I don’t live in a particularly glamorous area of Los Angeles. In fact it’s not glamorous at all. It’s the kind of neighborhood with both a shut-up elementary school surrounded by chain-link fence that attracts graffiti artists, as well as a shopping mall that features stores like Ferragamo and Burberry. I’m pretty sure my neighbors aren’t buying the out-sourced products sold there and I know I’m not. At any rate, in this same middle-of-the-demographic neighborhood, exists a house. It’s a monstrosity of a place–huge and ugly and out of keeping with the one story ranch houses around it; most particularly MY house directly next door, a brown stucco number built in the 1960s with vintage electrical wiring and plumbing from the same era.

My arrival in the ‘hood occurred at the nadir of the housing crisis. If not for the decline in market values, I would never have been able to buy in this or any other neighborhood for that matter…. but that’s another story.

Note: This is not a plot in one of my novels. At least not yet. This is the true story of the house next door to mine in one corner of the city of LA.