My first blog post from the “new” Blogger, which is out of Beta. I was hesitant, but so far so good. None of the new features really add anything for me, although adding labels/tags to my posts is intriguing. Anyway, nothing got erased and nothing exploded, so in that way I am satisfied with the upgrade. On to tonight’s short story.

I got off the computer last night at almost 2:30AM and layed in bed watching some Arrested Development. I fell asleep at some point, and remember waking up soon after thinking the building was shaking. I couldn’t tell if it was really that, or maybe like a neighbor’s washing machine or something. Either way, I shrugged it off, shut off my TV, and went to sleep for the night. I completely forgot about the incident until today at work when my co-worker Matt asked if I felt an earthquake last night. I first said no, then realized that I probably did, and corrected myself. Matt also barely felt it, and we were happy to find out that neither of us are insane (at least not earthquake insane). So yes, there was an earthquake last night and I barely woke up for it. At least this time I felt it. Since coming here, there have been at least 3 earthquake incidents that I apparently slept though, only finding out about them from students or co-workers the following day. Most of them are very weak, so I guess not feeling them isn’t too bad. I have no idea why they seem to always happen at night though; is there a geological reason for that? But yeah, I guess my first real earthquake experience a few years ago here was a bit more interesting and stronger, but nowadays it’s nothing special.

And now, reading news online after work per my usual routine, I see that the small tremor I felt last night was actually a much stronger earthquake in Shizuoka, then Tokyo, and then I suppose by the time it crossed Tokyo Bay and hit good old Goi, it was much weaker. Here’s a link to the CBS News article on it.