Here's the answer 11/15/11

• Got a large sweet tea at McD's and took myself to Chapin Park to write.  It's the loveliest spot with a large pavilion, benches and tables and porch swings scattered about shaded by mile-high pines and pin oaks.  The sand is covered in pine needles and soft leaves and sweet potato-sized pine cones.  Two City workers wiped the tables down with disinfectant  -- odd when a park smells like a hospital -- and emptied the trash, greeting me with a "how you, Ma'am?" and then blessing me three times when I had a sneezing fit.  Such nice men.  I was watching cars go by on Business 17 when the Public Works workers started putting giant green wreaths with golf ball-sized red lights onto the street light poles.  That's odd, too, sitting in a park when it's 75 degrees, smelling the ocean, and seeing Christmas decorations going up.  Guess I'd better get used to it.
• I was wrong about not beachwalking.  Too extraordinary (my SGD says that so well with his fake British accent) an afternoon to stay inside:  warm filtered sun, coolish breeze, haze draping the pier in a gauze curtain and making the north beach disappear past the bend.  My hurt heel felt like I was walking on half a golf ball, but I made it.  The low tide gave me lots of solid sand to walk on.  The beach was nearly deserted, and I relished the quiet.  I still have an hour or so of daylight.  Think I'll go work on the oceanfront deck -- wearing shoes this time.