Earthquake!

We had an earthquake last summer. I was in my car and didn't feel a thing. I got to work and everyone asked, "Did you feel it?" and I had to ask what they were talking about. Today, was MUCH different.

My job assignment today was working outside. The contractors we were working with are painting up on scaffolding, so we sit outside and watch. I was scheduled to work a 12-hour shift, I did sort of volunteer for it because I need the hours, but I didn't have time to really prepare and have enough milk for Joey stashed away. It's unpredictable how much he'll eat while I'm working on any given day. Sometimes, it's an average of 1oz. per hour I'm gone, sometimes it's 2oz. or more! I had talked to Dan around noon and found out that Joey had already downed almost half the stash in the freezer! This morning, there had been around 16oz., and Joey ate 6oz. when he woke up! Anyway...

After hearing that the weather was supposed to be beautiful all day long, no chance of rain making the job end early. I accepted the fact that Dan would probably have to dip into the emergency formula (that we did NOT purchase, btw, it was sent to us as a sample) and settled into what I thought would be a long shift. Around 1:50pm, I noticed a weird vibration. I didn't notice it at first, because whenever a big truck drives by our house, a similar vibration is produced. I first noticed that it wasn't going away and thought maybe someone was messing with my chair. I looked over at the two co-workers I was with, and they had the same confused look on their faces that I did.
"Are you feeling this?" One asked.
"Yes." We chimed in.

Then it got stronger. Not trees-falling-over or (thank God) scaffolding-collapsing strong, but the ground was visibly shaking. It was the strangest feeling in the entire world, I felt like I was in a movie. Large objects on the site were swaying back and forth and we feared for the men working on the scaffolding. Once the vibration stopped (after about a minute), we got the guys down and evacuated to the parking lot with a bunch of other workers. When it was clear we weren't going to get any more tremors, everyone headed back in, but that was pretty much it for everyone's work day. A "voluntary evacuation" was announced and everyone-and-their-mother got in their car to leave. Traffic was backed up for a while, and I knew it would be a while, so I took the time to have another pump session and let everyone else go nuts trying to leave. My stall tactic did the trick because while traffic out was still a little slow for a random Tuesday afternoon, it was moving pretty consistently and only about 15 minutes was added to my commute home.

I couldn't get a hold of Dan on the phone but text messages were going through, so I was able to make sure that they were ok (and that the house was still standing). Apparently Joey slept through the whole thing, which is ironic because one of his favorite games is "earthquake" where we shake the bed or couch and say "earthquake!!!" and he laughs. I'm not kidding, we've been playing "earthquake" for several weeks now, lol.

Here are the facts about the quake:
The quake was a 5.8 magnitude. It originated in Virgina, and was rumored to have been felt as far south as the Carolinas and as far north as Canada. It was a mile deep and the biggest quake to hit VA since May of 1897. No super major damage was reported and there were really only minor injuries, thankfully.