Canned Beets and MC Hammer Can Survive "The Big One"

By Kelly Sinon

They say that “The Big One” is inevitable. We live in California, surrounded by a network of earthquake fault lines and all of us are within their crosshairs. Not to scare you, but nothing says safety like “Duck and Cover.”  What elementary school kid in the 70’s wasn’t told that their metal and plywood desk would hold up an entire roof of a school building?

As the complacent Californians that we are, we’re jolted awake every so often at 2 a.m. for the requisite 3.0 that reminds us that we have canned beets that someone brought over from last Thanksgiving, a gallon of water and an open box of granola bars in our Earthquake Survival Kit; all for a family of four.  

 All of that is pretty scary when you think about it, but the canned beets only scare me so much. My fear lies more in the embarrassing realization that when “The Big One” hits, I will not be at my desk at work, or under it, but most probably doing something human.

 Sleeping. Naked. Showering. Naked. Going to the bathroom. Half-Naked.  That’s right. Think about it. It’s said that we spend a good chunk of our time in the bathroom so the odds are pretty good that we’ll be doing something that requires privacy and little to no clothing.  And we spend even more time sleeping.  I’m screwed.

 Venturing into , as the kids say, “TMI Territory”, I know this is how it will be for me, since after every 2 a.m. tremor, I wear something to bed for a week, convinced it’s a precursor to “The Big One”, only to get that dangerous, “I’m invincible” feeling and throw the jammies by the wayside.

The Survival Kit should contain clothes, we know but where to put the Survival Kit?  Ours is in the garage. Our bedroom is on the second floor. I guess that’s okay, because after “The Big One”, our bedroom might also now be in the garage, which scares me because there is no tiny desk to “Duck and Cover” under anywhere in our house.

Just as the food and water should be changed out of the Survival Kit every so often for fresh goods, the clothes should also be changed. How many Survival Kits contain MC Hammer’s Parachute pants after 1989’s Loma Prieta?  Makes you almost rethink that naked thing after seeing those in there, doesn’t it?

Californians are sturdy stock. We go about the business of living, knowing that we live in one of nature’s most unpredictable places. We retrofit, redesign and educate; but we have yet to build the “Duck and Cover” proof desk and I am patiently waiting, because canned beets and MC Hammer won’t give me dignity.


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Want to see how big that last earthquake was? Check out http://www.usgs.gov