Sunday, October 05, 2025

Apartment Life #389

 
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.


*Picture courtesy of Justin Bruce Weather on FB*

I had to share this picture that a local weatherman posted on his FB page. We had a huge thunderstorm this past week and this picture was better than the ones that I took for sure. 🤣 Oh and that big ball on the left hand side that looks like it's on fire is The Sphere Las Vegas. The Sphere is huge and lit up with millions of LED's that they can change to different pictures show on the outside of it. The inside is the same way. I wanted to share a little something of where I live. 

This is the picture of the storm that I took as it passed over where I live. I didn't get any rain from it but as it went away from me, it started producing rain in Henderson, NV. 
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On Sunday, my grandson's father came over for dinner and told me that he saw smoke pouring out of the tunnels that the homeless people stay in. So, I went outside to see what was going on and saw that there was indeed smoke pouring from the tunnels. So, I started snapping pictures. And my daughter took some pictures when the Fire department showed up. When the police got here, they questioned Jessica (The Mayor of tunnel town)  who barely made it out of the tunnels alive, and she said that Mikey (Her ex) was the one that lit fire to a bunch of chemicals down there because he was trying to kill the homeless people that were in the area down there. I talked to her on Tuesday and she said he's still on the run.

I didn't know it when I was taking pictures before the fire department got here, that I actually got a picture of Mikey and Antwon walking down the street next to all the tunnels pouring out smoke. Later on, I would find out that the police were looking for Mikey. Oh, and yes if you remember me saying in this post, that Antwon had been arrested and charged with attempted murder back in February for shooting a guy in the leg after a drug deal gone bad. Yeah, he's out of jail and back living on the streets over here. Isn't that great?

The fire department got here and they had to lower some of the firemen down in the tunnels to put the fires out. Jessica said that she and some others barely got out alive. She had soot and black stuff all over her from all the smoke.

They geared up and went down into the tunnels. They were here for about 2 hours putting the fires out. You can see how smokey it is behind the firemen. The smoke was pouring out of all the manhole covers all the way down this walkway.
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Wednesday night at 11PM this homeless woman named Shasta came to my door but we were already in bed. My daughter pulled up the camera and saw her back her motorized wheelchair up and then drive right through our garden.

Her whole wheelchair is sitting in our garden here and she's pulling on the sunflowers.

That wasn't good enough so she backs out of the garden, gets out of her wheelchair and pulls more of the plants up. 

My daughter called the police but they told her she would have to come down to the station and make a report for vandalism.

Then when she's satisfied that she destroyed it enough, she drives away.  We think she was mad that we didn't answer the door at 11PM because she's always asking my daughter to buy her a drink or a snack or to give her a couple of dollars. My daughter has bought her drinks in the past but you bet she won't anymore. 

This is what our sunflower plants looked like the day before.

This is what they looked like the day after she drove over them. The two big stalks were pulled out of the ground and my daughter had to throw them away. She's going to plants some more sunflower seeds and hope they grow. 

The high this week was 91F/32C
The low this week was 66F/18C

So that's it for this week's Apartment Hell  Life! Be sure to come back next week for more.

Saturday, October 04, 2025

Saturday Vittles

 

My Daughter and I are trying to eat more healthy so I thought I would share some pictures on Saturday's of what we've made.

Salad With Sliced Rib Eye Steak

You will Need: 

1- 1 inch thick Rib Eye Steak
Lettuce of your choice, we used Romaine
1/4 cup sliced red onion
1/4 cup roasted peanuts
1/2 cucumber- sliced
1 tsp. oil
McCormick Steak seasoning
Salt and pepper to taste
Onion Powder
Garlic Powder
Salad dressing your choice.



What to do: 

Season your rib eye steak with whatever seasoning you like. I used McCormick Steak seasoning, salt, pepper, garlic powder and onion powder. Fry steak in the oil and a hot pan until doness is to your liking. Let steak rest on a plate for at least 5 minutes. Then slice into several pieces.

Prepare bowls with sliced lettuce, onion, peanuts and cucumber. Put a few slices of steak on top. Add whatever salad dressing you prefer.

1 serving has 15 carbs and about 300 calories.

Would you eat this?

Friday, October 03, 2025

Freebie Friday!

 


Welcome to another weekly Freebie Friday post, where I tell you what free samples and full-sized products I received in the mail and how you can get them too. Someone asked me why I do a "Freebie Friday" each week, so I'll tell you.

A while back I listed all the free samples and wins that I had received that previous year and so many people didn't believe that I could have gotten so many free things.  I decided to prove it by taking a picture every week and sharing the sites that I found the links to the freebies at. So now you too can get great free samples coming to your mailbox each week.

  You can find links to great samples at Hey It's Free and Freebie Shark.


A little over 7 months ago I started saving for a new laptop. I decided to use all of the Amazon gift cards that I got from surveys and blog contests for this. Well about a week ago I received my "Free" laptop. As you can see, I used my gift card balance and my credit card rewards. Here's a picture of my old HP Windows 8.1 laptop and my new Acer Aspire Windows 11 laptop.

I'm pretty happy with it. It was easy to set up and once I logged into my Microsoft account, they transferred all of my bookmarks, and folders I had on the bookmarks bar from my old laptop. That made things a lot easier for me. 

Thursday, October 02, 2025

Book Review: Kaden By Mel Teshco

 

Book Description

The dragons will search the universe for their one true mate... Grace has a special ability. She senses paranormal beings. It’s the perfect trait to have as an operative for the Paranormal Detection Agency. A pity her next target, Kadin Marres, doesn’t just trigger her paranormal senses … he triggers her lust too. Kadin has been aware of the elusive Grace for some time now and has waited patiently for her. She’s a dragon breeder, and once he finally has her, he isn’t about to give her up. Not even if it means she goes from hunter to hunted.


My Review

Grace is an agent in the Paranormal Detective Agency and is sent to Kadin to assassinate him it seemed like. I'm not really sure what she was sent in to do other than seduce him but he sees through her facade right away. But that doesn't stop him from sleeping with her and letting her go through with the facade to seduce him. Afterwards though he lets her know that he knows who and what she is and why she's there. She has very little time to believe what he's telling her before her team breaks the door down and it's at that moment she realizes that her whole life is a lie. Her team turns on her in order to get Kadin who turns out to be a dragon shifter from an alien planet. 

Kadin and Grace find themselves on the run from her team and in that time Kadin tells her more about why her leader wants her and Kadin alive together. It's a lot for her to take in and even harder for her to believe until she comes face to face with someone from her past who tells her the evil truth of his plans for her and Kadin. 

I was so mad for her. She was lied to her entire life just to get to this moment. But Kadin is a dragon shifter and an alien. He possesses some abilities that help them overcome the people she used to work for and Kadin proves himself to be a great guy in the end. I really ended up loving this book. 

I give this book 5 out of 5 stars. 

Wednesday, October 01, 2025

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.

My brother's adoption reunion story


These two brothers and I have the same mother. The one on the right making the face is the older brother (Bear) who had been adopted and I found back in 2004. The brother on the right is Billy who I've posted on here before.

I found out I had another older brother when I was 12 years old. My mom was talking to her boyfriend about him and I overheard and asked her about it later. I found out that when my mom was a teenager she was raped by her mothers boyfriend. My mom told her mother and her mother kicked the guy out. She called my grandpa who she had been divorced from for a few years and he dropped everything to come and move them out of state. My grandparents got back together for a while after that but they made my mom give up her baby when he was born in 1967.

When I got my first computer I started searching online. Even then it was hard and I wasn't having much luck until I started finding websites that you and the adopted person can register at and when they see a match they contact you. That's what happened to me.

In 2004 I registered at a site called The International Soundex Reunion Registry (ISRR) and I had a whole bunch on info on my brother so it was fairly easy to make a match with him since he had registered years before with his information.

I knew his adopted parents names, where and when he was born and his birth mom's name. I didn't know that he had spent many years searching for us as well.

I got a call from a lady at ISRR telling me she thought she had found him and was going to be sending letters to the last known address she had on file. They came back because he had moved. So she looked him up on the computer and found some of the other addresses he had lived at and sent out more letters. They all came back undeliverable because he had either not left a forwarding address or had moved from the address more than a year before and they only forward mail for a year.

One day she called me and told me we had one more chance to find him but I would have to send this letter myself. If you have a person's date of birth, parents names their full name and $10, back then you could send a letter to DMV and they would see if that person had a drivers license in their state and forward the letter to them. I don't know if California DMV does this anymore, I couldn't find a link for it. The lady at ISRR sent me the link way back when I did this.

I was warned that the letter I wrote to him had to be very benign. I couldn't say Hi, I'm your long lost sister. For whatever reason if the DMV reads the letter and thinks it would be upsetting... or anything but Hey, I'm trying to get in touch with you, here's my number...call me...   they won't forward it.

So I wrote the letter saying Hi, What my name was. My mother's name and that we were trying to get a hold of him would he please give me a call. And I left my phone number.

It was about 2 weeks later that I started to think that I wasn't going to get a response. The lady at ISRR was calling me just about everyday asking me if I had heard anything yet, she was so nice and supportive.  All this time, I hadn't told my mother that I was looking for my brother. I wasn't sure what I was going to do if I found out he was in jail, had died or was a dead beat. I'm not sure I would have told her if he had died, I think that might have been too much for her. So I kept it a secret until one day about 17 days after I had sent the letter to DMV..I got a call. It was my brother's wife. She asked me why I had sent such a strange letter to her husband. The funny thing was, she thought I was an old girlfriend trying to get a hold of him. lol

I explained to her who I was and why I had worded the letter the way I had and once she realized who she was talking to, she got all excited and told me that my brother was active Army and was in Iraq. She told me she usually just put all his mail in a box for him to open in a few months when he got home, but my letter was so unusual she had to call and find out who the heck I was. So I was very happy I had worded it so mysteriously.

Just then she got another call and told me it was my brother. She put me on hold gave him my number and he called me a few minutes later. We didn't talk for very long but we exchanged email addresses so we could email each other later. After I got off the phone I took a deep breath and called my mom. I just said, "I found him." She knew exactly who I was talking about and she started crying. She asked me all kinds of questions but when she found out he was in the Army and deployed in Iraq, she got scared thinking he could be killed before she had a chance to meet him.

He went by Bear and we emailed back and forth for a while and my mom came over and I showed her all his pictures I had on the computer and printed out some for her, let her read all the emails we had shared and dictated an email from her while she was here to him and sent it. It was mostly emails because phone time wasn't available too often.

He was sent home in 2004 after his leg was injured in an IED explosion and a little while later he and his wife made the trip out here from California and we all got to meet for the first time. We all got along really well.  He and his wife divorced soon after but a few years later he met another lady and married her.

My older brother Bear, and his new wife, Melissa when they got married.

I'm just glad that I was able to find him before our mom passed away in 2011. 7 years isn't a lot of time to get to know someone, but they got a lot of memories in those 7 years and I'm glad about that. I know that finding him really mended a hole that was left in my mom's heart. 

But less than 2 months after my mom passed away,  Bear -John Radell got drunk, and went on a crime spree in the town he lived in. You can read the article here but essentially what he did was pull a gun at a guy in a bar, then went to a convenience store and pulled his gun on another guy and pistol whipped the man with the gun. He was arrested and spent some time in jail. Bear just got more drunk and high on Marijuana after that and then his wife had a stroke. She was in bad shape and lost the ability to walk and ended up in a wheelchair. But he was so out of it for most of the time she was in the hospital that he didn't go to the hospital to see her.

Billy and I distanced ourselves from him because of his erratic behaviour and we found out from a family member that he was threatening to come and kill all of us including our kids and grandkids. Billy and I both had enough so we filled out police reports and tried to get restraining orders but were denied because it was hearsay what we learned and he hadn't done anything to us. So we stopped talking to him but he kept emailing and calling us for more than a year after that. 

We didn't talk to Bear until 2020 when Billy reached out to him again and when he found out that my husband had cancer, he called me. We talked and I emailed him and few times, but we were never very close after that. Bear passed away from a heart attack in 2023. I'm glad I found him mostly for my mom, I know she was really happy that she got to meet the baby that she gave up for adoption. But not all adoption stories end happily. 


Tuesday, September 30, 2025

Book Review: Must Love Christmas Cowboys by Diana Palmer and Heather Graham

 

Book Description

Whether they’re out on the range or working in town, these men are rough, rugged, and ready for action. They’re true-blue cowboys and the stays of these brand new Christmas novellas from New York Times bestselling authors Diana Palmer and Heather Graham, set against the snowy backdrop of Colorado.

THE PERFECT GIFT * Diana Palmer
Rancher Ty Blakeney has more than enough reasons to be grumpy. Plus, it’s unseasonably cold, Christmas decorations are up annoyingly early, and now there’s a wailing little boy on his property, a frantic young woman chasing after him. Ty recognizes her, recently orphaned, scraping by to raise her young brother. Both of them as alone as he is. But between the three of them, along with a puppy in need of a home—and the magic of the holidays—they might just discover the gift of family comes in all kinds of packages.

CHRISTMAS, CRIME, AND A COWBOY * Heather Graham
When successful New York artist Jessy Danson inherits her beloved late grandfather’s Colorado property, she’s forced to tear herself away from her busy city life. While she hopes to wrap things up in time to leave for Christmas, her disinterest in the house’s rich history baffles Wyatt McFarlane, her grandfather’s handsome neighbor. But the house—and Wyatt—become exceptionally interesting when dangerous robbers break in, determined that Jessy will lead them to a hidden treasure. It’s a good thing there’s a hero right next door . . .


My Reviews

The Perfect Gift by Diana Palmer

Ed and Sara and brother and sister and since their dad just passed away, Sara has been doing all sorts of odd jobs to keep them afloat. Ed is only 5 years old and Ty stops by the side of the road one night where a frantic Sara can't find her brother because he's wandered off after their car broke down. While Ed is out looking for the "Wuppie" Ty Helps Sara find him, the wuppie turns out to be a little German Shepard puppy that needs some care.

Later on Sara visits her family's lawyer who tells her some really good news thanks to her grandfather's quick thinking. Ty wants to get to know Sara better and things are going well for a while but Ty has had his share of gold digging women who have hurt him so he's not quick to let love in his life and that seems like the end of his and Sara's growing relationship. Thankfully Ty gets his head together and hopes that Sara will find it in her heart to forgive him. These two sure took their time finding each other but it works out in the end. I loved Goose- the Wuppie. This dog got into all sorts of hilarious trouble. 

I give this story 4 out of 5 stars.



Christmas, Crime, and A Cowboy by Heather Graham

Jessy comes back to her grandfather's property after he passes away and wills the property to her. She's hoping to wrap things up before Christmas so she can get back to her family since her father is sick. But the handsome neighbor, Wyatt who she knew when they were both younger is there and very happy to see her back. While they are hitting it off very well, there are robbers who are hitting properties and getting bolder and bolder and much more dangerous with each new robbery. They started out not hurting anyone but now they are. 

When a woman is kidnapped and her life is on the line, Jessy remembers something about these older properties that might help save the woman. When the robbers hit closer to home and it puts Jessy and danger, Wyatt makes sure that she stays safe but in doing so, his big secret comes out and ruins all the progress they made in their relationship. 

This was such a great mystery about the robbers as well as a wonderful romance between Jessy and Wyatt. I really liked how it ended. 

I give this story 4 out of 5 stars. 

Disclosure: I was given an ebook of this title via NetGalley but all thoughts and opinions are my own.



Monday, September 29, 2025

Happy Raturday!

 


*All pictures this week are courtesy of martymousehouse.com*

Sunday, September 28, 2025

Apartment Life #388

 

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.

On Tuesday afternoon I saw this ambulance down the street and when a woman was wheeled out on a stretcher, she was screaming at a guy who came out alongside her. They were both speaking Spanish, so I don't know what they were saying buy an older lady came out a moment later and she was yelling at the guy when the lady was put in the back of the ambulance. The lady in the ambulance was holding an ice pack on her eye, and she was bleeding I think from her mouth. I could be wrong, but it looked and sounded like the women were mad at the guy for maybe hitting the lady. The older lady went in the ambulance with the other lady, and the guy went back into the apartment. 
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This is our pool. I told you that the homeless people were using it to bathe and other things. The pool lock has been changed, and they added these signs instead of the "Pool Rules" signs they had up there before. The new ones call the pool the Aquatic Venue Rules. lol That's a new one for me.

Someone must have said something about the homeless people in the pool because some of the rules now state not to swim in the Aquatic Venue is you have open wounds or sores, no animals in the aquatic venue and only service animals allowed on the deck. I told you a while back that two homeless ladies were picking their sores in the pool and one had her dog in there with them. So I have a feeling someone complained about it.

Related to that...I saw Jessica and Mikey in the pool area but not inside the pool gate, they were in their underwear and hosing each other off right next to the pool. I guess since they couldn't get inside the pool, they decided to do it that way. 
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The Inspector from last week came and got his ID badge on Monday. Nice guy, and he was very thankful that I called him to come and get it. So that was nice. 
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My apartment complex sent out 3 different notices about a water shutoff taking place on the 25th. The sent an email, posted it in the portal and put out paper notices about it on the doors. 



I put water in jugs, filled a few pans, thinking it's the Water District and the water could be off for more than 4 hours. The water was off for 45 minutes. That was it. 😂😂The only thing the water district did was have one guy in a van with a pump on the back of his truck, he put a hose down a drain down the street and sucked stuff up into the big container on the back of his truck. I guess it's better than not having running water for hours. But they made a much bigger deal than was necessary. 


The high this week was 96F/35C
The low this week was 70F/21C

So that's it for this week's Apartment Hell  Life! Be sure to come back next week for more.

Saturday, September 27, 2025

Saturday Vittles

 
My Daughter and I are trying to eat more healthy so I thought I would share some pictures on Saturday's of what we've made.

Cucumber Sushi

What you'll need:

2 Large cucumbers
1 Cup Imitation crab or real crab
4 TBSP Salmon Cream Cheese
4 oz package of Lox (Cured Salmon)
1 Large Avocado
Salt and pepper to taste
1/2 tsp. Old Bay seasoning

What to do:
Use a large vegetable peeler to make long cucumber slices. Depending on how large your cucumbers are you will need 12-16 slices. 

Lay the cucumber slices down on a flat surface, overlapping them a bit. We used 6 slices per roll. So we made 2 rolls and cut them into pieces.  Starting at the end closest to you, add a thin layer of the salmon cream cheese and spread it all over the cucumber slices. Next lay down a thin layer of Lox just at the end closest to you. Next add a bit of the imitation crab meat or real crab meat, depending on what you like. Add a layer of thinly sliced avocado and sprinkle the seasonings on top. Next you are going to grab the end of the cucumber slices closest to you and fold them away from you, over the mixture. Then carefully roll it into a log, trying to keep it tight as you roll. Make sure it is seam side down when you cut this into "sushi" pieces. 

6 pieces of this had 12 carbs and about 300 calories. 

I don't like traditional sushi but this came out really good. 

Friday, September 26, 2025

Halloween Pictures

 
My daughter saw all of these decorations on store shelves.


Wicked babies. lol 


Rats! I wanna pet them. lol I bet I could tame them with some chocolate. 

Have you started seeing Halloween decorations on store shelves?