The pleasure of working at the FTC made me feel the earth move!

The sound clip above is the saved recording of an internal phonemail message of mine that captured the fairly loud building sounds from the 2011 earthquake as it struck. If you listen carefully you may realize that in my moment of panic I didn't just drop the phone mid-sentence, but actually mid-word, as I scampered out my third floor office. The loud bang at the tail end of the recording is that office door slamming shut, phone still dangling and recording, with me already halfway down the hall. And if you turn up the volume at the end you may also hear a hallway conversation where someone (unknown), as if on cue, responds to someone's question "What was that?" with "I think it was an earthquake." Perfect!

—Joe Brownman