Last Night's Earthquake

05.14.08

I was in bed at about 3 am last night (this morning?), viewing the various posters I have on the wall near my bed. They are all quite excellent and deserve to be framed. I was especially considering framing my favorite, a large poster of a photo I took in Venezia.

I realized, however, that it might be foolish to frame something that close to my bed. In the event of an earthquake, it might fall off of the wall, onto me, and the glass in the frame could shatter and slice me up pretty badly.

However, maybe the frame would stay mounted to the wall despite the earthquake.

I thought back to the earthquake that destroyed my family's house in 1989... had any of the pictures come off of the wall then? I don't recall any of them falling, though I do remember that the entire contents of the fridge ended up on the kitchen floor.

It did seem like we were due for an earthquake sometime soon... better play it safe and keep the posters frame-free. I turned over and began to drift off to sleep.

At 3:35 am, the house was suddenly wracked with a huge BOOM. I jolted out of bed. It was an earthquake.

The earthquake quickly subsided, despite my fears that it might be the herald of a far larger one. I finally drifted off to sleep. Everything hanging on the wall remained intact.

Maybe I should frame those posters after all.

(It turns out that the earthquake was a modest 2.6, the epicenter 6 miles off the coast of Hermosa Beach. In other news, the L.A. Lakers just beat the paradoxically named Utah Jazz, 111 to 104.)