I remember this thing. . . .

[shadowwalkyr]

So, being the shop Safety NCO, it's my responsibility to give the weekly safety briefing. I've tried to share the wealth, but there was a lot of whining involved, and when my supervisor found "everybody" means "everybody," including him, the kibosh was put on that idea.

Most of my safety briefings are pretty much the same. Boiled down, it becomes "if an idea seems like it might be stupid, it probably is."

When I realized that, in five years, I'd never actually given a briefing on earthquakes, I decided it was high time.

I mean, this is California, after all.

Now, I've lived here all but three years of my life, and I can intuitively handle an earthquake. It's not hard for a Californian.

It's hard to teach what you know intuitively.

So, I found a subject matter expert. Close to home, even.

I tapped Hal, my father-in-law.

He was sublime. He was informative. He gave advice for before, during and after (for those of you who learned "duck and cover" when you were a kid, it's become "duck and hold on for dear life"). He was great.

He stayed on-topic and managed to keep it under thirty-five minutes ("I can talk for hours about this," he said. "Believe him," I said.)

Heh.