Just got back from the beach a couple of hours ago. Sorry I haven’t posted. I’ve been busy, you’ve been busy. You know how it is.
I’ll just try to catch up with some pictures, starting a couple or so days before Christmas…
Did you check out the big sale in the last few days of Barnes & Noble at Richland Fashion Mall? This was taken three days before Santa came.
Note that I am standing with my back almost to the opposite side of the store from the cash registers, and the line in front of me extends all the way to the registers. And I’m not even at the back of the line. I waited in the queue while my wife continued browsing. We came away with a dozen or so books, marked down by 50 or even 75 percent. One was for me — something I never got around to reading in school (A Separate Peace). The rest were gifts…
On the next day, Saturday, my middle daughter and I decided to take a last-minute swing through Five Points. It was the first time I’d spent much time roaming around there since the Götterdämmerung — the closing of Yesterday’s. I also had occasion to mourn the missing Starbucks, and my daughter and I had to help a man from Cayce find another musical instrument store when he was disappointed to find Pecknel’s closed as well. But Papa Jazz was still there, as was Loose Lucy’s!
Here’s the store!
And here’s persistent proprietor Don McAllister, who reports that he’s had his best year ever! He and I chatted nostalgically for awhile about retired local leaders such as Duncan McCrae and Debbie McDaniel, and the late lamented hero Jack Van Loan. And I learned a shocking thing: Don himself is 12 years younger than I am! I thought he’d been running this store forever…
OK, now we’ll skip over Christmas, because that’s all personal family pics. We went to the beach Wednesday…
I did a lot of walking — managed to catch up on my steps for the month so I didn’t even have to walk today to meet my goal. And on my first morning I was surprised to find this interesting rose on someone’s front fence. Yes, three days after Christmas. We are living in weird times. Not that I’m any expert on when flowers are supposed to be out. In fact, I’m only saying this is a rose because of the leaves and the thorns. I’m sure it would smell as sweet by another name…
Later that same day, the 28th, my wife and I took a longer stroll on the beach, and found more cool bits of nature than we would have found amid the crowds in August. I’ve seen starfish there before, of course, but this is the first time I’ve spotted a sea urchin that still had some spines on it. I used to see live ones at low tide on the Pacific coast of South America when I was a kid, but this was my first one in South Carolina, I think…
Back here in the Midlands, I often marvel at grown men out walking wearing winter coats over short pants. This kid had them beat. A jacket and a toque… with pants rolled up so he could wade barefoot in the winter brine…
We found quite a few beautiful, fully intact nice shells that we had to put back in the water because when you turned them over the critters were apparently still living in them — such as the one above…
We ran across an interesting confrontation between two avian species. (Click on it to see it better; I left it big.) Note the way the gang of gulls on the left is glaring as one at the pigeons, who are doing their best to ignore the gulls. Obviously, the gulls have a strong case on their side. I mean, it’s their turf, right?…
Alas, this magnificent crab — from port to starboard, he was about a foot across — was no longer among the living. But still, an impressive find. No idea what caused his (or her — I know even less about crabs than about flowers) demise…
Later that same day, I went to check, and Murrells Inlet was still there, with a pelican presiding…
That was a pretty full day of walking and shooting pictures. I thought this one I took that night was pretty good, for a phone camera….
And then, fairly early the next morning, I went for a similar composition, only of a bridge across a freshwater pond, rather than the ocean. Yeah, the moon and the sun kind of blew out on both of them, but I like them…
On Saturday, I made a significant archaeological find on the beach. This is the first sand castle I’ve discovered that the builder actually used stone as a significant part of its construction. Still, I see no evidence of use of tools…
Finally, later that day, we were walking back a block or two off the beach when my wife spotted this flag in the gutter below it. (A bit of unconscious political commentary on the state of the nation?) Since it was nylon and in good shape — it seemed to have simply blown off its staff — I went around to a couple of nearby houses to see if anyone would claim it. (Rather than, you know, burning it as I heard we should do with flags that touch the ground when I was a kid.) When no one did, I clipped it securely to the tree, hoping the owner would more easily find it…
That’s all. No actual commentary. Just, I’m back and hoping we all have a fine 2024…
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Um, your sea urchin was a starfish.
I hesitate to argue wildlife with a Crockett, but… how is this a starfish?
As I mentioned, I used to see those things alive and active in Salinas, Ecuador. My family rented a house on the water there each summer. We had a great time. The architecture would likely have freaked out a coastal preservationist — when I say “on the water,” I mean the water came up under the front porch and crashed against concrete, and we’d look down over the rail and see stingrays swimming right below us.
But the fascinating thing was low tide. That portion of the beach was all rocks, rounded by the action of the waves. We’d talk out on them and observe sea life in the crystal-clear shallow pools left among the rocks. All sorts of brightly-colored fish and other things, such as sea urchins moving their spines about.
Some of the creatures — I never sorted out which ones — would shoot little jets of water (at least, I supposed it was water) from one pool, over the rocks to another. Maybe a yard or so. I had no idea what the purpose was. Perhaps it was a reproductive function. Or maybe they were engaged in battle with the other little animals. Maybe they were getting rid of bodily waste, and didn’t want to do it in their own pools. I don’t know…
Anyway, then the tide would come in, and that whole little Atlantis would disappear…
I was looking at the very prominent item on the left. My apologies.
No need!