The earth did move for me!

1:42pm Thursday 3rd April 2008

FOR the second time in my life I thought I had gone completely mad.

On Wednesday morning - woke from my peaceful slumber with memories of seeing a freestanding unit in the corner of my bedroom vibrating at about 1am.

Getting out of bed I just shrugged it off as a very strange dream, brought on by over indulgence of pizza - as I'm on a diet. I thought it might have been some kind of guilty reaction.

That was until I got in the car and heard the lovely people on the radio, who make my drive into work so enjoyable, talking about an earthquake.

With the epicentre in Lincolnshire - started to question whether - could actually have felt it here in sunny Swindon.

There didn't seem to be many calls from people down this end of the country saying that the earth had moved for them.

So I faced a dilemma - do I admit to my colleagues, who are all cynical journalists, that I thought I had felt the vibrations during the early hours.

Surreal as that mental debate was, it isn't the first time in my life that I have had it. Odd, I know.

Cast your minds back to September 2002 and you might recall that the ground shook then too.

It's a particularly vivid memory for me as it was my first night at university in Sheffield. I'd just met all my new housemates, been out for a couple of drinks and started to get a feel for the area. I'd only been in bed for about 20 minutes when my bed, the fitted wardrobes in the corner of the room and all the walls began shaking - and noticeably.

Convinced that the house was about to come crumbling down around me I just hid under the covers, but a few minutes later everything became still. It was the weirdest moment of my life - as we don't tend to have that many earthquakes in the UK.

The next morning I was dying to know if anyone else had the same experience, but at the same time I was worried they would think I was totally cuckoo and ignore me for the rest of the year. After all, I had only met them less than 24 hours previously. Thankfully, half of them had felt it (God knows what the other half were up to - probably too much booze) and no one thought any worse of me. So with that in mind, I admitted to feeling the shakes. After a couple of cautious "did Steph spend too long in the pub last night" looks, they seemed to be convinced.

Then again, they have been giving me very funny glances since then.

Joke of the week: "Doctor, Doctor, I keep seeing pink elephants."

"Have you seen a psychiatrist?" asks the doctor.

"No, only pink elephants."

Your Neighbourhood News