Day One - Month of June opens with some Shakin'

Yes Ma'am!! The first day of June comes with a whole lotta shakin' goin' on!!! Three 3.7 earthquakes occurred at three separate times in this area. The explanation given by the Earthquake Engineering Laboratory yesterday - "The earthquakes are related to the subduction process. The first and third occur at great depth the second not. For that reason, there is no relationship between them rather than being caused by the normal process of collapse of the Cocos plate under the Caribbean" and "Although often the earthquakes that are reported are hereby senses acceleration records are pretty intense at many stations, as here in Guanacaste. Furthermore, its magnitude is not desprecible, which is provided by this type of information." taken from their page on Facebook. It was translated so it may not be the same word for word. You know lately how it takes an earthquake to get me to post, well, I'm happy I read about it cause I did not feel a thing. A big semi truck passes and it sometimes causes the earth to vibrate so who can tell?? This is the report from the University of Costa Rica:

Checking the activity chart for earthquakes, I have a lot to catch up on, the month of May was very active!! The whole Blogger look and layout is totally different since my last post. It will not put in returns and spaces inbetween lines now.....

Earthquake Alarm

I am positive I have a group of readers that is highly evolved, educated, and intelligent. What I present to you is an idea for an earthquake alarm. Earthquakes are new to me coming from hurricane country. With hurricanes, you have a warning, earthquakes no. Why couldn't someone invent a device that has a pendulum over a contact point and when there is rocking, shaking, the pendulum would disconnect from the contact point and an alarm would sound. Yes, it would be during the first tremors of an earthquake but at least if you were asleep, it would alert you to the start of the earthquake. Something simple and inexpensive like the fire alarms.

I've had many inventions in my life but never moved on them. Disposable feminine wipes, disposable glass wipes, musical greeting cards, donut baby bottles, sugarless PopTarts, etc. I even wrote to Kellogg to ask them to make sugarless PopTarts (my stepson had diabetes and would sneak PopTarts) and they wrote back that they have a whole team of researchers and for me not to send in any more ideas. Most of my ideas have come out of needing something that didn't exist. Of course, I was stunned when I saw my ideas on the market but was happy to have them.

So, put your thinking caps on and see if you can invent an earthquake alarm. You might save lives. Maybe the pendulum would have a weak magnetic connection and when the base moved with the earthquake motion, the point would disconnect from the contact and an alert would sound. If you do succeed with the prototype, patents, distribution, and marketing, please send me one. Thanks. Teri

BTW - We had two earthquakes this past Wednesday which sparked this post for action.

TERREMOTO

Yes, it's all in caps because when you have felt one, you can feel the fear when the just the word "TERREMOTO" is heard. Trill the r's. Emphasis Moto. It's a powerful word when you know what it means. My dictionary says it's pronounced "tayRaymóhtoh".
Speaking Southern, it comes out more like tar-r-ra mota.

Luckily, we only felt a slight shimmer here in my area but what happened in other parts of Costa Rica, well, I'll let Sally at www.abroadincostarica.com tell you about it. Great coverage at her site.

I've put a lot of thought into whether I would rather live with Mother Nature's hurricanes or her earthquakes and I long ago decided, I'd rather take my chances with an earthquake. I've lived through hurricanes. Yes, you have warning but I think a TERREMOTO is over fast and with no warning, there's no anxiety (except for the fear of aftershocks and volcanoes blowing).
Pura Vida.

My heart goes out to those suffering now from Thursday's TERREMOTO. Of course you know, if you live here you can take food, water, and money to the Red Cross to help.

SIDEBAR on my blog - Check out "Shake, Rattle and Roll" for updates on earthquakes here and around the world. I'm 'Miss Chicken Little' so I check this often.
Search (upper left corner on my blog) "earthquakes" for past posts on the subject or click here.

HELLO?? 6.6 and counting......

Maybe we should start getting nervous a little. If you look back in May, which I didn't report not one earthquake, we had loads of activity. About yesterday's rumblings, this is what the institute has to say about the two earthquakes yesterday: "According to USGS event 06:45 pm was M = 6. 2 and P = 9 7 km event 09:15 pm was M = 6. 4 and P = 5 9 km according to EMSC event 06:45 pm was M = 5. 9 and P = 10 km event 09: 15 pm was m = 5. 8 and P = 2 km these differences remind us that the location and magnitude of an earthquake are not easy much less when earthquakes occur offshore, away from stations that can register (that usually will be those that are on the Mainland). Assuming that both events are relatively close each other as evidenced by seismological centres, how to explain that the accelerations of the first were greater than the second? A common thing in both centers is that they report the first event as deeper than the second. In Costa Rica the accelerations of the first were much larger than the second. If the first earthquake was stronger, that makes little sense. However, if the second event was stronger, as suggested by the USGS, but more shallow as evidenced by the two seismic centers, then the reason for the differences in acceleration as marked between the earthquake from 06: 45 pm and 09: 15 pm should be mainly the depth. Indeed, if the second earthquake was stronger, but more shallow, most of their energy is due release very near the epicentral area, therefore, its influence at great distances to which would be our country, would have been necessarily less and would be reflected in lower values of acceleration. The importance of the depth in the area of impact of an earthquake can be understood better with this analogy which had already explained above: http://www.lis.ucr.ac.cr/index.php?id=30 (Translated by Bing)" To clarify why it is felt different in various locations, I ripped off this illustration from the University of Costa Rica's website.....

Just "Get Use to It!"

Link to earthquake in Costa Rica yesterday....
http://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/recenteqsww/Quakes/usb0006ib9.php

Earthquakes were something I had NEVER experienced before ~ coming from S. W. Florida. The ground literally shifting under your feet, it is an alarming and disorienting feeling. The first earthquake I experienced was "cool". After I saw all the damage in the neighboring town of Parrita, I now RUN and it has long lost it's "coolness". They call it Terremoto (or temblor)! 
Past post here from 2006.

Yesterday, when the earth moved, I was inside a three-story building. My first instinct was to run for outside the door to clear sky. I was happy to see I did this without hesitation or thinking, I just bolted. Some people barely missed a beat and hardly noticed. They're natives.

Post Script for long time followers and newbees: Remember when I had music on here, before 'they' blocked it because I am "international", well, IF I had my music list still in operation, Johnny Cash's Ring of Fire would be playing. That's exactly where we live here, check out Wikipedia link - Ring of Fire.
Yeppers, we all know terremotos come with the territory living here in paradise!

TERREMOTO

In English that means EARTHQUAKE!!!
Yeppers, Wednesday morning at 12:40 a.m.,
my house rocked/shuttered for about three seconds!
It's so hard to describe but being on the second floor,
I could really feel it. It seems to last longer than it is.
I'm sure most people slept through it but I was wide
awake, watching Joan of Arc for the second time.
I am from hurricane country. Hurricanes, I understand.
Earthquakes, that's a whole new terror.
IT comes from NOWHERE, out of the blue.
Like the raging lightning here a few nights ago
with barely any rain.
From out of nowhere, but it passed fast.
Same for the earthquake.
My first earthquake here was novel and exciting.
Later, after I saw the damage on t.v., my respect grew.
Raging Mother Earth - She ROCKS!
You gotta have respect.

TEMBLOR - a week later...

I have since changed my mind about preferring earthquakes to hurricanes. I'll take something I can run from any day over an earthquake (or a volcanic eruption). It didn't effect the Jaco area but other parts of Costa Rica, in the provinces of Alajuela, Heredia, Cartago and San José, weren't so fortunate. Check out The REAL Costa Rica blog: http://blog.therealcostarica.com/2009/01/14/the-power-of-the-earthquake/

SEX, DRUGS, & R & R

Tantra is our local sex shop at Galleone Mall in central Jaco. The windows are blacked out so if you want to see what's inside, you have to go inside.

Maybe I'll venture in one day just so I can blog about it and possibly find something of ahhh, interest. Point being, it's not hidden down some seedy side street, it's front and center, here in Sin City. One other sex shop was shut down, probably because you could see inside driving down the Jaco Beach main street. It was located in the "Red Zone" but it just didn't fly. .... TOO in your face.

The photo on the right is our local head shop, 420. Truly, I never connected 4:20 with "it's time to get high" but here, it's common knowledge. Who here waits 'till 4:20 p.m.? If you're a typical Jaco surfer, you "wake and bake". You would never guess it's illegal here. Not too much care is taken to conceal it. One evening while having dinner at a "nice restaurant", I actually saw a "local" empty out a bag of weed ON THE TABLE next to me to show some tourist what exactly they were buying. When your bill is $50, you don't expect drug deals to take place right next to you. The owner of the restaurant was out of town at the time.

I was taken back by the gas masks on display at the 420 Shop. I thought they were for a fall-out or something. The attendant explained to me how to use it. I felt so "virginal". I guess it could come in handy in case of a volcanic eruption.
We have five active volcanoes out of 117 total.
We have earthquakes too but there's no smog here in Babylon Jaco.

Little Jaco is changing so fast, I don't think they (or me) will be able to handle it in a few years with it's downward spiral expansion. The crime will scare off the tourist. Jaco already has a bad reputation. Some talk has been made of having "Tourist Police". Wonder what it would cost to pay-off these "special guys". Some Transitos (traffic police) have already gone from 10,000 colones ($20) to $100 cash (U. S. dollars).
I remember when 5,000 colones could get you out of a Whole 'Nother World of BIG trouble (that's another blog). Fifty dollars is your Get Out of Jail pass. It will keep you (The Foreigner) out of the Big Blue Paddy Wagon if you don't have the proper paperwork on you when you're out drinking at the Hot Spots.
...So I've heard.

As far as the "R & R" in the title, we're not talking Rock and Roll.
I should leave something to your imagination.

p.s. I keep seeing "Borat" clips on t.v. - Him and his sister would fall right in here in Jaco hell.

Jolt in the Night

O.K., was I dreaming or did we have a big tremor last night?
I couldn't find any info on it at the "SHAKE, RATTLE and ROLL" link on my sidebar.
I'm interested to see if anyone else in CR felt it or were my dogs barking about nothing. It woke me up but I promptly fell back to sleep. I must be used to it by now.

Above image depicts earthquakes around the world the last 30 days. Wow.

Church on Sunday - Italy

Photo above is in the Italian Village of Paganica.

While we were enjoying beautiful weather and tranquil conditions here in Costa Rica Sunday evening, it was Monday already in Italy and they were not as fortunate as a series of earthquakes hit their central area of L'Aquila.

Our prayers are with you.

Unseen Dangers

"DANGER, Will Robinson, Danger." - from Lost in Space (1960's). Google it if you're too young to know these things.

I was raised to see the "danger" in just about everything. My mom was a fanatic about keeping us safe (God bless her). She was quick to spot the potential danger and point the peril out to us girls. Her fears kept us from participating in many activities but I have never had a broken bone or serious injury (nor my sisters). My mom would have approved of me following my dream to live in a foreign country but she would have been crazy with worry over the "what ifs". My sisters handed out a dose of the what ifs before I moved to Costa Rica, like "what if you get sick" or "what if you die over there". I thought through the whole scenerio and long ago decided, I do plan to die here or there, one day but the burial part I've already specified.
(my past post: http://yo-yoinparadise.blogspot.com/2006/08/pushing-daisies-in-costa-rica.html)
I love Costa Rica and consider it my home now, it's where I live now. All of their worries didn't come close to the real fears I live with here, living in the tropics. (...and I'm from South Florida (Everglades area) which is considered "tropical" - read hot, humid, wetlands...)

For instance, the other night there was no rain - just twirls of strong wind now and then. Spooky like. I was immediately on alert. It prompted me to close some of my windows but not all of them like I would if it were raining. Then all of a sudden, a tremendous wind force whipped through my house. It was frightening. I wondered if the old tall palm tree (past posts - "the nesting tree")
would hold or fall to the house. If my tiles on my roof would be scattered all over the neighborhood but mainly, I wondered what was coming next. A few years ago, we had a tornado come through crossing on both sides of my house. There was damage all around but I was untouched. Raging Mother Nature is alive and well here. We have it all, from earthquakes to tornados, floods, even hurricanes and possible erupting volcanoes (112 volcanoes in CR - google Pacific Rim of Fire and you'll find Miss Costa Rica). My mom would have been worried sick the whole time I lived here. Both my parents have been layed to rest or I would have never been able to live here in peace. The strong winds the other night reminded me of "The Three Little Pigs" fairytale, I was proud to be living in a strong brick (concrete) house like I was raised in.

For me, the real dangers living here are unseen. It is not crime, drunk drivers, bad roads, or even the deadly snakes, it's the diseases! Tropical diseases, from the dirt, bugs, water... I enjoy watching Dr. House and last night this sick guy takes everyone hostage at gunpoint to diagnosis what is wrong with him. No one had been able to detect his disease in past years and he just had to know what was wrong with him at the fate of going to jail. Of course, Dr. House did diagnosis his disease within the hour (with much drama) and he had MELIADOSIS! Ever hear of it? Me neither, so I googled it. Check out what it is at this link:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melioidosis You'll be surprised. On Dr. House, I learned about the Chagas disease, too. I blogged about it (search - "Chagas", upper left corner of Yo-Yo). I've blogged about the MANY parasites that are found here (search "parasites", warning-this one is really scarey) but I really didn't research the tropical diseases. Here is Wiki's list: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tropical_disease It's a real eye opener and it makes me wonder if the writers of Dr. House draw from these lists for their "tropical diseases".

If you check out these links, it will put things into perspective as far as where your real fears should be. Most people coming to Costa Rica are so focused on the crime and the extreme weather, they don't put much thought into those things that are present but unseen.
I do, I was raised that way.
Pura Vida.

So you know, I do go barefoot on the beach and walk my dogs through the river
and I sometimes drink the water (can't help but to).
I feel my fears are in check,
"the only thing we have to fear is fear itself" message
and truly, my biggest fear has been resolved.
I feared dying without realizing my dream to live in Costa Rica
...and do as I damned well please.
Remember HGTV's show, The Good Life?
That inspired me, to "sale out and sail away" to Costa Rica.

For those that don't know about the three little pigs, here it is:

"Three Little Pigs
Three young pigs leave home to make their way in life. They have to construct their own homes. Two of the youngsters play around all day and simply put up a house of straw and the other of sticks. The third little pig is industrious and works hard to build a sturdy house of bricks. A hungry wolf happens by and huffs and puffs and easily blows down the flimsy dwellings of straw and sticks and eats the first two little pigs. But the wolf cannot blow down the tough house of bricks and thus this pig is saved. A tragic ending for the wolf in a version of this fairy tail is that when he climbs down the chimney of the third pig he falls into the boiling cauldron, is cooked and eaten.

Moral: hard work and enterprise triumphs over evil forces and misfortune (the wolf)." - quoted from Wikipedia.

The Rain Catcher

I have literally collected buckets and buckets of rain lately.
Anyone that lives here (my area), knows that when it rains, the main water filters clog with mud and the area is without water if they use the local water. It's a given. During the "dry season", well, there is no water then either. It's a definite problem but I have found ways to deal with it. The bright side is AyA is working on supplying water for us... soon.

I have a reserve water tank on my top of my house but I've used all it's water. It's on top of my house so I don't need a pump. It feeds water to the house by gravity. If you have a tank on ground level with a pump, the water tank is useless when there is no electricity. Plus, a tank underground can collaspe if it's not done right. Think tremors, earthquakes, mudslides... The earth moves here.

If we do have running water during the rain, it's muddy and not worth using. Check this out! The photo is of muddy water coming out of my faucet.

I catch rain in buckets to fill up my extra water bottles. At least I have water to flush toilets, mop, etc. I've even used rainwater to bathe but it's a real procedure that involves heating the water. It's cold.

It's part of "roughing it". I am lucky in some way because I have a big open balcony upstairs that collects the rain and a drain pipe that ends right above my front entrance. Poor design on the house but during the rainy months, it comes in handy for my rain catching.

Pura vida.

If it weren't for Earthquakes...

guess there'd be no posts at all! Yes, we had another one, well actually, we had TWO! One at midnight and we were the center of that one and another 3.4 mag. early in the morning around 4ish. Didn't even disturb me or my dogs. I so much prefer a bunch a little ones instead of THE BIG ONE.
Go here - http://www.lis.ucr.ac.cr/index.php?id=492 and check it out.
Otherwise, blue skies, nice waves, and the sun is shining EVERY DAY!
We need RAIN! Not a drop here in over two months.
If you live in this area, please set out water for the animals. Bananas are cheap, I them out this time of year for the birds and iguanas. They love me.

If you'd like to see the earthquake activity we have had this month so far, go to this site: http://www.lis.ucr.ac.cr/index.php?id=Inicio

"I feel the BIG ONE coming" - Sanford says to Elizabeth as he holds his heart and looks upward (Sanford & Sons)... that's what comes to mind with all these little ones.