A moment in time

Back to work today and boy it was good. I don't think I've ever noticed this clock at the entrance to our side of the building until today. Note it stopped when the earthquake struck and I've blipped it for posterity.

It felt normal (even though campus isn't completely normal). I enjoyed seeing my colleagues, having a lot of laughs and starting to get my teeth into some work.

We even collectively felt like playing 'guess-how-big-that-tremor-was'. That might sound macabre and insensitive but trust me, it helped. G put all our names up on a white board, when we feel one (and it was an active morning for seismic activity) we all guess the magnitude beside our name and about 10 minutes later we check our guesses against geonet.org.nz. We've been close but no precise. Being in a large, Stalinist concrete building is like comparing being on a ship on the sea with being in a little boat. As yet we're not used to the 'feel' of a tremor in it.

I felt reassured and better about being on the 4th floor. We got off more lightly than I anticipated, with just books and stuff thrown about but no real damage. My Johnny Walker Black label 'water bottle' even survived ;-) I think today has been an important step for me.

The drying process at home isn't over. As the guy today said, "Floors and ceilings take longer to dry than carpet". While I feel disappointed I hasten to add this is minor compared to what others are drying out in their homes and dealing with.

Another day over and another step in the process. Time to go and help clean up.