Well here in Scotland were are at the cutting edge of wind energy and carbon capture technology which im sure when its a bit better developed it will be exported or whatever

Solar energy is complete useless where we are. Thus people only buy solar panels for their houses as a status symbol.

And yet another day when we can't get any petrol for the car. *sigh*

My area has finally gone back to normal as for gas. Food. That's a different story as well as batteries.

Solar can work but a new way of getting the needed energy will need to be explored. Thus cloudy days are a problem.

Yes me, too. The night and morning. My wife, who is a true Tokyo people seems not to recognize most quake below 3. I always tell her and she says "what?".

The real thrill-factor with this quakes is that you just don´t know if it gets bigger or not.

Yeah, exactly. You just have to wait until it's over, hoping it won't get bigger. Not nice.

The super market we went to today was 75% empty shelves =( But at least they had bread based products and were not rationing them, so we bought about a weeks worth. They have no rice or instant 'men either.

Also off-topic, but email me at my username here [at] gmail [dot] com.

As for detecting quakes, I never used to feel, or at least acknowledge, anything below a strong 3. These days though, I'm feeling most except perhaps 1s. Driving me crazy it is.

Where is you area, if I may ask? maybe you mentioned it already but I forgot.
Bread seems to be fine, also instants and most stuff.
I actually forgot to check for Milk yesterday since we still had enough.

One of the good things if you are a foreigner in Japan: we have different food habits. Most things that are not so much attractive for Japanese are high on my list.
You pay more, ok but at least you can get them.

And Water radioactive levels seems to ok again in Tokyo, today. They says because of the rain. The first effects of Fallout, I guess.

And the Yen looks friendlier today also, since I am payed in Euros.

I'm in Kanagawa but to zero in more I'm in Zushi.

Milk, eggs, and bottle water are a problem to get here. Bread and rice as of yesterday seem to be OK for the time being. Limited on the bread but rice seems to be steady now. It is really the old folks as in the ones who grew up right during or after the war that seem to be stocking up the most. I guess this brings bad memories of having nothing and wanting too much that they go and try to buy the whole store.

From what i understand at least 2 engineers are in hospital due to radiation getting into the suits

Yes, Tokyo was hit really bad in WW2 for the massive bombing. No wonder some react like this. But also a lot of younger people just pile things for selfish reason.
On a website for table water people bought like 100L per person. delivery date: mid of May. Some people just don´t think so much.

BTW we are in Ryogoku, right beside Sumida gawa. (don´t know if I mentioned that already). This area was also spared from power outages, yet.

we are still far away from a ´normal´situation. I think we have to expect more of this.

yup, and in addition, in the process it seems that several security procedures were ignored, which led to the irradiation of those three poor guys...

I hope once the crisis is over, TEPCO will go down, and down hard. They need to make an example about what Japan should do to nuclear companies that so blatantly cheat.

Maybe they should consider introducing Seppuku again. But I guess Tepco Execs will have a hard time finding a ´friend´to decapitate them. I am not speaking of volunteers.

Heh, this would not be overly shocking in a country which has already the death penalty (I'm not starting a polemic about whether it is good or not to have death penalty, okay?). And if only it could put some moral pressure over some ultra-capitalists pigs, the world might be better. "With great power lies great responsibilites"...

At least, the public is told about these cases. In other countries nobody would ever get to know...

For me it's surprising that a nuclear power plant can be such a big danger even weeks after shutting down. The danger of a nuclear melting down once, the water cooling is defect for one reason or another seems to be soo big and there seems to be nothing one can do except repairing the cooling again. I thought handling nuclear energy was easier.

Not to offend you by any means but you perfectly made proof of you own statement ;)
I mean that it seems nobody before told you about the details of these dangers.
And THEY knew why they didn´t.

I am not claiming to be a nuclear expert but there is much more to it than bundling some Plutonium Fuel rods to heat some water.
Controlling a Chain-reaction inside the Critical Mass is the actual Black Magic.