Above is the CNN map of the epicenter. Here is a map of the earthquake’s effects, based on people’s reports of how much shaking they felt. Here is a similar map showing what people felt in Canada. And here is a list of aftershocks.

Oh, and just in case you were wondering, I have experienced two earthquakes during my time in Southern California, one of which was literally about a hundred times stronger than your stupid Northeast earthquake. So nyah. :)

My first quake, the really big one, was the Hector Mine earthquake on October 16, 1999, less than two months into my freshman year at USC. That one woke me up at around 3:00 AM, whereupon I immediately jumped across the room, turned on my camcorder and yelled, “Earthquake! Earthquake!” (The camera missed the shaking, but I did get footage of the electricity flashing on and off. Of course, that could be any summer day in California…) That quake was 7.1 on the Richter scale — very big — but its epicenter was quite far away, way out in the desert, and it did very little damage.

My second earthquake occured on September 9, 2001. It was a Sunday afternoon, and I was sitting in the basement of Doheny Library — which had only just reopened after being closed for two years while undergoing, of all things, an earthquake retrofit — when all of a sudden, the bookstacks started to shake, the overhead pipes and lights started swinging back and forth, and the ground very definitely shook. This quake was only a 4.2 (which, because the Richter scale is logarithmic, means it was almost 1,000 times weaker than the Hector Mine quake), but its epicenter was much closer to USC — in the Beverly Hills/West Hollywood area — so the shaking was almost as strong. For me personally, it was much scarier, since I was all alone in a basement surrounded by large metal objects. I haven’t set foot in the basement of Doheny Library since. :) (Although, tragically, the earthquake was by no means the scariest thing that would happen that week. About 36 hours later, the Sept. 11 attacks took place).

Local coverage from the Press-Republican newspaper of upstate New York, where the earthquake was centered.

Earthquakes on the East Coast??? What is this?!? I’m supposed to be the one feeling the earth move under my feet! :) But there was indeed a magnitude 5.1 earthquake this morning, not in Southern California like usual, but in Plattsburg, New York. It was felt throughout the Northeast, and it woke up my parents in Newington, Connecticut. Their conversation reportedly went as follows:

Dad: “Leanna.”
Mom: “Mmmph?”
D: “Leanna!”
M: “Hmmrmmph??”
D: “What’s that?”
M: “What’s what?”
D: “The bed is shaking. And the mirror. I hear noises. Mah.”
M: “Settle down.”
D: “It’s either an earthquake, or the house is falling down from the termites.”
M: “Settle down. Balf (the quarry down the street) is just blasting again.”

The quake was felt from the Buffalo area (where Becky is from) to Boston, and as far north as Ontario, Canada. Here’s an Associated Press article about it, and here’s a local article from Connecticut’s NBC affiliate. Oh, and here’s the latest from the U.S. Geological Survey, including seismograph readings.

Here are some quotes from the Fark.com discussion board:

“I felt it here in Boston this morning.. Thought I was nuts till I got a msg from a friend of mine who felt it too.. My comp desk swayed for awhile and I felt the building shake.. thought I was just crazy though..”

“Note to self: do not visit New York before the apocalypse.”

Click here for more.

More pictures of the Northern lights are coming in. Here’s one from Finland. Here’s some from North Dakota. For the very latest, visit SpaceWeather.com’s photo gallery.

In other news, click here for local coverage from the area where the tragic Amtrak crash took place on Thursday. And just in case you were wondering what Friday’s Miami Herald front page looked like, well, wonder no more:

Correction: Solar storm is still ongoing!!! If you are in a northern state, go outside and look north!!!

The solar shock wave (technically known as a Coronal Mass Ejection, or CME) hit at almost the exact moment I was posting the news (below) that it was on its way! It wasn’t too severe though. Check out a satellite image of Northern Hemisphere auroras at 1:16 AM PDT, or a photograph of the Northern lights over North Dakota at 2:45 AM PDT, or simply check out the very latest from SpaceWeather.com.

A large shock wave from the sun is on its way, and northern lights are expected sometime today! They may even be visible from mid-latitudes (e.g. much of the United States)!

Check SpaceWeather.com for the latest news, or click here for up-to-date satellite views of aurora activity. (If the “Activity Lvl” is in double-digits, and/or the “Power” is in triple-digits, we’re in business.)

Sorry for the delay in posting photos of the sweatshop protest. I’ve been having technical difficulties with my computer. But the photos will be online soon. Here’s the Daily Trojan article about it.

Protesting against sweatshop labor! Student sit-in at USC administration offices! Check the news. Photos here soon. CP

Testing again. CP

Recent pictures! The first photo shows my roommates, Cameron and Brent, with my friend Suzanne. (Check out Suzanne’s website, which I helped update!) The second photo shows pro-Palestine demonstrators protesting in Westwood on March 30. The third photo shows Becky petting Cousteau, the cute, extremely fat cat (23 lb.) whom we bonded with at the SPCA on Friday. Click on a picture to view the full-size image…

Well, I’ve done it again. I’ve revamped my website. I seem to have this urge every few months… or maybe it’s every time I have a huge school workload and I need some major non-school-related task to allow me to procrastinate. :) Either way, here it is: Brendan’s new and improved website!

As you can see, I’ve moved the graphical navigation bar from the left-hand side of the screen to the top of the screen, and I’ve eliminated a lot of excess information from the homepage, trying to make it less junky. The most important change, however, is what you’re reading at this very moment: my new “blogger” journal.

“Blogs” are a growing phenomenon on the Web these days. They are basically personal bulletin boards. The owner can post whatever he/she wants, whenever he/she wants, and it will immediately show up on his/her website. The technical aspects of the uploading process are taken care of by Blogger.com, which makes life much easier for the blog owner — in this case, me.

Unlike the tradition method of updating my website — typing out articles in HTML format, playing with fonts, tinkering with the layout, etc. — blogging makes it very easy to update my website instantly, whenever I feel like it. The goal here is to actually keep my website fresh, with updates at least every couple of days, which is almost impossible to do with HTML, because I don’t have enough time. But with a blogger, I only need 5 minutes a day, if that!

To update my blog, I don’t even have to be at my own computer. I can go to Blogger.com from any computer, enter my username and password, and just like that, I can update my website. It’s the same principle as web-based e-mail, but in this case it allows website owners to keep their sites updated on the fly. In fact, I can even update my blog from my cell phone!!! I could be walking down the street, and if I see a pink elephant in the road and I want to tell all my friends about it, I can whip out my cell phone, use the Sprint PCS Wireless Web to log onto the blogger site, and type “pink elephant in street - details to come,” and voila, it’s on the Web.

Kudos to Andrew Long, my conservative friend, for guiding me toward the joys on blogging. (Andrew is pissed off at me at the moment because of the strongly anti-Sharon, pro-Palestinian column that I wrote in Wednesday’s Daily Trojan, but for the most part we get along fine despite our ideological differences.) Andrew knew about blogging because apparently, a lot of conservatives have blogs that they use to spread their ideological views, in defiance of the left-wing media establishment (not to be confused with the vast right-wing conspiracy).

I don’t plan to use my blog for ideological purposes, though. (Ashcroft sucks!) Mostly I’ll be blogging in my traditional narcissistic style, babbling about inconsequential details of my life, as if anyone really cares. :)

Anyway… enjoy the revamped site, and look for more news updates soon!

Revamped site officially online as of moments ago. Details to come.

testing yet again

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Other links on site up & running - see left frame