Reply #61: Japan and Oregon

[Lydia Leftcoast]

1) The first one: I lived in an apartment that shook a bit every time a bus passed by. One evening, I was watching TV, and my apartment began shaking as if a bus was passing,but it didn't stop. My first thought was, "Long bus?" but then I realized, as the shaking intensified, that it was an earthquake. I experienced several after that, but no really big ones. When I was in Japan in 2002, I was standing at the bathroom sink brushing my teeth, when suddenly I found myself swaying back and forth. Yup. Earthquake.

2) Two noticeable ones in Oregon:

March 1993, known as The Spring Break Quake. I had to catch a 7:00AM flight, so I was up and driving out of town at 5:30AM. As I crossed the bridge over a little creek, the car started wagging back and forth, and I swore I could see ripples in the bridge. My first thought was that I'd lost my steering, but then I saw that the car ahead of me was weaving, too. I wondered if the bridge had somehow iced over, even though it was supposed to be too warm. I regained control just as I left the bridge, so I figured it was just some freaky ice.

Continuing along the route, I came to a roadblock, where the highway patrol told me that I'd have to take a detour, because the bridge was out. Well, 5:30AM, I wasn't thinking clearly, so I just shrugged and took the detour. It wasn't until I got to the next town that I saw all the shattered windows. That's the first time I thought of earthquakes.

The whole time I was gone, I worried about my stuff in the apartment, haunted by visions of my kerosene lamp spilling onto the carpet, but when I came back, the only "damage" I found was a few items that had fallen onto the carpet and therefore not broken.

A couple of years ago: I was sitting in a coffee shop near Portland State University when I began to feel shaking. I looked around, but no one else was reacting, so I thought it must be my imagination. Then the cups on the counter started rattling, and everyone looked up as the ground continued to shake for what seemed like an awfully long time. I took out my Walkman and turned on the radio to hear a report of a big earthquake in Seattle.