According to the USGS, there was an earthquake this morning near Washington, DC.

Time of the quake was 5:04.47 AM. The epicenter was 1 mile SE of Germantown, Maryland (Latitude/Longitude of 39.167, -77.252). The magnitude was 3.6.

Since it's only been about 30 minutes since the quake occurred, details are sketchy. The seismograph chart here was recorded by Millersville University.

No significant property damage is expected.

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District of Columbia - Millersville University - seismograph

One of the better arguments that the GOP has these days against the Obama programs is that businessmen, especially small businessmen, hesitate to make new investments when they don't know what their overhead is going to be like.

It's not true that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself - but fear is a great motivator. Ask any good money manager about investing, and he'll tell you the first rule of any sane investment portfolio is capital preservation. Want that in plain English? Jim, an old high school buddy, told me recently that, "I'm not taking any chances. If I were to get wiped out, I'm too old to start over."

They're Both Wrong

Take a look at the map. Does that shape remind you of South Africa - or of a different South?

Sometimes, I see errors like this, and I think, "Oh, my God, what are the schools turning out these days?" and other times, I think, "Boy, what a brain fart," and think about all the hideous mistakes I've made over the years.

The Story of Bill And Hazel

In a small town, everybody knows every else's business, and we tend to mind our own. Bill, a lineman for the phone company, had been screwing Hazel, a billing clerk there, for the last fifteen years. Surely Bill's wife Sue and Hazel's husband Joe knew about it, since everyone else did, but if they didn't want to do anything about it, why should anyone else raise a ruckus? That would be rude.

Except that Bill and Sue won the grand prize in the Kiwanis sweepstakes, and I ran a picture of the two of them accepting the ham from the Kiwanis chairman. Yeah, that sounds like small potatoes in a city big enough to have a TV station, but in a county of 20,000 people, that's newsworthy enough to run a picture.

Mark Twain once said that he had been ridden out of town on a rail. If not for the honor of the thing, he admitted, he'd have druther walked.

Let me tell you about disability. If you get your druthers, politely decline.

One of my disabilities is agoraphobia. When I was four, I was raped and sexually mutilated by a group of upstanding community leaders including a sheriff's deputy. To this day, I get extremely nauseated by the smell of dimethyl ether (they used tractor starting fluid to knock me out, make me compliant.) To this day, I am incredibly fearful of uniformed officers with badges. Someone in mufti with a sidearm doesn't scare me; an unarmed security guard directing traffic in the parking area at the outdoors concert is of grave concern. And then there's the agoraphobia.

Doctor's Hospital - Columbus