Very early this morning (it’s still dark), I’m in bed. Sleeping.

All of a sudden: I’m shaken awake. I look at the clock by my bed. The digital readout says 4:42.

What the heck was that, I ask myself. Damn! If that’s someone slamming a door in another apartment, they should be more considerate!

Then: hmmmm…I wonder if that’s what an earthquake feels like.

How am I to know? I’m new to the Bay Area, and have never experienced a quake anywhere else I’ve been.

I keep thinking. It didn’t exactly seem like a door slamming. It was more as if the Jolly Green Giant slammed his foot down right outside my bedroom window, with the whole building rising a couple of inches then settling back down again. All in the space of a second or so.

It was early morning, though. These thoughts did not last long. I went back to sleep and pondered them no more. In fact, I had totally forgotten the episode until I turned on the TV before breakfast. Then, I heard the news:

SAN FRANCISCO, California (CNN) -- A magnitude 4.2 earthquake shook the San Francisco area Friday at 4:42 a.m. PT (7:42 a.m. ET), the U.S. Geological Survey reported.

The quake left about 2,000 customers without power, said David Eisenhower, a spokesman for Pacific Gas and Light.

Under the USGS classification, a magnitude 4.2 earthquake is considered "light," which it says usually causes minimal damage.

"We had quite a spike in calls, mostly calls of inquiry, none of any injury, none of any damage that was reported," said Capt. Al Casciato of the San Francisco police. "It was fairly mild."

The quake was centered about two miles east-northeast of Oakland, at a depth of 3.6 miles, the USGS said. Oakland is just east of San Francisco, across San Francisco Bay.

An Oakland police dispatcher told CNN the quake set off alarms at people's homes. The shaking lasted about 50 seconds, said CNN meteorologist Chad Myers.

According to the USGS, magnitude 4.2 quakes are felt indoors and may break dishes and windows and overturn unstable objects. Pendulum clocks may stop.

One might say that my initiation to San Fran life is off to a shaky start.

Ah, the joys of moving continue…

Despite my previous rave review of the Marpac SleepMate (a white-noise device), ultimately it just wasn’t enough to resolve the dilemma of having moved into an apartment that’s located directly above a couple who have a TV in their bedroom and play it all hours. Sooooo…although I was initially kicking and screaming at the thought of expending all this energy, I spent the last two days dismantling and then entirely rebuilding my bedroom and office spaces, exchanging the contents of the rooms, one for the other. My sleeping space is now in the “second bedroom” and the office is in the master bedroom. Honestly, I had intensely resisted this as a solution because, for the first time ever (for me), the master bedroom has a master bath…and the occupancy, now, of the second bedroom, negates its (the master bath’s) advantages.

But: getting sleep is the primary consideration here. Deep, restorative sleep is essential for good health (especially for someone with fibromyalgia), and the lack of it “deprives the body of its opportunity to replenish its supply of dopamine” (Dryland, p. 54). Having recently read The Fibromyalgia Solution, I now know that I must continue to work on the sleep issues I’ve had for years and years if I have any hope of eventually conquering this condition. Hence, all the work to change my sleeping space around: short-term pain for long-term gain.

It was a warm, cloudless day when I first arrived in Larkspur. This is the view from my patio that evening…

Here are a few random thoughts from a mind clouded over with moving fatigue…

• I think the 80/20 rule applies to moving and possessions. At least for me. I’m estimating that 80% of the weight I cart around from place to place represents just about 20% of the actual volume. I have been making good progress with the unpacking, and the things I have left to take out of their boxes are (mainly) the books and framed art…these items don’t take up that much room on the truck, but they sure are heavy. [For anyone keeping score: 34 boxes of books and journals (not counting the boxes in storage); 8 large mirror-pack boxes of art.]

• I stopped by the local AAA office yesterday (to pick up a couple small travel items for my upcoming trip to Wisconsin). While there, I took the time to switch my membership from the Oregon/Idaho region to the Utah/Nevada/Northern California club. The person I talked to also gave me an estimate on car and renter’s insurance (which just may be the way I go after I shop around a little more). While talking about auto rates, of course I disclosed that I drive a 2007 Subaru. At one point, when touting the good rates enjoyed by drivers in Marin County, he indicated that, here, “everyone drives a Subaru or above.” Now, I guess he meant no judgment with this statement, which, of course, is true (there are LOTS of Lexus, BMW and Mercedes drivers here)…it’s just that he accurately pegged me (as an educator) on the low end of the socio-economic scale in Marin…which Wikipedia lists as the “richest county in the U.S.”

• My kitchen is unpacked and functional as of this evening. I “cooked” my first meal in this new place: a take-and-bake pizza (medium veggie) from Papa Murphy’s.

• I found my towels. (A big “thank you” goes to those of you who have written and called with your concern.) They were creatively used as packing material by my moving crew. Not to worry. I’ve still been taking baths.

• I found a local source for white-noise machines. I desired/needed one because the neighbors below me have a TV in the bedroom, right below MY bedroom. And they keep different hours than me (the prototypical early-to-bed-early-to-rise person). They stay up, and play their TV, to the wee hours. I rarely am up past 10:00 p.m. In case you’re interested, I heartily recommend the Marpac SleepMate 980A model.

• I watched the MLB All-Star Game on TV last night…played about 15 miles from right here. The National League almost pulled it off. They kept me glued to the set right to the very last pitch. I considered tuning out after 8 innings, but I kept reminding myself that, like life, a baseball game ain’t over till it’s over.

• One last question: Is every resident of Marin County, by definition, a Mariner?

Here I am, finally, on 7-7-07, offering up my first blog entry as a Californian.

This post would have come to you sooner, but, well, I’ve had some things to do…what with totally changing my life and all. I arrived in Larkspur on Monday, and my stuff got here the next day. As you can imagine, I’ve been fairly preoccupied with this end of the moving process.

Plus, I’ve spent a little bit of time since my internet service was restored doing some mundane (but important) computer-maintenance tasks. After the cable guy hooked me up, I, of course, immediately logged on to my email accounts; a backlog of several dozen messages proceeded to download. Inevitably, there was a lot of junk among the messages, all of which I quickly deleted. However, somewhere in that mess, potential trouble was apparently waiting for me…

Now, I am very conscientious when it comes to internet security and virus protection, so Norton AntiVirus did its regularly-scheduled full-system scan of my computer in the middle of the night on Thursday; during the run it detected (and quarantined) a copy of Downloader (a Trojan-Horse type of virus). This is quite unusual for my system to have inherited an infection from somewhere, so I went into a mild freak-out mode… even though Norton assured me that the threat was completely contained.

Anyway, I spent part of the day yesterday going through the (somewhat tedious) recommended removal process for the virus, just to be sure that my system was completely virus-free.

Given the chaos that is my life (what with living in an entirely new state, existing in the midst of a hundred or so cardboard boxes, virus removal, and unpacking activities), unfortunately there’s been little time so far for writing or blogging.

But, here I am, doing a little bit of composing at the keyboard, while trying to establish myself in an entirely new environment. I now live within spitting distance of the Golden Gate Bridge. And I am trying, desperately, eagerly, to decipher how things are done here. This ain’t rural Oregon, folks. This is more like big-city stuff. Suburban San Fran. In the mahvallus Golden State.

Among the things I’m trying to figure out:

• How to keep cool. (It was over 100 degrees here on Thursday.)
• How to keep warm. (It was in the low 50s this morning.)
• My neighbors and their noise-making patterns (and where to find a white-noise device).
• Recycling. Again! (This will be the topic of a future post all on its own.)
• This whole pumping-your-own-gas thing.
• Where to shop for, well, everything.
• Where the movers packed my towels. (And a number of other things that must be in incompletely-labeled boxes.)
• What are the best routes to get from place to place and avoid the freeways at rush hour.
• How to take care of myself physically, emotionally, and spiritually while undergoing this massive life change.
• How to make it a priority to just get out and take a walk. And to meditate. And to relax.
• Where to buy lamps for my new place. (There’s a dearth of built-in lighting.)
• How to feed myself when the kitchen unpacking has not been touched.
• What’s going on in the world, as I’m basically ignoring the news.
• How to improve my FM radio reception. (Amazingly, it appears to be terrible up here in the hills.)
• How to save up enough energy to make a trip to Wisconsin this coming week.
• And about a billion other things, all at the same time, as I begin life in an unfamiliar place.

Anyway, here I am. In California. Not Roseburg. (What a relief!)