The Big Ass Windstorm of 2006

Depending on where you live, you may not give a rat's ass, but Western Washington (that's everything west of the Cascade Range) just came through one of the largest windstorms in our history. Wind gusts hit 69 MPH in the city last night, the highest speed ever clocked here. There were 100 MPH gusts north of the city. Power is out to one million people, including about half of Seattle. Businesses are closed, schools are closed and so on. Even the mighty Seattle Post-Intelligencer was unable to be printed or delivered. When a newspaper doesn't come out, well, that tells you a lot.

My neighborhood, Capitol Hill, has power and, to my amusement, people are driving in from other parts of town to get coffee and food. There's a very interesting social experiment going on right now, rather reminiscent of Tom Insel's classic monkeys and anxiety study in the 1980s. His experiment featured two groups of monkeys: one raised with the ability to control its environment, the other without control of its environment. They were then administered an anxiety producing drug. The monkeys who controlled their environment got pissy but otherwise fared well. The other group of monkeys cowered in fear in the corner.

Human behavior is playing out similarly. I watched people who were not of my 'hood lining up to get coffee a half-hour ago. They all seemed very panicked and quiet. They didn't tip the baristas. And, as others continued to pour in from neighborhoods without power, people were driving around frantically trying to find parking and blazing up side streets.

Ah, human behavior. And mental illness.

During the storm last night, I went out to one of my local bars, had a few beers with some friends and laughed at the storm. Not that it was funny. But it was.