Earthquake again

Already a couple of my blog friends have contacted me to ask how we are after the large earthquake we had two nights ago.  Thank you for thinking of us.  We are fine and our lives have not been disturbed too much.

I was long in bed at 11:34 when the first earthquake hit us on Wednesday night.  In Japan we get so used to regular earthquakes that it registered that the bed was shaking and I woke up enough to realize it was quite a long earthquake though not too strong.  Even so, I thought to grab my glasses as I wanted to be able to see things if I had to be up and about and I got out of bed and put on my hard sole house shoes and went downstairs.  Sometimes if I'm slow getting downstairs, Tetsu yells up at me to come down before things start falling and blocking an escape route, so our usual procedure is to go downstairs and turn on the TV (if it isn't already on) to see where the earthquake might be and how strong it really is at the epicenter.  

Tetsu was sitting up groggily as he'd fallen asleep in front of the TV, and he'd already switched off the kerosene space heater that we use downstairs.  We were watching the TV alert and then suddenly the TV and our iPhones started buzzing and beeping simultaneously and calling out "Prepare for strong earthquake!  Strong earthquake expected!"  Even our animals react to the alarms and buzzing and John started barking and the cats started running under the sofa and tables.  Within seconds the 11:36 earthquake began, and shake it did, and get stronger and stronger!  We could hear things crashing around us...  things fell off shelves and things were breaking in the kitchen and upstairs.  I stood in a space against a wall where nothing could fall on me, Tetsu made sure the front door was ajar in case we needed to get out, and he was also trying to keep plants from falling off the shelf (one did) and prevent the TV from toppling (he succeeded).  

We wondered if this was going to be a repeat of the earthquake 11 years ago as the TV was telling us the epicenter was about in the same place but finally the shaking subsided though there were a few strong aftershocks that kept us where we were.  We didn't lose electricity or power which added to the feelings of relief.  

After a few minutes I did go upstairs to check on the upstairs cats and they seemed unaffected though there was stuff all over the floor, broken and otherwise.  A pottery cup had fallen off a bookcase in the hall and so pushed the pieces aside as much as possible so that we wouldn't step on them.  There was also a broken picture frame though the glass didn't break.  In the bedroom books and stuffed animals had fallen from the top of the closet and the whole closet had moved quite a ways away from the wall.  The lamp on my sidetable had fallen but the bulb was intact and still worked.  I had to squeeze into the sewing room because stuff had fallen blocking the door but thankfully my new sewing machine had NOT fallen to the floor (my friend said hers had).  I pushed things aside in that room too to make a path.  The kitchen had broken pottery that had fallen from the shelves and we later discovered that the main gas line had turned itself off and had to be reset outside at the propane tanks.  Interestingly, the sliding glass windows and doors that had not been locked (upstairs in the bedrooms) had slid open letting in the cold.  And for some reason I found that the water tap in the bathroom was flowing freely which I was afraid meant a broken pipe but actually it turned off with a twist so maybe it just got jarred open.

We decided not to sleep upstairs Wednesday night and we brought down blankets and comforters and slept in front of the TV.  The news reported that there was a tsunami alert and we imagined all those people on the coast who had survived the earthquake 11 years ago, racing to higher ground and waiting there hours in the cold until the tsunami warning was lifted 6 hours later.  

The news in the morning was that a Bullet Train had derailed though it stopped in time to prevent a major accident.  The bullet train line too has been damaged so it may be awhile before that will be back up running.  The main expressway also has damage so it will be a few days before there will be through traffic on that highway.

All in all, in our area people are only sweeping up broken stuff and everything is running normally.  I ended up with a bad headache yesterday and went to bed early...  maybe the scare was a shock to my system...  or maybe what with Covid and international war and now an earthquake my brain overloaded...  I'm back to staying quietly at home again...