Discovering John Denver and BC's Wilderness

 I ran across this YouTube clip below:

The moment it started playing and showed those pictures of the mountains, it gave me a feeling and reminded me of how desperately in love I was with our mountain wilderness when I was a little boy.

I had two loves when I was a little boy.  The first one was music. I had a little harmonica from the time I was 4 or 5 years old, and I'd play it like an organ, just playing chords, and changing the tone with the shape of my mouth. When I was 6, and learning to read in school, I noticed that I recognized both songs in the little "booklet" that came with it.  Each word had a number above it and an arrow up or down.

With the help of one of my sisters, I discovered that the numbers matched the ones on my harmonica, and that an arrow down meant "blow" while an arrow up meant "suck".  So, I played my first two songs on the harmonica. Then I started trying to play other songs that I knew, and pretty soon I was playing anything I knew.  Of course, I quickly realized that some songs needed flats or sharps and my little solo-tuned Marine Band Hohner couldn't do that, so I was out of luck on those. Laura's Theme from Dr. Shivago was just plain impossible to play, and no amount of improvisation would make it work.

I remember wanting to play guitar so bad that it almost hurt.  When I was 7, at Christmas, my parents gave me and my little sister both plastic, toy guitars. They had 6 strings, keys to tune them, and frets.  My sister's looked like a small acoustic, mine looked like a bright red electric guitar. So for several months I strummed it open, and pretended that I was the Beatles or the Monkeys.  Then, a few months in, my oldest brother (7 years older than me - he would have been a teenager) took my sister's guitar and the little booklet that came with it, and played a song. I was incensed! I was the guitarist! Me! 

So, I found my older sister who had helped me with the harmonica and she helped interpret how to use the chord charts. Again, I played the two songs in my little booklet, then launched into anything I knew. I was either just 8 years old or about to turn 8. I can't recall exactly.

I played everything that I heard and loved.  My only limitation was figuring out the words. No Internet. I had to hear the song on the radio and hope it came through clear enough for me to guess the correct words. Or, sometimes I wanted to play it so bad I'd make up words that sounded close enough. I was 8, poetic license for an 8 year old comes easy.

My favourite music genres were folk, (Peter, Paul & Mary, Pete Seeger, Judy Collins, and others), rock (Beatles, Monkeys, Badfinger, Beach Boys, Rolling Stones), and gospel.  Interesting mix, but there you have it.  

At 9 years old, my best friend and I formed a "rock band" to play songs, mostly Beatles.

Now we come to my second love as a child.

Somewhere around the time I was 10 years old, I joined a wolf cub pack. My family was big into scouting, so that was not surprising, but I went on camps and discovered the outdoors. My first camp was at a cabin on Mount Seymour.  My second camp was in Garibaldi Park, but the part that's now called Golden Ears Provincial Park (they split it in two). I fell in love with the outdoors.  

At about the same time, I discovered John Denver, with much of his music having an outdoor theme.  Somehow, his music resonated with my love of the outdoors, so I began to learn my favourite John Denver songs.  When I was 12, my dad bought a John Denver 8-track tape, which we played in the car and at home, so for once I could hear the songs enough to get all the words right!

At that time, we moved to the town of Mission, leaving all my Burnaby friends behind. We lived on the massive hillside of the Fraser River valley, so to ride a bike, you had to do really nasty hills. I was devastated at first, but soon got really strong legs.  I was the only scout registered in the district of Mission for about a year and a half.  So, I'd get my dad to drop me off at some starting point, and I'd hike solo in the mountains, or I'd ride my bike up somewhere.  I hiked the mountains and hills, waded barefoot in the creeks, swamps and swam in the lakes and bigger creek pools all around Mission. It was a perfect existence for a young teenage boy.

And John Denver's music seemed to express perfectly how I felt about the wonderful, wild, mountainous world I got to enjoy as my playground!

So, when I found and played the video embedded at the top of this post, there were some very strong memories and feelings that came back to me.  It's that love for God's creation that I desire to share with others through music and through scouting.

I hope that some of you get a sense of that wonder and Joy, as you listen to John Denver's Windsong!

50 Years of Central Park Pool in Burnaby

Central Park Pool

When I was a little boy in Burnaby, there were two outdoor pools that were within a reasonable distance of our home.  There was also a wading pool at Lobbley Park, but it was too shallow to actually swim in.  The two real pools were MacPherson Pool and Central Park Pool.  MacPherson was definitely closer, but cost 15 cents for a child admission.  Central Park was a fair bit further but had only 10 cents admission.  I first went to MacPherson when I was about 7, and that was my go-to pool for a long time. I was allowed to ride there, but Central Park was off-limits.

Getting There

When I was 9 years old, I begged my mom and dad to let me go to Central Park with my friends. This was originally not for the pool but simply to have adventures in the big forest trails.  It was spring time and my parents finally gave in.

At the time I had a small bike that I was starting to outgrow, with a banana seat.  We'd go to Sussex on Victory, cross Imperial, then we took a bunch of short cuts between apartment buildings and yards that didn't have fences. No one ever complained about it. I think they understood that the alternative was us little children riding our bikes down Imperial or Kingsway.  Finally, we'd enter the park about where the tennis courts are (and were).  We'd tear down the main trail, and we'd always hit our back-pedal brakes at the end where the horse-shoe pitch was, to see who could make the longest skid mark.  Then we'd start driving through all the side trails.

Yesterday... and 50 Years Ago

Yesterday (July 24, 2018) we had 32 degree Celsius heat with a humidex that made it feel like 35 (95 Fahrenheit).  So I decided to go to my old haunts to swim.  While I was there beating the heat, it struck me that my first time swimming there would have been pretty nearly 50 years ago!

Memories of Swimming at 9-years-old

As I swam and watched some of the children around me, I started recalling what it was like to be 9, 10, 11, 12 years old, and swimming with my friends in that pool.

I recalled distinctly how it felt to be getting ready. Boy's bathing suits today are like full shorts. They go down to your knees. We would have laughed at anyone wearing something like that to a pool when I was little.  I'd put my skimpy little bathing suit on, then grab a towel and put it over my shoulders. Then I'd hop on my bike and ride to my friend's place. We'd ride around to a few other homes to pick up our group. Usually somewhere between 4 and 10 of us would finally set out.

No one wore a helmet.  I remember there was a young man who wore a helmet to walk. I suspect he had Cerebral Palsy, and he had trouble walking, and the helmet was to protect him if he fell.  I always felt sorry for him, but a helmet made me think of him. None of my friends ever hit their heads falling off their bike that  I know of, and I don't know of any other child who had a head injury.  After a fall or two, you made sure you didn't fall, and drivers knew that every side-street would have a handful of little children riding bikes around, so they were just more careful.

No one wore shoes. Our bikes had nice rubber pedals.  You'd put the instep of your little foot over the pedals and you'd pedal away.  As you rode, you created your own breeze, and it felt absolutely delightful to have that breeze blowing through your little bare toes.  It also felt nice to have that rubber under your little bare feet.  If you stopped, it felt nice to put a bare foot down on the hot, rough road for a minute.

No one wore shirts.  All we wore was our bathing suits, with a towel over our shoulders.  The sun would bake down on our little bodies and it would feel really good!  As we rode, the breeze we created would blow over our little bare tummies, chests and arms and it felt positively delicious!

We'd do our usually break-neck pace down the main trail, then do the long skid-marks at the end, and note who got the longest skids.

Then we'd park our bikes by the pool. No one had a bike lock, you didn't need one. We'd typically arrive a few minutes before the pool opened, so we'd wait by the entrance for them to let us in.

I'd fish my dime out of the little pocket in my bathing suit and pay, then we'd head in. There were (and still are) little stone cubbies at one end, that we'd put our towels in, then we'd jump into the pool and start playing.

Yesterday, I watched a couple of young teens doing crazy, flailing dives off the low diving board, on purpose, and it reminded me the crazy antics I'd do with my friends.  We'd forget everything except how fun it was to be a little boy, swimming, splashing and playing with friends.

Then we'd get out, and lie on the deck. Our wet bodies took the simmering edge off the sun-baked cement, and it felt really nice to lay on our tummies directly on the hot, rough cement.  The sun would bake our legs, backs, shoulders and arms, and once we were dry, it would start to get too hot, so we'd jump back in the pool and do some more swimming.

Finally, when the public swim was over, we'd grab our towels and head outside the pool. We'd sit in the grass and dry off a bit in the sun, before grabbing our bikes and riding home.  The towels did not get a lot of use.  They were more ornamental, something you were expected to have and might want, but not really necessary. My bike seat would get more wet from my riding it in the rain, and I didn't mind being wet. Anyways, the sun made short work of any water on my body.

Yesterday, I noted a few differences. First, only a few children came on bikes. The ones that did had at least one that looked like a teen or came with parents, and they all had helmets.  (Given today's drivers and traffic, that's a good thing.) Most of the younger kids had adults with.  Also, the pool was a lot emptier than when I was little. We used to pack it with kids and only a handful of adults.  The really little kids would have a grown-up close on hand, but it was not uncommon for kids 8 and older to show up on their own or with other kids their age.  It's a sad commentary that it's no longer safe to do so.

Today is another hot day, so I'm going back for another swim...

9 Year Old Rock n Rollers

My First Guitar

As far back as I can recall, I loved guitars.  I remember when I was 5 or 6 years old, visiting a lady with my family and seeing a beautiful guitar she had behind her couch, and feeling a desperate ache in my middle, because I wanted to play it so bad.  I knew I would not be allowed, so I never asked, but I clearly remember how badly I wanted to play that instrument. I would not have been able to, but that didn't stop me from wanting to.

When I was 7 years old, at Christmas time (that would have been 1966), I got a plastic toy electric guitar. It looked really cool to me, and it had 6 plastic strings, keys to tune them with, and frets. It didn't sound like much but you could actually play chords on it.  It even came with a book that told you how to play two songs.

I think I mostly strummed it, pretending to play it as a rock guitarist for the first few months. But my sister also had one that looked like a regular acoustic guitar, and about the time I would have been turning 8, my older brother picked up her guitar, read the little booklet and played both songs.  I was horrified! I was supposed to be the guitar player, not him! (He was 7 years older than me, so he would have been 15, while I was nearly, or just barely, 8 years old.)

So, I got my older sister to help me figure out the booklet, and I played my two songs.  This was the same sister that helped me figure out the booklet that came with my harmonica when I was 6, the younger of my two older sisters. She would have been 11.

Once I had played those two songs, I started looking for more songs I could play.  My mother had bought a guitar book called "Alfred's Basic Guitar Method - Volume 1".  It had their famous, patented magic chord chart in the back cover.  This had the three major chords, three minor chords, and a handful of extra chords for every key.  I understood how tones and semitones and scales worked (I'd figured it out without lessons) and now I began to get the math and concepts behind transposing.  That back page of the book was my teacher!

Note: Alfred's Basic Guitar method books can still be bought, but they removed the magic chord chart. You have to buy it separately. I suspect that music teachers wanted it out because their students could learn without their help with that included.

With 5 siblings, and all but one of them older than me, I knew I would never get lessons, so when I wanted to play an instrument, and was lucky enough to get my hands on one, I taught myself.

Whatever song I heard on the radio and loved, I'd teach myself. I taught myself a ton of hymns, all the scout songs my oldest brother was bringing home, folk songs I knew, and whatever rock songs caught my fancy.  "Paint it Black" by the Rolling Stones, "Craquelin Rose" by Neil Diamond (I know, not age appropriate, but I didn't care, I loved the song), Shilo (also Neil Diamond), and many others.

I looked, but couldn't find a picture on the internet that matched either my toy guitar or my sister's, so no pictures with this one.

I Get a Real Guitar

Before the year was up, a friend's mother came over and sat on the toy guitar that I'd left on the couch.  I was devastated, but in the meantime, my parents had found some really inexpensive guitars in the Sears bargain basement.  They were from a company called "AGS" which stood for "American General Supply" and I recall they were sold for $10.50. Back then, that was probably the equivalent of a $75 low-end beginner's guitar like what you'd get at London Drugs today.

By this time, my mother knew I could actually play the instrument, so she told me I could use her guitar.

I still remember my first time trying to play it. My little fingers were used to the soft, relatively loose, plastic strings of my toy guitar. This real guitar had steel, relatively high-tension strings that hurt my fingers like mad.  I remember only being able to play for 5 minutes the first few times, before I had to stop, and I remember bawling a bit, cause I wanted to keep playing so bad, but my fingers hurt too much!  I was probably still 8 years old, but I had (and still have) a stubborn streak.  I'd pause, lick and blow on my poor, burning fingers, and then go back to more playing. I think it only took me a few weeks to toughen up my fingers.

Me at 13 years old, with my AGS guitar, in Mission, BC.

My Best Friend

I actually had two best friends, and had real trouble figuring out which one to choose between on occasion.  One of them was a boy my age from a family that my family was friends with. They lived down Jubilee street, and it was his mom who sat on my toy guitar.

The other was a boy I met on the first day of grade 1 (I didn't go to kindergarten, so that was my first day away from my parents.)

Steve and I walked home, and Steve invited me into his house. In there, he sat down in front of their cabinet record player, put a reel-to-reel tape on, and played and recorded a song off of one of his Beatles albums. I was amazed that he was allowed to touch the expensive cabinet (I'd have been killed for trying at 6), but loved the music. Steve and I shared a love of music, especially the Beatles!

Little Rock n Rollers

So, that brings me to being a 9 year old boy, who had taught himself to play Harmonica, Recorder and Guitar, without any lessons, and could play just about any song by ear.

That year, Steve and I got the idea that we'd form a rock band and play our favourite songs.  Steve had got hold of a second-hand acoustic guitar and had strung the first 3 strings on it.  I was impressed that he could pick the lead part out. I was a rhythm guitarist, and just played chords.  I was also impressed because I was convinced he sounded like Paul McCartney (but 9 years old...)

His little brother wanted to play along, so I took two aluminum meat-pie tins, put some pigeon feed in, and stapled edges together. I gave him that for a maraca. I only think he joined us once or twice, but I do recall wanting to include him.

Our first song was "Get Back" by the Beatles.  Our second song was "Hey Jude", also by the Beatles.  We sang a lot of Beatles songs.  Somewhere, Steve thinks they may have a tape or two of us singing. I'd love to hear it if he could find one.

I do remember getting us to sing "Sloop John B." by the Beach Boys, because I loved it so much (the folk musician in me, coming out!)

At one point we had a drummer and a handful of extra vocalist, and I recall Steve's mom took a picture of us all singing.

I remember us playing in Steve's garage one time, with the neighborhood kids riding their bikes around us.

Still Rockin' in the Free World!

I went on to play for my scout troop, my various churches, youth groups, seniors homes, and recently, my cub scouts and bible study group.  I still love all kinds of music.

Steve, meanwhile went on to playing real gigs, and still does so. Recently he created an album, mastered at Abbey Road Studios, with over 22,000 downloads on Spotify.  His album is available on Spotify, on CD and on Vinyl, through is web site http://www.stevejensenmusic.com

You can find Steve's Spotify account with this search:
https://open.spotify.com/search/albums/steve%20jensen

I often listen to his album on my way to or from work, on the Skytrain, and find it really relaxing and fun to listen to. (Warning, there's one song "Really Nice Person" with explicit lyrics.) 

I'll leave you with one of his music videos, featuring many lower-mainland locations, including the old Gastown Steam Clock, called "Walking Back Home":

Amazon Ads for my book - It Actually Worked!

Previous posts about this book:
I've Self-Published a Story
Using Facebook Promotions to Advertise an Amazon book
Amazon Ads for my Book

The last post on this topic I mentioned my reservations about Amazon ads, but finally, on looking at it decided to give it a try. With Amazon, you can set a daily budget, and between that and the duration, I knew I could control the costs.

So I setup a campaign to start the first weekend of December and run through to Christmas Day, with a maximum cost per click of .25 and a daily budget of $2.00. I was willing to lose that much money for the exercise.  I chose a sponsored products ad campaign and let Amazon automatically choose the keywords. I was convinced that their algorithms were probably better than any guesswork on my part, so I left it to them. I suspect that was a good idea. 

I learned a number of things from this. 

Amazon bids on ads, like mine, that have been activated and put out there.  If they bid on you, they will put you on pages that they feel, based on the ad's keywords are a good fit.  Every time they put you on someone's web page, that's called an impression.  You don't pay for impressions. You pay if someone clicks onto your page, whether they buy or not.

It started on Sunday December 3rd, mid-afternoon. The ad went live in the evening and had over 30,000 impressions by morning.  By the end of Monday, we were at about 80,000 impressions, and I had a few sales in the bag.

By end of day Tuesday, I was at 90,000 impressions. But then it slowed down. By end of the week I was stalled at 100,000 impressions.  I suspect as we moved into the holiday season, Amazon was focusing their bids on high-priced, high-demand items (they are a business, after all.) Impressions practically dried right up!

The interesting thing is they were still under $3.00 cost for the campaign. I had a daily limit of $2.00 but they weren't even coming close to it on any day. So I decided to up the anti.  I increased my per-click maximum to .50 and my daily budget to $6.00.  This resulted in getting more impressions, but still very slow. Sales picked back up.  I also extended the campaign to end of the first week of January, figuring that kids with new eBooks would be loading them with books during the holidays.  Most kids in Canada, and many in North America were off for the first week of January, so this made sense.

Middle of the week after Christmas, impressions began to climb and I got a bunch more sales.

At the end, my total spend on this campaign was under $20.00.  My royalties due for these sales are more than double that, so I'm ahead of the game.

The other interesting thing is, that although the ad campaign focused on the eBook, a lot of purchasers went to the paperback version and bought it, instead.

And finally, my original goal was to sell a dozen through this learning exercise. I sold 18 (of which 4 were paperbacks bought by me) so I'm ahead of my original goal.

Takeaways from this exercise:

1. Don't try to compete with big business close to Christmas (my next story will not be a Christmas story)
2. Don't be afraid to have a higher daily budget - you probably won't spend it anyways.
3. Amazon ads can work - you need a good product that's well positioned.

Thus endeth the lesson!

Wolf Cub Field Trip - To Jail!

Can't remember what, but something brought this back to me today, so I thought I'd share this memory...

When I was 10 years old, I was a member of 1st Burnaby South-view Wolf Cub Pack, which met in Maywood School on Imperial street behind Simpson Sears (now Metrotown). Back then we were called wolf cubs, not cub scouts (I preferred being a wolf cub - much cooler!)  This was when the organization was still called Boy Scouts of Canada. Now it's co-ed and it's called Scouts Canada.

I believe it was very rare at that time, (Scouting in Canada not being co-ed yet) but my Akela was a woman, named Beth Reynolds.  Her son, Greg, was one of the other cubs.  It never phased me that my Akela was a woman, I was just glad to be a Wolf Cub, but I realize now that it was an unusual situation!

We did a lot of fun things when I was a cub, and as leaders today, we try to ensure that out little cubs get to have a lot of fun activities, too.

One of the things we did was a field trip to the Burnaby Police Station. I believe later that year it was torn down and a new building put up.  We were taken around and shown various parts of the building. I honestly can't recall much of it, but there was one part that stood out for me.

The officer that was taking us around got us to the area where the prisoners were kept. They had jails in there with metal bars and bunks.  This particular "ward" didn't have any prisoners at the time, or they would not have been able to bring us in there.  He opened the door to let us go in, which we all did, and started climbing all over the bunks.  There was probably about a dozen of us on this field trip, so we all fit.

Then, he closed the door and locked it, turned to my Akela, and told her "Okay, we can go talk in the staff room in peace!" and they walked away and left us there.  After the initial laughs and wails of "Hey! No fair!" or "I didn't do it! I'm innocent!", one of the boys grabbed the bars and started to chant "We want out!", so we all joined in.

After several minutes they came back and let us out.  They were teasing us (we do that with our cubs, too), but we knew we were safe. We would never have wanted to be in there for real!  That memory has stayed with me over the years! It's funny what stays with a child!

What Does Christmas Mean to Me?

My family came from the Netherlands before any of us children, other than my oldest brother, were born, and he was just a baby.  When they came here, they adopted Canadian customs and traditions for holidays, including Christmas.  As a result, we grew up enjoying Christmas trees, presents, Santa Claus, Rudolph, Reindeer and more, much like any other child growing up in Burnaby would have done.

We did a few things that were unique to us:  We never hung up stockings. And we usually opened presents on Christmas eve.  Other than that, I think we were a pretty normal family in terms of Canadian Christmas celebrations.

Christmas 1965 - I was 6 years old

I don't recall ever thinking Santa was real.  I somehow understood that he was a fun game that parents played with their children, and that the stores were trying to use him to sell their goods. I also don't remember ever sitting on his knee, and I knew who my presents came from.

Me opening presents when I was 5

I do remember really loving the Christmas story. Someone would read all the key verses every year before we opened presents, and I loved our manger set.

Me at age 5 playing with the manger set - I liked to add my toy animals

I also loved it when my family would sing Christmas Carols.  We were all very musical, and we'd pull out the instruments and have a little mini-concert.

Family Christmas Music in Mission - Pretty sure I'm 12 here
Dad took the pictures

Antoon and I on recorders, Merina on Guitar (Big Bertha), Sylvia on Flute,
Mom on round-back mandolin

Better view of my mom on the round-back Mandolin - I have it now

Here is Away in a Manger, recorded by me (recently) on multiple instruments that we would have played when we were young, from my SoundCloud account. Click the play button to hear it:


When I was just seven years old, and was becoming an avid reader, I started reading stories in Reader's Digest books and in newspapers and other places. These stories told of the meaning of Christmas, or illustrated the spirit of Christmas.  I was too little to understand that the latter was God's Holy Spirit working in people's lives, but I do remember it clicked.  Somehow Santa really fell into the background, and it was much more about what God did in sending us Jesus.

I fell in love with the true meaning of Christmas that year, and I realized that St. Nicholas was a bit of a distraction from the real point.

In many European countries, there is a special day for Saint Nicholas, usually on Dec 6th.  This has the effect of clearly separating him from the day to celebrate Christ's first coming.  Unfortunately, in both the UK and in North America, we've combined the two.

I recently talked to my cubs about who St. Nicholas really was, and what Christmas really was about. There are things we know about him and things we can't validate, that are part of the legend and myth surrounding him.

Here are the historical facts we have about Bishop Nicholas of Myra:

Nicholas was born during the third century in the village of Patara. At the time the area was Greek and is now on the southern coast of Turkey. His wealthy parents, who raised him to be a devout Christian, died in an epidemic while Nicholas was still young. Obeying Jesus' words to "sell what you own and give the money to the poor," Nicholas used his whole inheritance to assist the needy, the sick, and the suffering. He dedicated his life to serving God and was made Bishop of Myra while still a young man. Bishop Nicholas became known throughout the land for his generosity to those in need, his love for children, and his concern for sailors and
ships.  In many lands, St. Nicholas day is celebrated on December 6^th, the date of his death.

So Nicholas was a devout Christian who followed the example and teaching of Christ. His example is a good one to follow in that respect and he's worthy of note, and maybe even a feast day, if that's your thing!

Some stories that circulate about him include a very consistent one in which he attempted to help a man whose wife had passed away (or was very sick) and several daughters. The result was gold coins in the stockings that the girls had hung to dry in their chimney (chimney's used to be big enough you could stand in the fireplace and you'd use it to cook or dry clothes.)  This drove the tradition of stockings for St. Nicholas day.  It has nothing to do with the Nativity story.

There are other stories about St. Nicholas that are a bit harder to verify. After his death, he is credited with rescuing a 12-year-old boy who was taken as a slave by Arab pirates from Crete, on the feast day of St. Nicholas. A year later, in answer to his mother's prayers, St. Nicholas miraculously rescued the boy and whisked him back to his home and his parents.  He's also credited with praying to God who miraculously raised 3 murdered children back to life in answer to his prayers (while he was still alive.)  While there are numerous sources of these stories that corroborate fairly well, there is no evidence supporting them.

He was an interesting character, as you can see, with lots of interesting facts and unverifiable legends, but even the historical facts clearly identify him as a person of faith and personal character, with a heart of giving and helping others.  While this is a good fit for the Christmas season, I still think it's a bit of a distraction.

The real point of Christmas, and the true gift of Christmas, is summarized in John 3:16.  God gave us his son, Jesus, born in a manger, announced to lowly shepherds, worshiped by foreign magicians and soothsayers. His son was not sent to drive our foreigners (Romans) from Israel, nor to be recognized by a sinful world as a key world figure, but to give his life to redeem us from sin. To free us from the tyranny of sin, made the tyranny of the Romans, or anyone or anything else, for that matter, immaterial! One day He will free us from all the rest, too, but for now, he has left us in this broken world to proclaim the message of the Gospel to broken people. The same message that the Angel of the Lord announced and a choir of angels sang many years ago, on the first Christmas day:

"For unto you is born, this day, in the City of David, a Saviour, who is Christ, The Lord!"

That's the true meaning of Christmas!

--------------------------------------

The Little Interpreter

Experience the joy and magic of the first Christmas story as experienced by two boys.  David is a young Jewish boy, living in Persia, learning to be a scribe, when the star first appears.  Adopted by one of the wise men when his father passed away, David goes as an interpreter for the wise men.  Thomas, a young shepherd boy, is there when the angel announces the Christ child. Almost two years later, he meets David and leads him and the wise men to the house of Joseph, Mary and Jesus in Bethlehem.  Along the way, David learns lessons about faith, and about accepting differences in all people who would worship the Christ child!

An excerpt from the story can be read on my author blog site:

https://sototallyfiction.blogspot.ca/2017/11/the-following-is-excerpt-from-my-book.html

The Kindle eBook or paperback can be bought at these English-language Amazon sites:

US Kindle and paperback

https://www.amazon.com/Little-Interpreter-Robert-Houben-ebook/dp/B076YRB7K3/ref=la_B076Z431Y2_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1509854590&sr=1-1

Canadian Kindle

https://www.amazon.ca/Little-Interpreter-Robert-Houben-ebook/dp/B076YRB7K3/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1509854858&sr=8-1&keywords=the+little+interpreter

Australian Kindle

https://www.amazon.com.au/Little-Interpreter-Robert-Houben-ebook/dp/B076YRB7K3/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1509854902&sr=8-1&keywords=the+little+interpreter

UK Kindle and paperback

https://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_sb_noss/262-5055983-1930431?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=the+little+interpreter

John Denver's Music and My Love of the Outdoors

I grew up in a Scouting family, hearing stories from my brothers and my dad about camping and great hiking experiences, so it's no surprise that I got bit with the bug when just a little boy.

At first, I did my own adventures with my friends, riding bikes to ravines and patches of bush, where we'd play.  I joined the Wolf Cubs program of Boy Scouts of Canada when I was 10, and almost right away went on a camp in a cabin up on Mount Seymour.  Following this I did a camp at a park called Garibaldi Provincial Park. The southern part of it was separated and renamed Golden Ears Provincial Park soon after.

I"m climbing the flag pole at Camp Garibaldi - this became Golden Ears Park

At 11 years old, I did a linking camp, where older cubs like me got to join a Scout camp (with the big boys).  I went with a couple of my older friends from my pack, 1st Burnaby Southview (we met in Maywood School.)  I remember sitting on the beach on a log, and looking at those gorgeous mountains on the other side of the lake and dreaming of living up there in the trees.

Then, my family moved to Mission, BC when I was 12, late in the year. The following year, as I turned 13, I discovered that if I rode my bike up the hill, I was in those same mountains. There was a small lake that had a raft with a pole you could push it around with.  There were trails and rivers galore! I was in heaven!

About that time, an artist whose music I knew and liked, came out with an album that blew my mind.  It was a live recording of a concert, and it was called an evening with John Denver.  The songs he sang positively screamed what I felt about the mountains, and wildlife, and I fell in love with that music.  I promptly learned a bunch of songs on that album and can still play and sing them.

Me, behind Antoon and Mom in Mission - 13 years old - probably playing John Denver!

When I first went out with her, I used to serenade Loretta with some of his songs! Annie's Song, This Old Guitar, and Hey It's Good To Be Back Home Again" and many others, so these songs have another nostalgic angle for me!  I still sometimes play those songs for her, but haven't for a while...

I was saddened when I heard that he crashed his plane and died back in 1997, but I continue to enjoy his music, thankful for the joy of knowing his music, and growing up to it.

------

Check out my Christmas Story - an excerpt and links are available here:

http://SoTotallyFiction.blogspot.com

Amazon Ads for My Book

Having tried out Facebook, I started reading up on Amazon.  You get a significant number of "impressions" which means your ad shows up on someones page on Amazon.com, but don't have to pay until they click on your link. What you pay for that suggests that you need to get a sale for every 5 clicks, based on my current price, but that's not happening for most authors.

Targeting is key, but those who do the targeting indicate it takes a long time to make it work, and it works better for a series.

So Amazon marketing is off the list for me. 

About my Story

Experience the joy and magic of the first Christmas story as experienced by two boys.  David, a young Jewish boy is living in Persia, learning to be a scribe, when the star first appears.  David had been adopted by one of the wise men, Gaspar, when his father had passed away, and goes as an interpreter for the wise men.  Thomas, a young shepherd boy, is there when the angel announces the Christ child. Almost two years later, he meets David and leads him and the wise men to the house of Joseph, Mary and Jesus in Bethlehem.  Along the way, David learns lessons about faith, and about accepting differences in all people who would worship the Christ child!

Major English-language Amazon sites:

US Kindle and paperback -  Canadian Kindle -  Australian Kindle -  UK Kindle and paperback

Using Facebook Promotions to advertise an Amazon book

Well, I paid a mere $7.00 to Facebook to promote my book, to see what would happen.

I had a pretty good idea that Facebook would not do that well, especially after looking at my options:

I was not able to constrain my age range below 13 as that's the youngest that Facebook will let you manage a page or open an account.  So right there, they are wrong for my demographic.  I could only do Canada, as broadening the geographic range would make it more expensive than the experimental nature warranted, especially given the incorrect demographic, but the paperback is only printed in the US and UK so there's no free shipping, regardless how many your buy, so only the eBook is even a rough candidate.

In the end, they reached 329 people (actually pretty good reach for $7.00), of which only 8 clicked on the link (about $1.00/click) and only one shared the post.  Clicking on the link meant they clicked on the Facebook post that had further links out.

Unfortunately, I know who some of the clickers are, so they would have done so from other sources, too, so a couple of those 8 clicks can be scratched, as they are meaningless.

All in all, if I ever want to sell something compelling to the general public, 13 and older, in Canada, Facebook is a great option! For my children's Christmas story, not so much...

So, my next step is to start digging into Amazon Advertising to see what the options look like.

Experience the first Christmas through the eyes of two boys, in my new story, available on Amazon in eBook or paperback

https://www.amazon.com/author/roberthouben

Christmas music playlist on my SoundCloud

https://soundcloud.com/robert-houben/sets/the-little-interpreter

Major English-language Amazon sites:

US Kindle and paperback -  Canadian Kindle -  Australian Kindle -  UK Kindle and paperback

I've Self-Published a Story

All my life I've loved to tell stories.

Some of my earliest memories were of playing with my little sister, Margaret, with some puppets that an older sister Sylvia made for us.  Mine was a cloth and felt mouse with a super-hero costume and cape. I called him Mouseface.  My little sister's was a bisque cat head with a very light cloth body, which she named Pussycat.  I loved to make up silly stories and make her laugh!

When I was older, I had a scoutmaster who invited me to bring my guitar along from time to time and I would lead my fellow scouts in a collection of campfire songs and songs we'd hear on the radio. Kumbaya would be followed by Sloop John B (Beach Boys version).  We'd tell stories at campfire time, and do skits and sing songs.  I loved the stories, skits, music and performing.

I continued leading campfires and telling stories at cub and scout camps as I progressed through being a teenage leader-in-training through to a full adult leader.  Most of these stories were canned stories, and I continue to tell stories like "The vinder-viper" and "The purple ape".  I've embellished these so that they are great favourites. My cubs continue ask for them after hearing them several times over!

In both elementary and high school, I remember thinking up whole, elaborate stories in my head, when I was supposed to be focusing on school-work.  Somehow, this didn't prevent me from passing school, but it was clearly more fun than learning at the glacial pace that school expected of me.

Then I had my own son, and various nieces and nephews, and I found that I loved to make up stories to tell to them. I'd make up running stories while driving my son and nephews to school. Sometimes, I'd go around the block before dropping them off so I could get the story to a good point. Then, the next time I took them somewhere, they'd beg me to continue it.

I've loved telling stories, especially to children, I think because of a combination of things.  First, I love the creative aspect behind it. Second, I love the performance aspect of getting up in front of a bunch of children and telling the story from memory.  And lastly, I love the joy and delight I see on the faces of the children when I'm telling them the stories.

So, a couple years ago, I started taking some of the stories that were rolling around in my head, and writing them down.  When I had a couple at a pretty good place, I started to do research.  My wife is an aspiring author, who writes for the local Collingwood newspaper, and she was a member (and webmaster for a time) for the local Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators (SCBWI) western chapter.  I attended a few events and sessions with her, and I recommend this as a good way to get critique and input on your book.  Unfortunately, my schedule made it very hard for me to make any of the meetings for the last year.

How should I publish my book?

As I researched what it would take to publish a book, it turned out that there were several options:

You could hunt down an agent and start hitting up publishers. If one of them thought your book was any good, they would engage you and would try to change the book to suit their picture of success.  This was a problem for me.  I grew up in an age when a handful of rich people in offices somewhere took the top 40 songs that *they thought* the general public would like, fed it to us in every radio station and told us that this was what we liked.  We didnt... There were about a dozen songs I liked, and another dozen I could tolerate, but the rest basically sucked, and I put up with them waiting for one of the good ones. Meanwhile, there were a bunch of songs I had heard before and really liked, that were no longer in that top 40, so you basically didn't get them unless they ran a request line.

I couldn't bear the thought of that same mentality trying to coerce my book into their idea of "good" (which would probably suck for me) so I decided that this was a definite no-go for me.  I also figured that I was too impatient to wait for years while someone messed around with my story.  Traditional publishing typically takes a couple of years to get a book to market.  I don't move that slow, why should they!?  I guess I'm too impatient and independent for that.

Traditional publishing generally returned a fair bit more money than self-publishing, but only if some publisher liked your story, and the average still wasn't that high, and you had to do a lot of marketing yourself.  It didn't sound too promising.   Ultimately, I want my story to be read. I decided if about a dozen people bought my book and liked it, I'd consider it a success. If it didn't sell well, I'd put it on my blog site for free and see if it got read that way. In the end, I'd like it to be read.  I'm a story-teller, and want my story told! Nothing wrong with friends and family!

Another thing to note about me is that I've long been an entrepreneur, and I'm not afraid to take chances, and do things myself. I've published iOS and Android apps, written (back in the day) 100% pure Java programs, and generally done things that others said were impossible.  I'm somewhat intentionally too ignorant to know that I can't do something, so I go ahead and do it.  The impossible sometimes dissolves when you do that. Once in a blue moon it doesn't.  As a tech entrepreneur, you cannot be afraid of failure, or you'll never succeed, because generally, anything you do is risky.

My previous colleagues would come up with something that we wanted to do, and they'd laugh, because I'd start out saying "That's not going to work because..." and I'd list a bunch of obstacles.  Somewhere in the next 48 hours I'd come back and say "I've figured out how to do it..." and often I'd have a working prototype!

So, in short, I figured that self publishing was for me.

Self publishing is a spectrum. At one end are companies like Friesen Press, who for a fee will help you create your book.  They want about $2,500.00 to do a serious engagement. They'll engage for small bits but will push you for that moderate package.  I suspect it's the one that they've had the most success at, so I'm not faulting them, but my research told me that the average self-published book made $500.00, so the math didn't work.

At the other end is do-it-all-yourself.  Sounds scary, but I'm a bit of a nut, so I decided to go for broke.  I love to try new things, and this sounded like a great opportunity to learn something new.

I made it a project!

I decided last year that I wanted to take a Christmas story that I was working on, and get it out by the next Christmas (this Christmas, 2017).

So I began working the story hard.  I took my early draft and condensed it. And then I condensed it again. And then I looked at everything in it critically and asked myself, "Does that really belong in my story?" And so I condensed it more.  I worked on using dialog to tell the story, instead of narration, wherever possible. And then I condensed it more.

Then I started proofing it. For reasons too numerous to get into, I was unable to find a proofreader so I did my own proofreading. You're not supposed to, but I did. My English skills are quite good and once you tell Word that you are a Canadian, spell checker liked my Canadian spelling and supported it quite nicely.  I took awkward sections and reworked them until they didn't feel awkward.  I looked at dialog and reworked it.  It kept feeling better.

Now, I'm a perfectionist, but somewhere you have to draw the line and say "That's good enough!"

I had a deadline for myself. By mid-October I needed to start working with Amazon to get the eBook formatted, so that by the beginning of November, the book would be available in time for the Christmas season.  I will admit that I kept proofing it as I went along. I read it about 10 times in the Kindle Previewer, and kept finding little things I wanted to fix, so I'd make changes, upload them to Amazon, download the .mobi version and load it back into the previewer.

I signed up as a Canadian publisher with the Canadian government and got a range of ISBN numbers, for free.  I used one for my eBook and one for my paperback.

I discovered some beta programs that Amazon was running and signed up for a KDP account.

I gave in and spent some money on getting iStockPhoto credits so I could buy royalty-free art for my cover page from them.  So I'm out about $30.00 but I can buy a few more pictures with the credits.

In the middle of my cub scout volunteering and planning, my Bible Study group starting up for the fall, a health problem that had Loretta call 911 for me, and intense efforts at work, I managed to do all of this, and plan out a marketing campaign that includes a bunch of social media.  I also created my Amazon KDP account, formatted and uploaded both an eBook and paperback version, setup payment mechanisms, configured an author blog and set up my AuthorCentral site.  Pretty crazy stuff, but I've done all this and more for software, in the past, so I don't find it that daunting.  Try publishing an iOS app someday! This was easy, by comparison!

And I've actually had fun doing it!

It's done!

Well, on Saturday October 28, 2017, I posted both my eBook and my paperback.  They told me it could take up to 72 hours to be live, but the next morning the paperback was available, and the eBook was ready for pre-order for the Nov 4, 2017 release date!

The eBook can be pre-ordered here until Nov 4, at which time you can download it immediately.  

The paperback version can be ordered here.  If you order the paperback, you can download the eBook for free.

Free Christmas music!

I also created a playlist of my Christmas songs on my SoundCloud account that fit the story and named it after the book.  To hear these songs, click the play button below and adjust your volume:

These songs were all done on my Mac Mini using GarageBand. I had a blast recording them! All instruments and vocals are me! No

So, there, in a nutshell, is my latest mad venture!  Go big or go home!

More to come!

I'll be posting a few excerpts from the book that stand alone on my writers blog site located here:
https://sototallyfiction.blogspot.ca

Summers in Mission

When I was 12 my family moved from Burnaby to the town of Mission, BC. It was about an hours drive up the Fraser valley across the River from Abbotsford.

When we first moved there, it was a bit of a culture shock for me.  I came from Burnaby, which was essentially a part of the greater Vancouver area.  Mission was so small that when we came from the Abbotsford side at night, from the other side of the river you'd only see a handful of lights on the hills of Mission.  You'd walk along the downtown stretch (all 4 or 5 blocks of it) on a Saturday morning and almost always see people you recognized from school. That almost never happened in Burnaby!

The day we moved there it had hailed and the hailstones, way bigger than what I'd ever seen in the lower mainland, looked like snow piled up on the ground and about a quarter inch in diameter! It was late fall and we had moved to a street that was essentially the hill up the side of the valley into the mountains.  I thought I'd never ride my bike again, but I soon got my legs for the hills.

I turned 13 before my first summer in Mission.  Being inland, when it warmed up, it was usually warmer there than in Vancouver, so it would start getting nice and warm about April or May.

Antoon, Mom and I on the porch of the house in Mission - I'm 13 here and wearing my swimsuit

Then, as it began to warm up that first Summer in Mission, I began to make discoveries.

I discovered was that if you were willing to ride your bike for about 20 minutes up the hills, you would arrive at a lake on the side of Dewdney Trunk road. I never knew what the park was called when I was a boy, but looking it up now, it's called Bear Mountain park.

Bear Mountain Park North of Mission on Dewdney Trunk Road

The little lake had a raft and a pole you could use to push it around. The next sunny day, I put my swimsuit on under my shorts, rode my bike up to the lake, pulled it into the bushes, pulled off everything except my swimsuit and took the raft for a spin.  I only jumped into the lake once. the reeds at the bottom made it hard to get back to the surface, which was a bit scary, not to mention yucky!

I would spend an afternoon there, poling the raft around the lake, then climb up the hill behind it and go exploring on trails, or slosh through the swamp where the water ran out of the lake, all in nothing but my swimsuit and my bare feet. I was absolutely delighted!

It didn't take long to discover other places to play. There were creeks, that usually had muddy spots where you'd pretend it was quicksand. Or you'd swim in a pool in the creek, or go fishing there.  I missed my friends in Burnaby, but there were so many fun things for a boy to do with all that forest, and lakes and creeks and mountains all around.

One of my favourite places was Mount Mary Ann.  The first time I discovered it was with a friend, who showed me a mining tunnel that ran horizontally into the mountain at the bottom of the crag. Nowadays they have it boarded up for safety reasons, but back then it was a kid's paradise to play in. It had a moss-covered rocky crag that you could climb, with a pit in it.

Aerial View of Mount Mary Ann with the rock crags that I used to climb on. The mining tunnel was at the bottom among the trees on the lower right.

I loved to climb on those crags in the summer time. I'd wear just my shorts and ride my bike there.  I'd hide my bike in the bushes and go climbing up the rocks. Then I'd sit on the rocks and feel the sun baking my skin, cooled a bit by the breeze that blew down the valley.

I remember being stopped on my bike there one day, catching my breath after climbing the Stave Lake Road hill, and a little yellow finch flew onto my handle-bars.  I froze and didn't move, just watching him so close and so cute, not wanting him to fly away!

I had always loved the outdoors, but Mission was were I developed that love into a lifelong enjoyment of camping, hiking and adventuring!

Summers in Burnaby

Summer was my favourite time of year.  As soon as it started to get warm I had a desire to take my shoes and socks off and lose my shirt.  It was fun to run around the yard in just shorts and feel the grass under my bare feet, but there were lots of other things a little boy could enjoy in a Burnaby summer back then.

When I was 9 and 10, my older brother Tony became a Playground Supervisor for the Burnaby Parks Board at Lobley Park in Burnaby.  I would walk there with him, and as soon as I got there my shirt and shoes would all come off and I'd spend the entire day in my bathing suit.  Tony and other teens would lead fun arts and crafts, and we'd go splash in the wading pool and play on the playground.

The park had lots of trees (still does) so you could always find shade to play in, and back then it had a full playground with monkey bars, swings, teeter totters and a merry go round.  Many of the trees are still there, though the playground is gone and the wading pool has been replaced by an expanded firehall.

Lobley Park today

I'd also go with my friends to the local swimming pools. There was MacPherson, which cost 15 cents, or once I was a bit older (9 years old), I was allowed to go to Central Park pool which was only 10 cents.  We'd ride our bikes there in just our bathing suits (no helmets, and bare feet) with our towels over our shoulders.  Going to MacPherson there was a hill with a dirt jump we'd go over.  If it was Central Park, we'd go as fast as we could down the main trail, then jam on the back-pedal brakes to see who could make the longest skid mark. Both pools are still there are largely unchanged.

MacPherson Pool today

Central Park Pool today

We also often went to Stanley Park. Our favourite place was Second Beach because it had a playground. I often had a friend tag along. We'd load the station wagon up with a bunch of us in the back (no seat belts back then).  We wouldn't even bother with a change of clothes or shoes. We'd go in our bathing suits and bring a towel. Nothing else required. Some pictures below of one of our Second Beach excursions:

Me and my friend Shawn at 2nd beach, play fighting. Note the sand on our bare feet.

Posing with my mom. Very sandy bare feet!

And with my dad - I'm doing bunny ears on him!

My First Cub Camp at Mount Seymour

Last weekend I drove our scouts up to Mount Seymour and dropped them off at the parking lot for a weekend camp.  This brought me back to my first cub camp.  It was held at Mount Seymour in the snow. The scouts came with toboggans and hauled our gear in to the cabin. I recall having cold feet when I arrived at the cabin.

I also still recall the awe when I got to the cabin and realized that the snow was three times my height!  I recall running around in the cabin. Burnaby region still owns that same cabin. Our scouts had to use a different cabin because the Burnaby one was waiting for some repairs, but you get off at the same parking lot, shown below.

I joined cubs in 1969 and still have my membership card for 1st Burnaby Southview pack, which met in Maywood School:

Within a few weeks of me joining, the previous Akela, Al MacLean retired and I got a new female Akela by the name of Beth Reynolds.  Female Akelas were rare at that time, but I didn't care as long as I got to go camping! That's what I was in it for.  And my Akela didn't let me down!

I'm glad I get to volunteer and help another generation of young people have the joy and character-building experience of camping!  I usually just work with the cubs, but then, most of these guys were my cubs just a few years ago, and they needed a driver for the Friday departure, and I'm always glad to help!

From the pictures I got to see of the camp, it looks like they had a great time!

Camping at Weatherhead Creek

When I lived in Mission, I used to go camping constantly.  As a 15/16/17 year old teen, I'd plan a camp and invite a bunch of my scouts along with. Most of them were younger than me, though I'd often get Gordon to come along, and he was two years older.

One of my favourite areas to hike in was this area around Davis Lake Provincial Park.

When I did camping as a part of wilderness hiking I traveled light. No tent, just a fly sheet, ground sheet, and some rope to hold it up.  I'd point the open end of this shelter toward the fire, and we'd generally have a couple of dead hemlock saplings that we'd broken or cut down that we'd put across the fire. It would burn through at the middle, and we'd reach out of the sleeping bag to push the two ends in as they burned away. We'd talk, plan our next adventures and tell jokes by the fire light, occasionally pushing some ends in to keep it burning.  Eventually we'd fall asleep, to awake in the morning when it began to get light.

Just past the end of Davis lake, possibly still in the park area was a creek that ran past the road called Weatherhead creek on the old topographic maps.  There was a rough logging road that ran down up along the ravine that the creek cut through the mountains (it was a sizable creek), and I recall trying to hike up it with some of my scouts (to see where it led and what interesting discoveries we'd make up there, of course...)

We did this one time, and one of my scouts, Raymond, brought a little transistor radio with him.  We had crawled into our shelters, with the embers of the fire still glowing.  He turned on CKLG and we listened.  I remember that no one spoke as we went through several songs. I clearly recall two songs that we heard that night. They were Dreams by Fleetwook Mac and Miracles by Jefferson Starship.

Music has always meant a lot to me.  There was something about those two songs that really felt like magic that night.  To this day, hearing either of those songs takes me back to Weatherhead creek, under a flysheet, with my young scouts, me still in my teens and with a fire glowing just outside my shelter.

Translink Compass Beta: My card arrived today

I was accepted a week ago into the Translink Compass Card Beta program and the card arrived today.

The card is pre-loaded with $100.00 of pretend concession fares.  I have to have valid fare to use the transit system, but they want me to "tap in" and "tap out" with the card whenever I use Skytrain or Bus, so that we can validate that the system is working correctly.  The actual test is due to start next Monday, so I'll give you some updates then.  They also gave me a bunch of little handouts if anyone is curious, as I'm also a Compass Ambassador!

Stay tuned for more updates.

Christmas when I was Little

I was just looking at some pictures that my wife put up on her blog and it took me back to when I was little.  I've dredged up a few pictures from the past.  I'm a little unsure of the timing, but from what I'm wearing and from Margaret's size and age, I'm pretty sure that this is mostly 1965.  This picture is not Christmas, but it's a clue. Note that Margaret is having her 3rd birthday (November of 1965), I'm 6 years old in this picture.

Here are a series of pictures of us around our Christmas tree, in the dining room of our house on Imperial Street in Burnaby.

One of the highlights of the year was visiting a friend, we called "Miss Lydia".  This was probably after Christmas, and I'd had a haircut.

I got the honoured spot on her lap.  I got this army helmet (with a first aid symbol on it, indicating I was a medic). I loved this helmet and for years, I'd wear it, riding my bike around with my toy guns, playing war with my friends.

I used to add my toy plastic animals to the manger scene.  My mother never minded, in fact it might have been her idea.  She caught me playing with them, here. 

Playing with open toys under the tree.

I remember all these toys.  I loved the monkey, the train and the tractor with the trailer that it would pull.  I recall that the steering wheel actually turned the front wheels.

This wasn't actually Christmas, I think it was the following January, but you can see that we had some serious snow.  I've got my little-red-barn lunch-box with Dick and Jane sitting on the fence and Spot running. I did a little hunt on the internet and couldn't find it anywhere. I'd love to find a good picture of one.

Update: I found a good picture of one:

Finally, for fun, I threw in a much later picture, from 1969, when I would have been 10.  I believe this was another visit to "Miss Lydia's" place, as I don't recognize the furniture.

So that's my little trip down memory lane.  I hope that this stirred up a few of your own memories!

Hope you're having a Merry Christmas and that you have a Blessed New Year in 2012!