duck-shaped pain

One book, in particular, I've been longing after for years, but have never bought, mainly because it costs around $48 - $60, depending on where you get it. It's A Pattern Language by Christopher Alexander (and some other people), a 1977 book on town, neighborhood and house planning.

It takes urban and residential areas and breaks them down into over 200 units or "patterns" that the authors deem necessary for an ideal life. They start on a large scale -- "Independent Regions" is the first "pattern" and work their way to tiny details, such as the placement of items on dressers and desks in a house and the best places to put chairs. It's an enormous book, in terms of length, and it reads more like a sociological treatise or weird novel than a book about architecture.

I've had it on my half.com wish list for nearly a year now, and one was finally listed for sale today -- for only $25. So, as you can probably guess, I grabbed it. Happy day.

I wish I could tell what season it is. It's technically fall, but it sure isn't acting like it. Today, I wore a sweater to work because it was grey and blustery out, but once I got to work, it got HOT -- 85, much too warm to be wearing a big wool sweater. I didn't have anything else I could change into, so the sweater stayed. I got funny looked from happily short-ed people at the post office, and I just wanted to start smacking them all. Living here in September to October almost requires that you keep an entire spare wardrobe with you at all times, to properly adjust to the weather. Sometimes I wish I lived somewhere that had a real fall. [1]

I'm thinking about making pumpkin soup for dinner. I had some last week -- pumpkin bisque, to be precise -- at the bagel shop when I took my grandmother there for lunch. We were just going to get a bagel, but the pumpkin soup won out. At first, it sounded sort of repellent, then intriguing, and finally, it became the best possible meal available at the time.

It was very good. It was actually curried, I think (my grandma said it had hot sauce in it, but it tasted more complex than that, like decent curry powder). Through the miracle of the Internet, I think I managed to find the recipe for it, or at least something close. I would, however, make it with vegetable broth instead of chicken broth -- vegetables go with vegetables. I'm also wary of the 2 cups of half and half, but I'm not sure what to substitute instead -- whole milk? soy milk? Dunno.

[1] Wait, I did -- Oregon. And it just felt wrong.

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