What's shakin?

Last night I was lying in bed in Honey's family's humble house here in Minglanilla south of Cebu city, reading Simon Winchester's rivoting account of the catastrophic eruption of Krakatoa in 1883 near the island of Java. I had just finished the chapter discussing the history and theory of plate tectonics and the west Pacific's rather unstable geologic underpinnings when I felt the room start to shake. My first thought was, "Wow, the kids (Honey's brother has three small children) are really jumping around and shaking the house." Then I noticed the whole room and bed I was lying on was gently swaying back and forth several inches (it seemed) and I knew what was going on. It only lasted a few seconds and then Honey came in the room and exclaimed we had just had an earthquake. While I was gently swaying in bed, she had been in the bathroom taking one wild ride on the toilet. Within minutes we were on the internet and discovered that a 7.9 earthquake had just occurred deep within the earth near the Philippine Trench, about 200 miles east of here. Pretty ironic. Such is life here on the Pacific Rim. Anyway, while I was reading I heard the squeaky song of a Pied Fantail outside and managed to get this pic through the window. They're pretty common.

Another common species is the Collared Kingfisher. They prey on anything that moves and are often far from water.

Each of the three evenings we have been here there has been a dragonfly patrolling nonstop over a parked car in the yard. It seems to behave like a glider or emerald. I'll have to do some research.