On Wednesday technology gained some relevance I hadn't really considered before. Around 1:45 in the afternoon I had just logged in to check my email and take a mid day peek at twitter and facebook when the room began to vibrate like a train was passing through.

Immediately I noticed the water I had just opened and set on the desk was dancing around in the bottle. It took a second or two but I realized we were experiencing an earth quake. A rare occurrence in Ontario but a flash back to my childhood years living in LA. 

Even as everything around me was shaking and the walls were still creaking I typed a twitter message "we're having an earth quake" (http://twitter.com/mikespot) It continued on for about 30 seconds, a low vibration and rumble and a side to side sensation that felt surreal and made time breifly stand still.

I typed earth quake into the twitter search field and still being less than a minute after it began there were already dozens upon dozens of new tweets piling in one after the other from people all around upstate NY, Ohio, Ontario and Quebec. Everyone sharing their personal adrenaline fed testaments of what we had all just experienced.

I then opened facebook where I posted a comment and added some replies to a few of the many new comments from others I interact with there, people anxiously shared their experiences throughout the afternoon.  I have communicated with thousands of people online over the years but always with a sense of delay and distance. Wednesday afternoon it was alive and in the moment on a grande scale

A busy day for social networking that began with tweets from friends about a bear wandering into the north end of town and ended with tornadoes touching down just 30 minutes outside of town, The leaders of the free world have begun passing through town on their way to the G8 summit being held in Huntsville to the north of what is otherwise a relatively quiet  place to live here in Barrie Ontario.

Mother Nature was restless on Wednesday but thankfully everyone survived to tweet another day.