Movin' and Shakin'
Sunday morning a week ago was the starting point...I was lying in bed in a semi-awake state when the bed started to shake...it only lasted a few seconds and I looked over at my bride, who was sound asleep, and thought to myself " now how did she do that?"...later when we found out that Anza had a 6 point something earthquake and when I told her my story she didn't miss a beat when she said " you just couldn't see me twitching my nose ". I could have used her magic the rest of the week.
When I got to the office Monday morning I found the air conditioning vent from the ceiling on my desk chair...it is a 4' x 4' square piece of metal weighing about 20 lbs and if I had been sitting in that chair I would probably still be having a massive headache if not worse.
I had two HOA board meetings scheduled for Thursday morning between 8 and 10:00 AM and I rushed to get out of the house to make certain I was on time for the first meeting...I woke up near the truck scales in Cabazon when I reached for my cell 'phone and discovered that I had forgotten it...too late to go back... I was just going to have to tough it out without the 'phone for the rest of the day...how the board meetings went is the subject of another blog and you can be sure there is a story behind these, too.
What was left of Thursday morning passed uneventfully...about 1:15 PM the shaking started again and I made sure I wasn't sitting at my desk... even though the air conditioning cover was still on the floor next to the wall the rest of the air duct was hanging from the ceiling and I didn't want to find out how heavy that was...we tuned into the usgs website and found that the quake was 4.8 and centered in Yucaipa...the very time my bride was supposed to be attending the annual staff luncheon at Gabiano's in Yucaipa...I could hardly wait to see how his was going to turn out...as usual all the phone lines to that area were busy so I would just have to wait and see.
Around 3:45 I left the office to go deliver a bid and then headed up the freeway to home. At the Verbenia off ramp in Whitewater traffic slowed to a stop...normally I would have just stayed in the fast lane ( accidents usually clear out fast ) but this time something told me that I should use the off ramp and get to the south frontage road...I did and traffic was fairly fast up to the dinosaurs in Cabazon...I was marvelling at how far traffic was backed up and how nicely I was going on the frontage road...shouldn't have done that...traffic stopped completely...again I was lucky...I was in the left lane of a two lane road and traffic was inching slowly along while the right lane was full of tractor trailers and stopped dead. I asked one of the stopped truckers if he found out on his CB radio what the hold up was...he said that there was an officer involved shooting at the scales and the freeway was shut down for a complete investigation...I said " oh, no!!! I don't want to be here all night"..."oh, it won't be all night" he said matter of factly, " only about 6 or 7 hours"...at first I thought he was joking with me but he was completely serious...and here I am with no telephone to call home ( I thought the LA news channels would have something on them about the closure but none of them even mentioned it... we had to read the morning paper for information on the shooting and that was relegated to the last page of the local news ).
About 45 minutes later I inched up to the intersection of the frontage road and Fields Road in Cabazon and noticed two Highway Patrol officers; one of them directing cars along the Union Pacific railroad tracks on the south side of the freeway and the other waving traffic north on Fields Road towards the outlet stores. Remembering the trucker's words I decided to go along the railroad tracks...I knew there was nowhere to go from the outlet stores except to the scales so I inched up to the officer directing traffic along the tracks.
Surprise!!! For the most part I forget about the white Toyota Scion that I'm driving...it's decorated to look like a small English ambulance with an amber light bar on the roof, red, white and black lightening bolt type decals with medical crosses on each side( in the formation of MD lettering ), and racing black and white checkerboard decals on the bumpers and side panels ( the name of my employing company is Asphalt MD's )...as I pulled up to the officer he said " hey, how're you doing?...haven't seen you in a long time...you're a long way from home, aren't you?"...I replied that, actually, I was on my way home to Redlands and asked what was going on...he proceeded to tell me about the shooting and we chatted for a couple of minutes with me right in the middle of the intersection...he apparently is stationed in Indio and is used to seeing either myself or the boss in his identical Scion in the Indio area. I asked him how the road was along the tracks..."Oh, it's rough and you'll have to do some off roading...you might get some scratches on that beauty, but you'll make it OK ". I thanked him for his help and sure enough, about 20 minutes later, after some moderate off roading, another officer directed us onto the Ramsey street on ramp for westbound Interstate 10.
I got home about 7:30 but many other people were not so lucky...one property manager told me she didn't get home from Palm Desert until 2:30 AM ( material for another blog )...and of course my bride was worried...I'm never that late and if I am I'll normally call with an ETA.
After telling my story I asked how the quake felt..."oh, not so bad " she said, " just a little shaking...we didn't even get up from the table "...so much for the earthquake and duck and cover drills that teachers teach the kids.
Needless to say I'm very glad that the earthquakes weren't worse...and especially glad that they don't have officer involved shootings very often.
When I got to the office Monday morning I found the air conditioning vent from the ceiling on my desk chair...it is a 4' x 4' square piece of metal weighing about 20 lbs and if I had been sitting in that chair I would probably still be having a massive headache if not worse.
I had two HOA board meetings scheduled for Thursday morning between 8 and 10:00 AM and I rushed to get out of the house to make certain I was on time for the first meeting...I woke up near the truck scales in Cabazon when I reached for my cell 'phone and discovered that I had forgotten it...too late to go back... I was just going to have to tough it out without the 'phone for the rest of the day...how the board meetings went is the subject of another blog and you can be sure there is a story behind these, too.
What was left of Thursday morning passed uneventfully...about 1:15 PM the shaking started again and I made sure I wasn't sitting at my desk... even though the air conditioning cover was still on the floor next to the wall the rest of the air duct was hanging from the ceiling and I didn't want to find out how heavy that was...we tuned into the usgs website and found that the quake was 4.8 and centered in Yucaipa...the very time my bride was supposed to be attending the annual staff luncheon at Gabiano's in Yucaipa...I could hardly wait to see how his was going to turn out...as usual all the phone lines to that area were busy so I would just have to wait and see.
Around 3:45 I left the office to go deliver a bid and then headed up the freeway to home. At the Verbenia off ramp in Whitewater traffic slowed to a stop...normally I would have just stayed in the fast lane ( accidents usually clear out fast ) but this time something told me that I should use the off ramp and get to the south frontage road...I did and traffic was fairly fast up to the dinosaurs in Cabazon...I was marvelling at how far traffic was backed up and how nicely I was going on the frontage road...shouldn't have done that...traffic stopped completely...again I was lucky...I was in the left lane of a two lane road and traffic was inching slowly along while the right lane was full of tractor trailers and stopped dead. I asked one of the stopped truckers if he found out on his CB radio what the hold up was...he said that there was an officer involved shooting at the scales and the freeway was shut down for a complete investigation...I said " oh, no!!! I don't want to be here all night"..."oh, it won't be all night" he said matter of factly, " only about 6 or 7 hours"...at first I thought he was joking with me but he was completely serious...and here I am with no telephone to call home ( I thought the LA news channels would have something on them about the closure but none of them even mentioned it... we had to read the morning paper for information on the shooting and that was relegated to the last page of the local news ).
About 45 minutes later I inched up to the intersection of the frontage road and Fields Road in Cabazon and noticed two Highway Patrol officers; one of them directing cars along the Union Pacific railroad tracks on the south side of the freeway and the other waving traffic north on Fields Road towards the outlet stores. Remembering the trucker's words I decided to go along the railroad tracks...I knew there was nowhere to go from the outlet stores except to the scales so I inched up to the officer directing traffic along the tracks.
Surprise!!! For the most part I forget about the white Toyota Scion that I'm driving...it's decorated to look like a small English ambulance with an amber light bar on the roof, red, white and black lightening bolt type decals with medical crosses on each side( in the formation of MD lettering ), and racing black and white checkerboard decals on the bumpers and side panels ( the name of my employing company is Asphalt MD's )...as I pulled up to the officer he said " hey, how're you doing?...haven't seen you in a long time...you're a long way from home, aren't you?"...I replied that, actually, I was on my way home to Redlands and asked what was going on...he proceeded to tell me about the shooting and we chatted for a couple of minutes with me right in the middle of the intersection...he apparently is stationed in Indio and is used to seeing either myself or the boss in his identical Scion in the Indio area. I asked him how the road was along the tracks..."Oh, it's rough and you'll have to do some off roading...you might get some scratches on that beauty, but you'll make it OK ". I thanked him for his help and sure enough, about 20 minutes later, after some moderate off roading, another officer directed us onto the Ramsey street on ramp for westbound Interstate 10.
I got home about 7:30 but many other people were not so lucky...one property manager told me she didn't get home from Palm Desert until 2:30 AM ( material for another blog )...and of course my bride was worried...I'm never that late and if I am I'll normally call with an ETA.
After telling my story I asked how the quake felt..."oh, not so bad " she said, " just a little shaking...we didn't even get up from the table "...so much for the earthquake and duck and cover drills that teachers teach the kids.
Needless to say I'm very glad that the earthquakes weren't worse...and especially glad that they don't have officer involved shootings very often.
posted by Dad Merk at 10:10 PM
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