A whole lot of shaking going on...

in Wilmette, where nothing ever happens. This morning around 4:50 am, there was an earthquake of a magnitude of 5.2, which shook up the entire state. I was up a few minutes before that, but I missed the action when I went back to bed. There were plenty of other people who did notice it, including my friend who lives in Lake Forest, who told me that her bed was shaking. I experienced earthquakes when I lived in New Zealand, and remember them to be similar to the rumble of a train going by in the distance. The most unusual thing about this quake was that we rarely have earthquakes in this area. Historically, there have been a few strong ones about 200 years ago when the state was not heavily populated.

Now, to continue with more strange news from Wilmette, there was a cougar sighted here last week. Later in the week, the same cougar was seen on the north side of Chicago. Unfortunately for him, he was shot by the police. After a investigation, it was determined that he was a wild cougar who probably wandered into the area from Wisconsin and places further west. He appeared to be following the canal south when he turned up in a residential neighborhood and met his demise.

There are more and more predatory animals in our area--we had a coyote living a block away. Since our climate is becoming more moderate, we have so many rabbits around, which make a good meal for predators.