Neil Diamond. Even scarier if you can't hear what he's singing.The power­boat­ers, women cyc­lists and dragon­boat­ers must have been ruing the choice of Wel­ling­ton as the choice of cham­pi­on­ship ven­ues as a, er, ‘brisk’ north­erly blew in from the Hutt and across the har­bour over the week­end.

The wind also caused hav­oc with the Sat­urday night Neil Dia­mond con­cert at the Sta­di­um, where the poor acous­tics of the sta­di­um com­bined with the swirly winds to blow most of the ancient pop-star’s dul­cet tones out of the Sta­di­um before any­one had a chance to hear them. We can report there were many out-of-town souls com­mis­er­at­ing with each oth­er at the Cuba Street cafes on Sunday morn­ing. $100 seats! To hear the Wel­ling­ton north­erly! Ah well.

How­ever, there seemed to be lots of per­fectly enjoy­able inside and out­side action to par­take in, with the Fringe Fest­iv­al wrap­ping up while the Nation­al Arts Fest­iv­al for Chil­dren got under way. The Greek Food and the New­town Fest­iv­al were both on, and, to cap off the most per­fect of windy Wel­ling­ton week­ends the Hur­ricanes won.

And, finally, what is the coun­cil up to with height restric­tion bylaws?