When the Earth Moves Again 1

A little earthquake just up the river from here; I’d be surprised if anyone on the surface noticed it.

I was in a 4.something-I-think-4 once in San Francisco. I had traveled there by train for a conference. (One of the bennies in traveling on a business pass was being entitled to a private room in a sleeping car.)

It was my first night on the ground after three nights en route (leave Philly in the evening, arrive in Chicago in the morning, kill a day, leave in the late afternoon, arrive Oakland late the second morning–it is a big country).

I woke up dreaming I was back in the sleeping car rocking in the berth from crossing rough switches. It lasted about as long as it would take to cross two tracks at slow speed leaving a station.

I realized what had happened, figured it was over, and went back to sleep. The next morning, the desk clerk told me that a number of persons had come down at three o’clock and checked out.

I have always wondered, where did they go at three o’clock in the morning? Another hotel in downtown San Francisco?