If your patio has filtered shade, you could try planting Pennyroyal between your concrete pads. Pennyroyal looks similar to baby tears (fine ground-hugging mat of green) but does better in my hot-climate yard. If your patio area has more sun than shade, try Common Thrift.

I absolutely agree with the part played by relentless new coverage, cameras and cell phones everywhere. It serves as a double sword to encourage a lot of sympathy but it also reveals real corruption making it seem as if a whole group is corrupt (or that a whole group is victimized for that matter). Sometimes it seems like certain people want their 15 minutes of fame nowadays since everyone is capable of becoming a star in the movie of life. I can't help but believe that many of these homegrown mass shooters are drawn by the idea of fame and the fact that the whole world will notice and hear them. I've seem some videos that look as if people are trying to bait the police into getting worked up and loosing it. Maybe I am seeing it wrong but I don't think so in all cases. Its like a kid will taunt a cop, act completely uncooperative and he's got that cell phone held up in the air, as if attempting to make a U-tube hit to play the poor victim in. We used to respect police when I was a kid and no one would have acted so rude or uncooperative like I see on these videos. I liked what that guy Dr. Piper wrote. I agree with the idea of self absorbed and narcissistic people who get their feelings hurt over any perceived challenge, whoever or whatever makes them feel bad is tagged with a name like 'bigot' or 'hater' with they themselves being the innocent victim. Many people seem to think freedom is equal to complete lack of restraint and that they live in a country where no one should not have any right to hold them to account for anything no matter what. This type of thing is completely out of hand. The laws are becoming more and more oppressive due to groups like M.A.D.D. (not to single them out, it just comes to mind) and 'The War on Drugs' that push the idea that more laws and penalties will solve these problems. Current events are always connected to the events preceding them. Problems like this need to be looked at as a progression of events from a historical perspective to make any sense. You can go back to the 1950's, 60's and 70's to mark the progression of events along with popularizing and accepting certain philosophical ideas. People now seem oblivious or uninterested in how these things connect and focus mainly on the results we have to live with because most people seem oblivious to history. Seems many only live in the present moment concerning any given crisis or personal experience as if history is irrelevant. The tendency is just get outraged or to come up with overly simplistic solutions like fixing 'the gun problem' or adding stiffer laws. Not that we need more guns mind you, I'm no NRA fan.

It sounds like you're looking for more of a foundation planting than a ground cover. I would suggest some sand tolerant grasses. You could probably find some local 'volunteers' for free plants. How elevated are we talking? Stilts with parking underneath or a 4-6 ft block foundation?

I think I'd rather deal with some cracking/sinking pavers now and then than to have to deal with potentially worse repercussions for doing the job "right." It seems to me the proper way to do a paver patio is only for certain property layouts and certain patio locations. My property was designed to direct rain runoff right past my back door, and the proposed paver patio would be in the flow's path. It's not going to get a lot of traffic... only light foot traffic, so I know that matters, too. I am wondering now, though, if excavation won't be a problem so long as I don't go lower than the excavated level of the existing concrete patio. That would give me at least a bit of depth to work with. Still, in the deep South, I have to wonder how much is truly necessary. It's not like it's going to heave with deep freezes every winter. [SHRUG] You bring up another concern I had, which was the sand washing out of the installation. I am not even sure how this isn't a given and something to be expected. I read that pavers can be installed on an existing concrete patio, something I was interested in doing to have the old and new areas match, but I was concerned because the recommendation was to put a layer of sand on the concrete patio. I immediately thought about the sand washing away over time.