I’m in a rush this morning. I had Christmas tunes in my head all night and now I’m sitting here in my towel wanting something pumpkiny or pepperminty to eat and drink. So I may have to take myself over to Starbucks before work. I do have a $5 gift card I got for attending a Citrix webinar…

I’ve been buying all sorts of odd ball things at New Egg all week too. An inverter, gaming headphones, a DVD drive… small stuff all at about half off and free shipping. Man, I love free shipping and New Egg stuff takes like 1 or 2 days to get to me. I love it! That’s all I did for Black Friday. I had to work. LOL

For those of you looking for opportunities to pelt me with questions, I’ll be on Phoebe Jordan’s Blog Talk Radio show on Thursday December 3 from 9 pm to 10:30 pm EST.

Okay, a quick Marcus and I’m speeding out of here to get me some pumpkin bread and peppermint mocha.

I don’t remember if I’ve use this one before but I like the pensive pose. Okay, I like the nicely defined package too, but that a girly thing. LOL You all have yourselves a great Monday!

No, I’m not done yet, but I’ve done a self-edit on Parts One and Two and fixed some continuity issues that were plaguing the story. One hundred and ten pages are as cleaned up as I’m going to get them for now. Now, I’m on the last bit.  Part Three is a wrap up. Get through all their issues and give them the HEA. Then a quick epilogue which will have a bit of my trademark humor (this book has very little humor) and it will be off to my editor. YAY!

I must say, Vahid has been a difficult character to work with. Stubborn. Secretive. Loyal. All of which serve to cause him problems with his mate. And all of which almost lose him his mate. You do get to see the tender side of this tough character though. When his mate tries to commit suicide, his reactions make you want to cry. When he tries to make up for three years of mistakes with her, you want to cry. He’s a character with very deep emotions and his intensity will hopefully draw readers to him.

Well, it’s Monday and I do have a Marcus and for my birthday I had… the Motherlode! WOOT! Damn. The M’s sure do have it. Marcus… Motherlode… Mmmmm chocolate. Rott bought birthday dinner from Claim Jumper including the Motherlode. Not the whole cake. Gawd. We’d be dead now if he had. One slice was enough for us to eat on all weekend long. I feel like I’ve been OD’d on chocolate cause I had some with Extreme Moose Tracks ice cream. Gah. That’s waaaay too much chocolate. It sure makes for a nice birthday cake though. One slice feeds all.

Here’s today’s Marcus. I needed something right up there with the Motherlode. Something to OD on…

Mmmm, yeah. That works for me. What a gorgeous Monday Marcus. The M’s truly do have it today. Have a simply fantastic M-Monday!

I talked about giving birth to Motley over on the Flirty Author Bitches blog, explaining that I’d been in the hospital for over a month. I’d been really sick and once they induced labor I got seriously cranky. I think I might have stayed that way which is probably why Motley doesn’t always think she’s hit the motherlode when it comes to mothers. I did post a video over at FAB. It’s the video that was playing on MTV when Motley arrived. I about took the nurse’s head off when she tried to turn off MTV. It was the only thing distracting me from the pain. I don’t let Motley forget that she arrived during an Aerosmith video. LOL

Apparently, the term motherlode extends to creativity and book covers too this past week. I was on a roll. After I did Fire Season’s cover I got an idea for the covers of the next two books. I think they turned out quite well. After that, I made a couple of sig tag banners for people. What do you think? Was my creative genius at work or am I tooting my own horn for no reason?

I think I did okay on the graphics front. This week I’m leaving on Friday to pick up Rott in Mammoth. I have a long boring drive ahead of me and a lot of stress. Actually, I’m already stressing. I may have to start work on my next project without a breather because I need the distraction. Well, actually, I have some trailers to do. Hopefully, my creative motherlode holds for a few more days.

Before I go I’ve got to post a Monday motherlode of Marcus! I cannot have a Monday without him anymore. And I really love this photo. Tres hawt. Tidey whities never looked so good. Well, cept maybe for the ones on Travis Fimmel. HEH. Gah. No contest. I’d still take Marcus over Travis, but it would be a tough decision.

If you get the chance, stop by Motley’s blog Socially Dead and wish her a happy you’re no longer a teenager birthday. Hope you have a great Monday!

First of all, you have to realize that I don’t have an exact recipe for making this. I don’t have measurements or anything like that. If you’re a decent cook though, you can prolly follow this and end up with a pot of adobo that’s edible.

Here’s a list of ingredients you need:

• pork or chicken – as much as you need to feed your crew
• apple cider vingar – NOT the white stuff. Never the white or fancy stuff. Just the apple cider kind.
• mixed pickling spices – You can find this stuff in bags in the spices section. It’s a bunch of peppercorns and bits of bay leaf and not hot chiles usually.
• paprika
• salt
• soy sauce
• GARLIC (fresh cloves – a few to taste… I use a half dozen)

I also use a tea ball. A tea ball is a lovely little device with holes. You put tea leaves in and drop the tea ball in hot water. The holes let the water in so you end up with a nice cup of tea, but no tea leaves in the bottom of your cup. I use two of em full of mixed pickling spices in adobo so I don’t end up with a mouthful of peppercorns later. You can also tie the spices into a cheesecloth. If you don’t care about getting a mouthful of peppercorns you don’t need this.

You can use boneless meat or not. My brother uses chicken thighs (with the bone in) which are generally pretty cheap in the store. When I make chicken adobo, I use boneless chicken breast. Motley isn’t much of a chicken person though so I usually make pork adobo. I get those country style ribs and I toss them in a tall pot whole. The reason I don’t cut them up and take them off the bone is because you end up cooking the meat long enough that it falls off the bone anyway. I just pick all the bones out of the pot when it’s done. They’re a good size and easy to pull out without the chore turning into a mess.

Into the tall pot goes the pork and garlic then I cover the meat with water. I make sure it’s completely covered too. No parts sticking out. Then I add some apple cider vinegar. You prolly want to know how much. I don’t know how much. It depends on how much water you have. My best guestimate would be about a cup and a half per 12 cups of water. Basically, I start pouring and the instant it reeks, I stop. Cause really, when you start pouring, it doesn’t smell much. The moment I start to recoil from the pot is when I quit pouring. LOL

Drop in your mixed pickling spices. You can put a little or a lot. Generally, I fill two tea balls but it depends on how much you’re making and whether you like stuff strongly spiced or not. Some people might not like a lot. There is no right way or wrong way to do this. I’ve had very weakly spiced adobo and very strongly spiced. You have to experiment and find out what your family likes best. I sprinkle in the equivalent of probably a couple of tablespoons each of paprika and salt. I dump about a quarter cup of soy sauce in and then I turn on the stove.

I cook it until the meat falls off the bone and a lot of the water is gone. Generally, it’s kind of a soupy-stewy consistency when it’s done. I break the meat into chunks with a spoon. I serve it over steamed rice and spoon some of the sauce onto the rice. You can also find a Filipino store and buy frozen lumpia (Filipino egg rolls) and fry those up to go with the meal. Yum.

So that’s it for what’s been cooking in my house. Hope the recipe that’s not a recipe works out for you and that you get to enjoy some adobo!

BTW, don’t forget that you can pick up my books at Noble Romance and Pink Petal Books. If I sell 85 copies of the Darkworld books they go to print and then I can offer SIGNED copies! Woot! All the books are quite steamy and a lot of fun. I don’t think I can write without humor, although this weekend I’m gonna give it a whirl as I finish my story for Wild Child Publishing’s Weirdly anthology. I’ve just become the editor in charge of the antho so I gotta get on the stick and finish my story so I can check out the other ones coming in.

Hope you have a great weekend!

Since I was flush, I ordered a white pizza. And boneless hot wings. The wings were a little warm so I drank a few bottles of water with dinner. I’m full now. Thanks Dubya.