Tastes as good as it looks

Watermelon is great thirst quencher on a hot summer's day. I was glad to slurp through a generous slice this afternoon.

I felt tired after a social Friday night and Saturday, so today has been slow and undemanding.

As the day winds down I feel relieved that my family and friends who live near the sea are ok. There appear to have been plenty of surges, sudden drops and rises in sea level, churning, boiling and discolouration.

Civil Defence did the right thing to issue an alert. There isn't much between South America and New Zealand, just Easter Island and the Chatham Islands. The best we have is modeling to tell how an extremely complex tsunami will behave. Still, there are many 'experts' out there, people who have never studied earthquakes, tsunamis, hydrology, geophysics or hazard risk analysis.

My thoughts are with those who have been affected in Chile. It's hard to comprehend such a huge earthquake.

A busy week ahead for me. I'm away Thursday to Sunday at a wedding at Okarito in South Westland. But more about that later.

Have a great rest of the weekend if you're just starting Sunday and an excellent start to the week if you're heading towards Monday.

I posted yesterday's blip at Birdlings Flat earlier today if you're interested.