Better Homes and Gardens

After nearly three months in the Hoosier state, I have finally bought a couch. It folds out into a bed, even, so if you want to come visit me, you will no longer have to sleep on the floor.

Doesn't it look homey, with the lamp and the plant and the Chagall? It's rather intimidating to own something so large and heavy, but I already have a bed, so in for a penny, in for a pound, I guess. I can never move now. Not that I'd be able to find something so well-located again, anyway.

I've been sick for going on two weeks, which meant no homemade bread this past week. On Sunday, my breadmaking day, I was too sick to even contemplate mixing, let alone kneading. I have, however, been having a lot of fun with soups. I tried Laurie Colwin's curried broccoli soup, which was pretty good and fairly easy to make, plus a ridiculously easy sweet potato soup: Bake some sweet potatoes until soft. Let cool a little and then peel, then put them in the food processor with a quantity of chicken or vegetable broth. Season with red pepper, cloves, and ginger. Very soothing.

As soon as my cough goes away and I can eat delicious dairy products again, I'm going to make some roasted autumn vegetable soup using one of the recipes I got last week at the Farmers' Market. The recipe sounds rather unhealthy so I'm going to make some alterations. I'll see how it goes.

Happy Hour at the Irish Lion last night with a bunch of people from the department. The Lion is not an ideal venue for this sort of thing because one sits at long tables and I invariably end up with a bunch of non-talkers. I rallied as best I could and brought out one of my favorite conversation starters: what was the first album you ever bought by yourself? (Mine was Jagged Little Pill, by Alanis Morisette, I think.) (Confidential to CLA: note carefully the "by yourself" part.) This was a very musical crowd and so that was quite effective.

Tonight I've got mountains of epistemology to go through. Maybe I will do it while sitting on my couch.