what an interesting 24 hours. i started off the day yesterday waking up at 6:30am and meeting peter at 8 limbs yoga for our usual wednesday morning class. afterwards, we headed back to my apartment so that he could jump in the shower and i could change. around 9am, we drove over to b&o and grabbed some quick breakfast....and then Peter dropped me off at the hair salon so i could trim my short hair once again. after finally launching my project the night before, i felt like indulging myself with a haircut.
I got to work around 10:15am and started reading my emails, poring over all the press coverage on Jungle. About 5 til 11am, I started hearing some loud, clunky noises above me. I thought the people in the office above were moving large pieces of furniture or something...and then the trembling started...i didn't know what to think...i was confused. And then my huge 21" monitor started tilting towards me and all the contents of my bookshelf fell all over the floor. I noticed the hanging light from the ceiling swaying all over the place. I freaked out and ducked underneath my desk (thank god for sturdy amazon door desks). I sat there shaking so hard, literally thinking I was going to die. About 45 seconds later, I emerged from my now cluttered office out into the hallway to find all my coworkers standing huddled underneath door frames together or crouched below their desks, all still shaking and not knowing what to do next. We then all evacuated the building and gathered in a huge crowd outside, everyone hugging each other, thankful that we were all safe. We looked around, blown away by what had happened and forgetting all the issues we were dealing with at work just before the earthquake, issues that seemed so small in comparison now.
We were then told to gather our things and go home. I climbed the six flights of stairs and walked around, seeing all the cracks in the walls, computer monitors on the floors, ceiling light fixtures which had fallen and shattered its glass everywhere. I quickly gathered my things, sent out a few short emails and took off.
Walking home with Betina, we saw a ridiculous amount of traffic as everyone was trying to get home as soon as possible. I eventually got in touch with my parents, as the cell phone and telephone networks were all crammed. I spoke to them for awhile, calming my mother down and reassuring her that we were all safe. When we got home, Jocelyn was still a little shaken as she was home alone when this all happened. Fortunately, everything was completely intact at home...nothing major had fallen. We turned on the news and watched in awe at something that we had all experienced for the first time.
I logged in briefly to see if people were still working...which they weren't. Then I just sat on the couch, watching the news, answering many phone calls from concerned friends and relatives...forgetting to eat lunch. Eventually, I wandered out onto Broadway, shipped off my laser printer which I had sold on eBay, and grabbed a wrap sandwich from World Wraps. I didn't really know how to take advantage of all this extra time I had.
6.8 on the Richter scale. Epicenter near Olympia. Take a look at some pictures from a Cobalt employee.