Close-ish to the end of a rather intense Hall session (my character currently having gutted a bad guy in a rather neat Jackie-Chan sort of fight) Karen's power went out.
Poof.
She calls me to report. No power.
Karen, after checking to make sure her breakers didn't get tripped - "because it would be stupid to sit here in the dark if that was the problem" - calls the power company, who says "no power until 1:30am." Lizzie logs off to get some sleep.
About five minutes after that, we're still on the phone chatting, when Karen's power came back on. But Liz is already in bed, so we end up continuing to talk on the phone.
Another ten minutes pass and my phone starts making the strange beep-tastic noises that it seems fond of when someone else is trying to call in. I glance at the clock. 11:03pm. Thinking it should only be Kevin - no one else calls me late at night - I switch over.
"Oh my god, oh my god!" a somewhat panicked voice in my ear.
"What's wrong now, JD?" I ask.
"There's a tsunami warning for California! Where's Kevin staying?"
"Um. All right. Well, give me a minute and I'll call him."
I switch back to Karen.
"JD called me to tell me there was an earthquake in California. Tell ya what, I'm going to call Kevin and if it's nothing, I'll call you back in 10-15 minutes, ok? If I don't call you back then something's wrong."
"Right-o. No call in ten minutes, time to panic. Got it."
I hang up, then dial Kevin's number.
BEEP BEEP BEEP!
"The number you have dialed is NOT a working number! Please check your call and dial again."
Blink.
Heart rate spikes somewhat.
Try again.
Ring. Ring. "Yes, dear?"
"Oh, nothing. There was an earthquake in California, so I was a bit worried." Liar. I was a lot worried.
We chat for a while. After some poking around on the internet, I discovered these things:
Calif. Quake Prompts Brief Tsunami Warning
By JOSH DUBOW, Associated Press Writer
SAN FRANCISCO - A powerful earthquake roiled the waters off the northern California coast, triggering a brief tsunami warning and the evacuation of thousands of residents from a community with a history of battling killer waves.
The 7.0-magnitude quake struck at about 7:50 p.m. Tuesday about 90 miles southwest of the coastal community of Crescent City and 300 miles northwest of San Francisco, according to the
U.S. Geological Survey.A tsunami warning was briefly in effect from the California-Mexico border north to Vancouver Island, British Columbia, but was called off about an hour after the quake hit. There were no reports of significant damages or injuries.
This has been a test of your local panic system. If this had been a real emergency, you would have been subjected to MUCH MORE panic. Thank you.