Mary and I went out for dinner at a Japanese restaurant in San Jose. After we had ordered and while we were waiting for our food, we had the lovely experience of a magnitude 5.6 earthquake centered to the northeast of San Jose (see wave form above extracted from the USGS site). The quake started (at least what we noticed) with about 5 seconds of strong side to side motion followed by another 30 seconds or so of slow swaying. It was long enough for people to start to get concerned, but even though the shaking felt pretty strong, nothing seemed to be falling down or anything. For the next 10 minutes or so, no one was able to make a call with their cell phones. After we finished dinner, we headed home to check on things. It turns out our house is only about 6 miles from the epicenter. Fortunately, other than a small table-top picture frame that had fallen over, nothing appeared amiss. One thing is for sure, we’re not prepared for a strong temblor like the Loma Prieta earthquake that wreaked havoc on on the Bay Area in 1989.