Shake, Rattle and Role: American Style

I had this really vivid dream on Thursday night. I was at work in my office at school when the earth shook! I scrambled under my desk, and except for objects rattled off of shelves and piles of empty boxes from MSA testing toppled around the room, I was okay. The room, however was pitch black (power off), and I have no windows. So I got up and found the door, but it wouldn't open. The building had shifted and the door was jammed! I could hear the sound of kids being evacuated and I pounded on the door until the teacher next to me came and shouted that she would get help. A few minutes later one of the building services guys showed up with an axe (an axe!--I doubt we actually have one on the school grounds) and he chopped me to freedom. Once out, we began to learn the news of the extent of the disaster. The epicenter was no where near D.C. but in western Kentucky! In a fit a disbelief, I woke up.

I look at the seismic activity in the U.S. since the Great Chile earthquake and it's really saying something. Something that my subconscious mind is clearly worrying about. California is as shaky as ever!, but there are two "hot spots" if you will. Central Oklahoma and the fault just off of the coast of Oregon have been very active. In Oregon, the activity is on a known plate, the quakes in central Oklahoma are on a mid-continental plate where rifts have and are forming. Are these signs of something larger to come? I would have any idea. But it is curious, and as I have said before the general global seismic activity is occurring at a pace much larger and more intense that usual.