Here’s a Miscellaneous paragraph from something I’m working on elsewhere:
I park up on La Jolla because my boss is too cheap to pay for a parking permit in the building. It is six blocks down to the office. I enjoy the walk and it helps me ‘transition’ from the commute up from Long Beach with something physical. Plus the neighborhood is nice. The yards are well maintained, the stucco walls and window-trim freshly painted, and the backyard fences and adobe-ish walls stand up straight, resolutely containing whatever’s within. Most of the houses, and all of the duplexes, look like single-family versions of El Zorro’s Rancho and probably came up in the 20′s and 30′s when ‘Spanish Revival Style’ buildings came up all over Southern California. My dream home is also in the Spanish Revival Style, but instead of a front yard and a backyard, I want a real hacienda, with a courtyard in the middle and high adobe walls facing the sidewalk and street. In my hacienda I’ll have to walk across the courtyard every morning to get from my bedroom to my kitchen, and if it’s raining, I’ll take the long way under the overhang and admire the dripping leaves and how the raindrops startle the greydawn puddles below.