Saturday, April 19, 2008

More rain......what the hell did you expect???? A few other earthquakes.....years ago!!

Nasty....gloomy.....depressing......Misery!!!! Yep...another damn day of this miserable Misery weather........you might by now be wondering why we have our stick and brick here in this state???? Well.....you know....I am beginning to wonder about the same thing!!!!!! And....the near future is not pleasant to think about........we will soon be through, very quickly, with Spring.....and then comes the horrific heat and humidity which will last until mid- to late-September......UGH!!!!!!
OK....enough depressing thoughts........

Today was all of the above in the first sentence.......so, I did some research online......working on a couple of projects and plans for perhaps....just perhaps, some more remodeling of the stick and brick. Because of keeping my mind occupied on these things......the day actually slipped away very, very quickly.

One other project kept me going for 2-3 hours as we seem to be having problems with our HP3301 All-In-One printer, fax, scanner, copier, etc., etc., etc. And that kept me busy checking out various troubleshooting solutions from the HP website......but, not certain that any one thing is going to work for us........we'll see!

While doing some of these online things today.........I began to think back to other times when I have experienced personally rocking around in other earthquakes........and my remembrances made this little shaker yesterday morning seem very minor.

The first time that can remember being in an earthquake was sometime in the summer or early fall of 1969. I had been in Japan on some temporary orders.....actually up in northern Japan at Misawa AFB.......and I was awaiting a commercial flight back to Seoul, Korea. Sitting in the first floor restaurant which had LARGE glass windows which looked out over the flight line runways......I was having a small breakfast and tea. Suddenly,......it is ALWAYS "suddenly"....the place began to shake...and then it became stronger and then even stronger....and the glass windows began to break and come crashing to the floor with glass flying everywhere....I could see the runways going up and down like ocean waves....and they then began to buckle from the heaving ground underneath the concrete. I made a quick fall to the floor and crawled under the table just as the tea cup turned over...........and then in what seemed like an eternity...the ground stopped moving and everything began to settle down.....broken windows, broken dishes, ceiling tiles on the tables and floor, and the restaurant completely ruined.

WOW.......what a shaker!!!! I now do not remember the strength of this quake, but it certainly was not a small one like yesterday's!!!!!! Obviously......I didn't fly out of there that day....or the next. Eventually, I caught another flight a few days later and returned to Korea.

About a half year later....I was then stationed in Okinawa....and was working the graveyard shift.....from midnight until 7-8am.......and while sitting there at my desk one night.....everything began shaking. This one....was more like yesterday's quake.....small, but surprising and a bit disturbing!

In 1983, the 1st Lady and our three children and myself spent the weeks during the summer driving up to Alaska, touring the state for four weeks and returning back to the lower 48.....a total of 8 weeks of travel covering 11,000 miles in a pick-up and slide-in camper. On our return trip, we took a LARGE ferry/ship across Prince William Sound......a 13 hour trip...which ended in Valdez, the large oil port. We spent the night there and then the next day toured the area and began to drive up the highway on the way to the Yukon Province border of Canada.

We decided to stay overnight in one of the many, many pull-off state camping areas...and as we drove into the park, a large sign stated to beware of the grizzly bears in the park!!! Well, as it was summer, it never gets dark....you can read a newspaper or go trout fishing at 3am and still see everything very clearly. Well, we went to bed.......and in the middle of the "night", the truck/camper began to shake and rock from side to side.....very violently!!!! I realized what was happening and the first thought I had was "were we underneath a cliff....or by a stream that might rise up"?????? I looked outside and saw the trees swaying from side to side.......at least making a 45 degree angle with the ground, rather than the normal 90 degree angle.

The 1st Lady woke up yelling....."It's a BEAR!!!!!" .......hahaha, as she thought a grizzly was on the truck/camper!!!!! Well, the canned goods and many other items began to fall out of their proper cabinets....and then it was over!!! Later that morning, we heard that it had been a 6.4 quake....and had been felt for hundreds and hundreds of miles from the epicenter.......VALDEZ, which was only 20 miles down the road from where we had spent the night!!! WHAT an experience it was for all of us!!!!!!!

Soooo, yesterday was not that big of a deal, other than we felt it shaking us here in the darkness of the night in southeast Missouri/Misery.........and I am certain it will not be our last one to be felt. It is a cool experience.......but that is only because we were never in any danger.....or had any of our property damaged......right???? They can....and are.....deadly, and those kind we do not want to experience, EVER!

A day has gone away.......and we have not really done very much, but just be retired and enjoying that part of our lives........however, .............

LIFE IS REALLY GREAT!!!!!.....And, I hope it is for all of you, also!!!!

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