DOUBLE OOPS

Those who live in glass houses ...

“;And this is Hawaii,”; CNN anchor Rick Sanchez said over the weekend as he displayed a map following the 8.8-magnitude of Chile. Not quite. Sanchez pointed to Galapagos Islands, about 500 miles off the coast of Ecuador. He was off by only about 4,000 miles. The Raw Story, a Washington, D.C.-based Web site, chided Sanchez yesterday, noting that “;maybe he just doesn't know where the South Pacific island state is located.”; CNN's Sanchez is not alone; Hawaii is located north of the equator.

WHOOSH!

Strong, cool winds whisk in March

They weren't kidding about the high winds.

Walking about town yesterday proved to be quite an adventure in some spots as gusts pushed and prodded. Even by early afternoon, which usually sees peak temperatures, things hovered at a balmy 77 degrees, with relative humidity at just 38 percent.

Today's forecast? Prepare to get swept away again: Clear, sunny and breezy, with winds at 15 to 25 mph.

DEJA VU

Siren testings bring back not-so-fond memories

Normally, those monthly civil-defense siren tests go in one ear and out the other.

But yesterday's test at 11:45 a.m. had a chicken-skin sense of deja vu, coming just two days after a real near-disaster. Saturday's blaring sirens at 6 a.m., then just about hourly till 11 a.m., alerted (most) people to a statewide tsunami warning. Officials are working on spotty problems reported that day of malfunctioning or non-activated sirens.

Fortunately, the ocean surge created by the devastating 8.8-magnitude earthquake in Chile caused no damage or injury here. But chances are that the siren testings scheduled at 11:45 a.m. on the first Monday of each month will unnerve some folks here for months to come.