The East River.

Early in the morning at the time when the milkman used to deliver, when we had milkmen, I go for a run along the East River. The East River, despite its name, isn't a river. It's a strait that connects the New York Bay with the Long Island Sound.

The river has different moods, different tones of voice. Today it was running fast upstream, with dozens of swirling eddys. Other mornings the river is furious, with waves and churning current where outflow from the Sound meets inflow from the Bay.

Occasionally, even early in the morning, there is ship traffic on the river. A lonely sailboat, a speeding yacht. More often there are tug-pushed barges slowly chugging or large industrial Department of Environmental Protection ships--200-footers--heading out somewhere, or in, to do whatever it is they do.

For as long as I've been in advertising I've been regarded as fast. Not fast as a runner, fast as a writer. But the truth is, I write fast because I run slow. On my runs I try to unravel the assignments I have. When I have copy to write, I write it, or at the least, block it out in my head.

Nothing right or wrong about this, nothing good or bad, just how I handle things. How I work.

And it's impossible to put on my timesheet.