*All pictures this week are courtesy of martymousehouse.com*
Monday, March 09, 2026
Sunday, March 08, 2026
Apartment Life #411
This is a weekly blog post that I'm calling Apartment Hell Life. I've mentioned a few times some of the crazy things that have gone on in and around my apartment complex and in my neighborhood in the past 27 years that I've lived here and people keep telling me I should write a book. But instead of a book, I've decided to share the crazy things that have happened in and around my apartment complex in the last 27 years here in a weekly blog post.
Last week I had a package go missing, probably because the building numbers were not on the buildings because they are still painting. Delivery people were having trouble finding the addresses, even the Constable asked me where an apartment was when he came to put up 7 days pay or quit notices. So, I wrote to management and they said they would put up temporary building numbers. They did.
But it got windy and the temporary signs fell off the buildings. So, they put the signs on the gates to the courtyards. They are staying there at least.
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There was a guy parked on the sidewalk path that I take Falcor for a walk on. He stayed parked there for 6 hours. One time I walked past his car and he was, pleasuring himself. I walked the other way until he was gone. The next morning, I saw this right next to where he had been parked. I think we can all guess what the white powder was inside it. I threw it away. I didn't want a kid picking it up.
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Friday morning the police were down by the McDonald's next door to me and had stopped all the homeless people who stand next to the drive through asking for food. People in the drive through complain all the time and the police get called on the same people all the time. They left for a little while but were right back at the drive through a few hours later begging again.
The high this week was 86F/30C
The low this week was 51F/10C
So that's it for this week's Apartment Hell Life! Be sure to come back next week for more.
Saturday, March 07, 2026
Saturday Vittles
My daughter and I are trying to eat healthier, so I am sharing some of the dishes that we are eating each week.
I told you a while back we have been eating these small plates of food for lunch. I thought I would show you a couple more since we bought a few new things to go on them.
This one has:
Artichoke hearts, black olives. green olives, pickled cocktail onions, raspberries, blueberries, picked spicy vegetables, and strawberries.
It's filling and it tastes good. I like changing up what we put on the plates so there's a variety of different things. You can change this up to suit your own tastes.
Here's a different one we had on another day.
It has dried apricots, sliced radish, pickle spears, black olives, green olives, pickled spicy vegetables, sliced baby cucumber, chopped dates rolled in oat flour, and pretzel crisps.
Would you eat this? Do you like artichoke hearts?
Thursday, March 05, 2026
Book Review: Masked Nights: Seduced by my Billionaire Stepbrother (Behind His Mask Book 1) by Kenzie Haven
Book Description
Midnight Haze. It's the city's sexiest, most taboo night club, and my friend has dragged me along for an evening of good, old-fashioned hedonism. But while she's off scratching an itch, I'm swimming in a sea of masked faces all dying for a taste.
A taste of me. A taste of each other. I am their fresh meat, their prey. And I feel helpless in the tide of their desire.
My one anchor is a stranger I know all too well. A man as forbidden as Eden's fruit. He calls to me from behind a mask, but I know what lurks behind it: my billionaire stepbrother, Dale.
Can I resist his call, or will the hot, sweltering darkness claim us both?
My Review
Penelope/Pene is at Midnight Haze, a BDSM club with her friend, after the friend talked her into going. Everyone there is in a mask but not much else. Pene is just there to look around this time, didn't really have any thoughts of doing anything with anyone, that is until a sexy, masked stranger invites her to come to a private room with him. She's drawn to this stranger and throws caution to the wind and accepts.
It doesn't take long after they start undressing each other for Pene to recognize a birthmark on his back, it's her stepbrother, Dale. They are not related by blood, but their parents are married to each other so technically they're family. They've lusted after each other for years but never acted on it because of their parents. Dale is hoping that Pene will let go and have fun with him and she does.
The sex was hot, their chemistry is so good. These two know they belong together and only stopped each other before because they think their parents will have a problem with them being together. Well, looks like their parents will just have to get over it now.
This is a very short novella of a short, sexy time in a BDSM club. It was right to the point and I liked that. What a fun story.
I give this book 4 out of 5 stars.
Wednesday, March 04, 2026
Favorite Picture of the Week
I wasn't out a lot this past week but I was able to catch this really nice sunset one night.
Tuesday, March 03, 2026
Book Review: Captured Prey: A Primal Play Novella by Reno R. Mist
Book Description
I want to be hunted…but not by just anyone. No – it must be by the monster I have secretly craved.
Chase me.
Devour me.
Take what is already yours.
I know I shouldn’t speak these desires aloud, but I’ve longed for this – to be the heroine sprinting through a moonlit forest, breathless and trembling, pursued by something dark enough to unmake me.
When I uncovered the rumor buried in a forgotten academic footnote, I knew I would come here. A secret invitation. An unholy promise. If this is what I want, why not indulge?
I will be the prey.
All I need now is the hunter waiting in the forest.
Captured Prey: A Primal Play Novella is part of the Second Circle Entry series, told in third-person POV. Each story explores desire, inhibition, and awakening in richly sensual worlds. Often pairing mortals with monsters, love and hunger intertwine as things that go bump in the night steal your heart…and possibly your soul.
Seductive. Sinister. What are you waiting for?
Readers who enjoy Scarlett St. Clair, Carissa Broadbent, Allie Oleander, Laura Thalassa, Cassie Alexander, Layla Fae, Sylvia Mercedes, and other dark romantasy authors — especially lovers of high heat chemistry, alpha monsters, and dark fantasy romance — will find themselves right at home.
This spicy, primal novella features a tall, dark, and handsome Slavic deity, a 35+ gutsy academic mortal, and a pulse-racing chase that ends in a sweet and steamy reward for adult readers. This book can be read as a standalone.
My Review
Asmodeus, the demon of lust owns a club where you can make your deepest desires come true. When Celia finally gets up the nerve to go inside the club, she's met with Asmodeus. After talking and finally getting out of Celia what she really desires, Asmodeus gives her a contract to sign, a way to back out and an explanation of what will happen once she walks through the door.
Lahs is a Leshy demon, he's not expecting Asmodeus to come to him and ask to cash in the favor he owns him. Once Lahs hears what he wants, he's surprised that a human female actually desires a Leshy demon for her fantasy, since he's made of the Earth. Mostly vines, leaves, bark and wood but he also has a human form he can shift into. Lahs agrees to her contract details.
Celia's desire? To be stalked through the woods by a mythical creature, chased, caught and ravished.
Quote "So you want ravishment, not violation. Fearplay without harm."
That one sentence from the book was one of the sexiest things I've read so far this year. Right then and there, I knew I was hooked.
Once Celia walks through the door into her fantasy, Lahs holds up his end of the agreement, chases her and they both have fun in the chase. Once Celia is captured though, Lahs expects to find her scared of the way he looks, but she just smiles at him, waiting to see what he'll do next. Lahs was fun, the chase was fun and when they get together for some steamy time, that was hot! These two completely different beings are so good for each other. They gave each other what the other needed and they both had fun doing it. This was a fun, dark fantasy read. I can't wait to read more of this series now.
I give this book 5 out of 5 stars.
Disclosure: I was given an e-ARC of this book via NetGalley but all thoughts and opinions are my own.
Monday, March 02, 2026
Everyone Has A Story, Here's One of Mine
I've been thinking of writing an autobiography or memoir, but it just never comes together for me, but I figured if I write one story at a time and post it on my blog maybe once a month, I can do that. Maybe one day I'll pull all the stories together and put them in a book but for now I'll just share some stories with you about my childhood and into adulthood. Some of the stories will be happy, some sad and some horrific because that was my childhood. But they will all be real, things that actually happened. If it seems like something that people enjoy reading maybe, I'll keep it going. These stories will not be in any kind of order; I'll just write them as they come to me.
Hurricanes I've been in
I've told you before that when my parents split and divorced, I ended up living with my grandma for almost 2 years. My dad didn't want me or my brother living with him because he wanted to date a bunch of women. My mom had a boyfriend named Larry and he hated me and didn't want me living with he, my mom and my little brother, and my mom went along with it. So, my grandma took me in for a while. I lived with her when I was 11-13 years old. During that time there were a couple of hurricanes in California where we lived.
In September of 1982 California was hit with a category 4 hurricane named Olivia. I was living in Redondo Beach, California at the time with my grandma. I remember my grandpa coming over and boarding up some of the windows of our house. He stayed with us for a couple of days while the hurricane passed. They weren't a couple at the time, but you could tell they really cared about each other.
I mostly remember all the rain, wind and flooding. Trees in my grandma's yard fell over, tiles flew off the roof and the fence in the back yard fell over in parts. The wind was the scariest part. I was 12 years old and had never seen wind like that before. When parts of the fence fell in the back yard and some of the wood started slamming up against our house, me and my grandparents went outside and took the wooden slats and threw them over the fence into the vacant lot next door so they wouldn't keep slamming up against the house and wouldn't break the windows. The wind was absolutely nuts. It was hard to hold onto anything let alone big pieces of wood from the fence, but I helped as much as I could. Back then I thought of my grandparents as old, but I realize now that they were the same age I am right now! That's crazy to think about.
Then the next year in August of 1983, we got rain and wind from Hurricane Ismael which at the time it came over us was a tropical depression, but I remember being scared because I thought the same thing was going to happen again. Thankfully it didn't and while there was a lot of rain and wind, it wasn't anywhere as bad as the previous year.
I've been in other storms but nothing like Hurricane Olivia.
Have you been through a hurricane?
Links to past stories
2023
2024
Sunday, March 01, 2026
Apartment Life #410
This is a weekly blog post that I'm calling Apartment Hell Life. I've mentioned a few times some of the crazy things that have gone on in and around my apartment complex and in my neighborhood in the past 27 years that I've lived here and people keep telling me I should write a book. But instead of a book, I've decided to share the crazy things that have happened in and around my apartment complex in the last 27 years here in a weekly blog post.
Maintenance covered my window and a bunch of the wall so they could paint some of the white part of the wall that was flaking off. But they started at 6AM and were pounding on my window AC and my window at 6AM! I was mad when I got up and threw open the curtains and saw maintenance standing there.
He smiled and waved at me. 🤣🤣🤣 Like, "Good morning" It was not a good day to be woke up at 6AM. I had a kidney infection and a cold this past 2 weeks. Sorry I haven't been visiting your blogs as much in this time. I'll catch back up when I feel better.
This complex with the orange roof also was bought by our new owner and my new manager is their new apartment manager too. This apartment complex is right next to mine. So maintenance started painting their buildings the same color as ours this week. So to prevent any overspray from getting on the 3 cars in the street, they wrapped the cars in plastic.
The owner of the middle car came out to walk her dog and lost her mind when she saw plastic on her car. She started yelling at the guy who was on the ladder and started ripping the plastic off. The guy on the ladder didn't speak English so he went and got another guy who was trying to tell her why they wrapped the cars in plastic while they were spraying paint on the building.
But all she kept yelling was, "Keep your MFing hands off of people's cars."
The high this week was 84F/28C
The low this week was 49F/9C
So that's it for this week's Apartment Hell Life! Be sure to come back next week for more.
Saturday, February 28, 2026
Saturday Vittles
My daughter and I are trying to eat healthier, so I am sharing some of the dishes that we are eating each week.
Sauteed Edamame and Buffalo Cauliflower
For the Buffalo cauliflower
You will need:
1/4 cup Frank's hot sauce
3 TBSP Honey
1/2 tsp. McCormick's Mesquite seasoning
1/2 tsp. McCormick's Smokehouse Maple seasoning
1/2 head of cauliflower
What to do:
Place hot sauce and spices in a baggie, set a side.
Cut the cauliflower into small bite sized pieces.
Place the cauliflower into the baggie with the mixture, close the baggie and shake well to get all the cauliflower coated.
Place cauliflower onto a baking sheet and bake at 425F for 20 minutes.
This makes 2 servings. This side dish has 100 calories for the 1 serving and about 50 carbs per serving.
For the Edamame
You will need:
1 cup of frozen Edamame
1 TBSP Butter
1/2 tsp. onion powder
1/2 tsp. McCormick Mesquite seasoning
1/2 tsp. garlic powder
1/2 tsp. salt and pepper
1/2 tsp. McCormick's Montreal Steak seasoning
What to do:
Bring 2 cups water to a boil in a small pan. Boil the frozen edamame for 10 minutes. Drain and set aside. In a small saucepan, melt the butter and add spices. Add drained edamame and stir to coat all the edamame. Serve while warm.
This side dish serves 2 and has 150 calories and 20 carbs per serving.
I served these with some baked chicken. We both really liked this.
Would you eat this.
Friday, February 27, 2026
Book Review: Redemption by V.E. Huntley
Book Description
They think his love for her makes him weak. They're about to learn it makes him unstoppable.
The breathtaking conclusion to The BloodStone Legacy trilogy—a dark, seductive paranormal romance about forbidden love, impossible choices, and the price of redemption.
For centuries, vampire commander Aden Westcott's reputation for brutality was legendary. Until her. She's his salvation and his damnation wrapped in mortal flesh and he'll tear apart heaven and hell to protect her. When enemies close in, Aden must choose: lose her forever, or become the monster that even other vampires fear.
In a society divided by power and blood, redemption demands the highest price. In this final chapter, Aden's and Ellie's choices will echo through eternity. Some say love conquers all. In their world, it might just destroy everything.
Redemption is Book 3 of a trilogy. It ends with the HEA you've been waiting for.
Perfect for fans of enemies-to-lovers romance and dark fantasy who crave high stakes, forbidden love, and a brooding immortal hero facing his own redemption.
This book contains dark themes, including scenes that may be distressing to some readers. Be mindful of the trigger warnings. For a full list of content/trigger warnings, please visit the author's website.
My Review
This is the third book in the Bloodstone Legacie trilogy but it's the first book in the trilogy that I've read. That did not make this book any less enjoyable though. This book can be read as a standalone in my opinion.
Ellie is taken by an ancient and evil vampire named Matthais, who wants to be the most powerful vampire in existence. Matthais wanted to start a war between the humans and vampires so that vampires were in charge instead of the humans. He thought that vampires were far superior and should be at the top of the food chain, so to speak.
Not only does Matthais have enhanced vampire soldiers at his disposal, he also has a weapon he can use against vampires that kills, even the oldest, strongest among them and Aden and his family have nothing to fight the effects of the weapon. Matthais wants Aden to pledge his loyalty to him in the coming war but Aden not only wants to save Ellie from Matthais but eliminate him too, for even touching her.
Along the way, Aden has to make some serious choices since his father was hurt and now Aden is in charge. His actions hurt a lot of people but even though he sent the actions in motion, it was Matthais that was truly responsible for the horrible outcome.
Aden will stop at nothing in order to save her though, which I loved. While I haven't read the first two books and I have no idea what went on between Ellie and Aden, but that didn't take away from what I have read here.
This book was so full of action, it really kept me engaged throughout the entire book. Plus, I loved the spice level between Ellie and Aden, something that I've come to expect in a vampire romance. The ending was everything that I could have hoped for.
I give this book 5 out of 5 stars.
Disclosure: I was given an e-ARC of this book via NetGalley but all thoughts and opinions are my own.
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