Studio711.com – Ben Martens

Earthquake preparedness kits are selling like hot cakes and it’s in the news. Seattle is going to be obliterated by an earthquake! The end is near! RUN FOR YOUR LIVES!

The other night I got curious as to why the impending earthquake is all of a sudden big news. Why is everybody freaking out about this all of a sudden? There are articles every year about this, so was there some new revelation or scientific discovery?

Nope. It can be traced back to a click-bait article in the New Yorker. This got picked up and went viral. News flash: There’s a fault line under Seattle. News flash: There are fault lines everywhere. Yes, any fault line could be the source of an earthquake, and yes, you should be prepared for the possibility, but seriously, settle down. You should also be prepared for a house fire, a car accident, a volcano eruption, measles outbreaks and missile attacks from North Korea.

Three local earthquake experts got together to do a Reddit AMA (Ask Me Anything) and it’s a much better source of actual science related to the possibility of a Seattle earthquake. If you’re really concerned about this, note that three LOCAL experts wrote this. They study this stuff as a profession and yet they still happily live and work here.

So yes, it’s possible that we could have an earthquake tomorrow and yes, it might be devastating, but this possibility has existed for a very long time, and lots of data says that it’s not likely to happen for another couple hundred years. There are also threats of disasters. Do some basic preparations and get on with your life.

P.S. Luke 12:22-31

P.P.S. If you want to watch a good interview about this, check out episode 12 of The New Screensavers. That link will take you right to the start of the interview.

My parents are embarking on a huge adventure this summer. They are building a new shop/garage beside their existing two car garage! The end result will feature a workshop area divided from a garage bay that is big enough to hold their Allis Chalmers WD 45 tractor and some other things. I dream about having something like this someday (or just a property big enough to hold it!)

While Dad is planning to do most of the work by himself, he did contract out the foundation. That got laid this week. It’s hard to believe they were able to cram three cement trucks down that 1/4 mile long dirt road driveway and maneuver them in the area by the house!

My rationale for keeping this daily blog has changed over time, but right now, the main motivation is to record major events in my life and talk about things that interest me in between. We recently had one of those major life events that we’ll remember forever, and even though it’s a pretty dramatic story, I do want to capture some of my thoughts about it. Everybody processes this kind of thing in a different way, and I find a lot of value in writing it down.

The short version is that while we were sitting in church, my brother-in-law, sitting right next to us, was a victim of cardiac arrest. Our parking lot quickly hosted four or five ambulance/rapid response vehicles, a fire truck and at least one police car. Church members started CPR, EMTs were on the scene just a minute or two after the 911 call was placed, and a comibination of CPR and an AED not only saved his life but also prevented any brain damage. I’m intentionally leaving out a lot of details because, while this event happened in public, it’s not something that you would choose to show to a church full of people. But I do want to write my personal experience going through this as a family member, husband and father.

We say that we have “crazy” and “stressful” days when really everything is usually within a pretty normal set of boundaries. A big part of the battle when confronted with a truly life-threatening event is how quickly you can jump outside of those normal boundaries, realize what’s happening and take action. Our church members excelled at this. Before Tyla could finish telling me to get help, I took off running to grab a landline because I knew somebody else would call from a cell phone. By the time I came back on the phone with 911, another member was already asking me for the address and I saw others starting to call too. That first call had to have been initiated in less than 10 seconds and it played a key role in saving his life.

A couple members were already tending to the situation, checking his pulse, getting him in the rescue position, etc so my next thought was getting Elijah out of there. He’s too young to understand a lot of things, but he didn’t need to see any of what was happening. Thankfully, somebody else had already grabbed him and taken him away. He was pretty oblivious to the next 15-20 minutes of events and I found him later playing on the playground (under the watchful eye of some parents.) Thankfully some other people shuttled Tyla and Megan out of the immediate area too. Obviously if I was the only one there and responsible for medical care, I wouldn’t have had the luxury of worrying quite as much about my family, but in retrospect, I’m so thankful that they were spared a lot of the events that happened in that area.

The first paramedics made excellent time since they are less than a mile away, and seeing them brought a huge feeling of relief. I’ve been through a number of CPR courses including a multi-month outdoor first aid class, so I’ve seen all these steps before, but it’s so much easier to take instructions from a pro than to be thinking for yourself under that stress.

I use the word “medic” in the title loosely. I participated by helping to move him out of the pew, praying, and answering a few questions. The outcome would likely have been exactly as good if I wasn’t there. But not participating in the direct medical care was also unsettling. It was a surreal experience as I stood there pretty sure that I was watching my brother-in-law die wondering what I could possibly do to help more.

The story has a happy ending. We offer endless prayers of thanks for letting it happen the way it did. So many small changes to do the day would have created yet another fatality. The survival rates are abysmal, but this was a success story.

It was really odd going through this with a young child. I wanted to shield him from as much of it as possible, so even as we were driving to the hospital wondering what the outcome would be, I had my happy face on trying to keep Elijah entertained. How do you process the possible death of your brother-in-law while you’re feeding bunny snacks to your kid and queueing up his favorite music? While it was odd to have that mismatch, it was also really helpful to see Elijah’s smiling face as he bounced around the hospital. He kept the mood lighter than it might otherwise have been.

We were all back in church the next Sunday. I knew it would be weird, but I didn’t realize how hard it would be. As we got to the first Bible reading (the point where it happened the previous week), it was all I could do to stay in my seat. I have no idea what Pastor was saying because all I could see whether my eyes were open or closed was the look on my brother-in-laws face when he slumped over. It’s burned into my skull. It got easier as the service went on, but I’m sure it will be tough for many Sundays to come.

None of us know when God will end the clock on our existance, but we’re thankful that our family is still in tact with relatively few after-effects. All of these emotions that we have are tempered by knowing that the story has a happy ending. We’ll probably never understand why this happened in our lives, but “we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him.” (Romans 8:28)

I’ve been wearing contacts since sixth grade. More specifically, I’ve been wearing A contact since sixth grade. There were only a few years in there where I had to wear a contact in both eyes. I’ve always had the disposable ones that last two weeks before you’re supposed to toss them.

I recently switched to a new eye doctor and he gave me a trial of the Acuvue Moist daily wear contacts. As the name implies, you open up a new package and then toss the contact away at the end of the daily. The benefit is that you get a fresh feeling contact all the time and you don’t have to buy any contact solution. When you’re traveling, that’s one less liquid to worry about in your carry on.

I was previously using the Acuvue Oasys and these new ones are about double the cost. But since I only need a contact in one eye, that extra cost still fits mostly within my annual health plan budget.

So far I’m really liking them. One of my favorite parts is being able to pop my contact out whenever I feel like it without going in to the bathroom and putting it in it’s case. Is it worth the extra cost? Ehhh… if I had to pay very much out of pocket, I probably wouldn’t do it, but for basically free? Yeah, why not?

What would you do with an extra second?! The possibilities are… limited. But that will be your opportunity tonight. The moon and redistribution of mass on Earth (earthquakes, moving glaciers, etc) effect the speed of rotation of the earth. Atomic clocks obviously aren’t affected by these things so for the same reason that we need leap days, we also need some smaller adjustments.

Wikipedia says this has happened 25 times since 1972 and tonight will be the 26th time. The International Earth Rotation and Reference Systems Service schedules these events six months in advance on an as needed basis.

I’ll spend my extra second sleeping… or more likely I’ll spend it trying to get my son to go back to sleep.

Last summer, I wrote up my thoughts on The Martian by Andy Weir. It’s an awesome science fiction book based almost completely in the realm of actual science. (The author admits to one intentional deviation in the first few pages to make a better story.) You could quickly summarize the book as “MacGyver on Mars.”

The buzz around this book is ramping up again because trailers for the movie are starting to come out. It’s directed by Ridley Scott and stars Matt Damon. I really enjoyed the book and have high hopes for the movie.

If you’re at all interested in engineering, space, or science fiction, this is one to keep on your radar. I don’t know whether it’s better to read the book or watch the movie first, but personally I’d say you should read the book first because it’s your only option right now! Here are a couple links to get a taste of what you’re in for. Don’t worry about spoiling the book by watching these. He gets stranded on Mars. Surprise! That’s the whole point of the book and you learn that in the first couple pages.

XKCD has a comic this week about the movie too.

The Microsoft campus has lots of art in all of the buildings. There’s so much of it, that it’s easy to walk right by without paying much attention. But if you walk into the main conference center, take a minute to stop and look at that huge, graffiti-covered cement wall. It’s an original piece of the Berlin Wall! The piece was a gift to Bill Gates and he has it on display in the conference center.