake hit. It’s fascinating to listen to but it doesn’t capture the strange “oncoming truck” sound that I heard before it hit. quake.mp3 The audio of the house shaking in this file indicates that it lasted about 18 seconds, but it is hard to make that estimate because it doesn’t include that precursor sound or the more gentle shaking after the main shock.
Sitting here in my office in Mountain View, I’ve not felt anything all day. When I arrived today, I did notice that my little desk clock, which is shaped like an egg, had wobbled over a few inches on my desk and was no longer facing the right direction. But that was the sum total of the evidence I saw.