INTRODUCING GUEST AUTHOR JOHN HICKMAN

             http://t.co/blVOkmDoBw

AN EMBARASSING MOMENT IN TASMANIA….

My next call was Alliance Floors, a large retail shop whose retailer was my long-time friend Alfred Johnson. Originally from England, he had a lovely Manchester accent. I had worked with him many years ago in a Melbourne floor covering shop where I got to know him very well. He was what people called ‘an eager beaver’, that is, hard-working, with a cheerful disposition and with his dry English observations, I always looked forward to seeing him again!

Entering his large shop, I found it empty, except for a pretty lady who was adjusting a stack of rugs – clearly a good housewife.

‘Hello! Would Alfred be around?’

She looked up at me and smiled: ‘No, sorry, he had to rush out on an urgent case and will be away for a while. I am Elizabeth, his wife!’

‘Nice to meet you Elizabeth! How are things, is business going well?’ I handed her my business card.

‘Oh, you are Peter – Al has told me a lot about you! Only good things, of course,’ she added with a giggle. ‘I have a photo at home with you and Al from your Melbourne days.

‘That’s nice, Elizabeth…..well, how is your business? I repeated my question.

‘Yes, thank you! We cannot complain.’

‘Al is a very hard worker, I know. And it is very nice of you to help him in the shop.’

She laughed: ‘Oh, I am just an unpaid worker, you know!’

‘You are a great help to him, I am sure. And should get some reward for all your good work!‘ I tried to flatter her.

And without any change in her conversational tone, I heard her say: ‘Oh, I get it every Sunday morning!’

I froze on the spot! This was one of those moments when I had the feeling of not having heard right.

‘She cannot possibly mean what I think she means’ were my thoughts. Or, perhaps, did somebody else say that in this shop? Red-faced and looking helplessly around I became aware of her pealing laughter, loud and with ‘joie de vivre’ as the French say. And her state of merriment increased in direct proportion to my embarrassment.

Finally, shaking myself out of it, I gave her some new sample swatches of PVC vinyl floorings, together with pricelist and technical data sheets. I was surprised to discover that she was very conversant in this field and offered to pass-on to Al all my imparted knowledge. Finally, grateful for her expertise, I took my leave and sat in my car for a while to ponder the situations I sometimes get into.

Peter Frederick

http://www.peterfrederick.org

http://www.life-on-the-road.com

TWO MEN DANCING……

Having completed my turn into Hills Avenue and

gazing automatically ahead towards the veterinary

surgery, which was about half way to my destination, I

saw something that made me sit bolt-upright. Outside

the entrance of the vet’s were two men dancing!

‘What?’ My tranquil eyes snapped wide open and I

looked again. Although still far away, I could definitely

make out two men dancing. They were about the same

size and holding each other in an embrace while dancing

to the tempo of an imaginary English Waltz.

‘What is happening to me?’ I looked again, this time

squinting, yet there they were, still dancing! All the time

I was getting closer and seeing them more clearly. On

and on they danced, on the spot, in front of the entrance.

But having nearly reached the two, I suddenly noticed

that they were not two men, but one man and his Great

Dane! They were holding each other the same way:

upright, hands and paws at each other’s shoulder blades,

staring into each other’s eyes with utter concentration,

but neither saying a word. The man was rather elegantly

dressed in an expensive suit and his face was almost as

red as a stop sign from embarrassment and effort.

Wondering what the problem was with the two and

slowing down almost to a halt, I suddenly perceived the

true situation. The man was trying to get the Great Dane

into the veterinary surgery but the dog didn’t want to go.

Obviously the man had tried brutal force by positioning

his dog in the doorway and trying to push him through.

The dog had, in return, reared up on his hind legs and

got a hold of his master exactly the way he, himself, was

being held. Every time the man tried to push the dog

through the glass door into the waiting room, the big dog

took evasive action. Obviously, he was smarter than his

owner because every time the man tried to push him hard

against the door, he did not push back - oh no! Instead,

he quickly side-stepped so that the man found himself in

the doorway, with the dog on the footpath side!

So he had to resume his original position again, with

the dog in front of the door and him on the road-side.

Another push against his dog was parried again with

a side-step (actually a ‘Quick-Step’, as they teach in

dancing schools) and, once more, he found himself in the

doorway instead of his dog! A step forward, side-step,

reverse position and, again, round and round they went.

If it had been a dancing competition and somebody had

played the tune of the ‘Tennessee Waltz’ they would

have won a prize, for sure! They just kept looking at each

other very seriously whilst pirouetting on the spot.

I had to drive on and was long past the two when

I glanced into the rear vision mirror and saw that they

were still dancing. And they really did look like two men

dancing! Except one of the two had his trouser bottom

rather low, with spindly, unattractive, legs sticking out!

Peter Frederick

http://www.peterfrederick.org                                     http://www.life-on-the-road.com

From my book ‘ON THE ROAD AGAIN’

Back in Melbourne, it took me a while to recover from the bout of this new strain of flu which, in the meantime, had reached our shores. I still cringe at the thought that I may have started this flu epidemic here. But eventually, I was on the road again and busily calling on my customers and clients, physically somewhat weaker but wiser in product knowledge.

It was our monthly sales meeting in the office of my managing director, Declan Doherty. As usual, we were all there: myself, my colleague Ken Butterfield and our receptionist, the lovely Marilyn Bevan who had just brought us our morning coffee, steaming hot with a biscuit on the side. Sometimes our bookkeeper lady, Norma Hazelwood, would join us with her concertina-type computer readout for her various comments about our customers and their payment patterns.

Ken Butterfield, an extrovert, was as noisy as ever. ‘Hey Pete, what did you get? Cappuccino? I like my coffee like my women – black and strong!’ He nodded happily to himself and took his first sip. An ‘Ah!’ emanated from his lips, followed by further sipping sounds.

‘Thank you all for being on time – so let’s start this meeting!’ The resonant voice of Declan, my boss, sounded this morning especially fruity and well-rounded. It was like hearing a Shakespearean actor and It never failed to impress me. I could picture him on stage or maybe in a pulpit, dressed as a bishop. He was always well-shaven and in his tailor-made suit, with his elegant manners, he was the epitome of a successful company executive.

Ken, my colleague, eased himself back in his comfortable chair and tried to draw another careful sip from his cup which was still far too hot for a proper gulp. For a moment, he looked bothered because this was the time of the day when he really needed a cup of coffee.

He was a pleasant colleague, with great knowledge of the flooring industry, but he was also equipped with lots of gossip and funny anecdotes which sometimes bordered on the weird. Also, he had the habit of uttering words and phrases that were rather uncommon: ‘When cocky was an egg’, for example. If a landmark was imposing and could not be missed, he described it as ‘standing out like dog balls’.

Also with us this morning was Lionel Harting, our sales representative from South Australia, a well dressed, quiet gentleman whose heavily lined face showed the stress and strain he faced obtaining business in his state. But despite all these worries, he was also a scoutmaster with a very successful group of boys who were winning awards at state-wide scouting competitions.

Norma came into the meeting with her voluminous computer readout and dropped it with a heavy thud onto the large conference table, thereby creating the desired attention. With her horn-rimmed glasses, she looked around at everybody. I must say that I felt straightaway guilty because some of my customers were very bad payers of their bills.

Marilyn, having finished serving everyone coffee or tea, left the room. As always, she carried out her tasks with care and kindness. However, I noticed her eyes were somewhat reddish, as if she had been crying and I made a mental note to find out what was the matter with her.

I was brought back from my thoughts by Declan’s beautiful BBC voice. It reminded me of a recent meeting we had with Melbourne’s health authorities. Declan and I had gone to the head offices of this government office for a meeting that was attended by about eight top health officials, all wanting to know about the latest in flooring technology.

Declan took control of this meeting by making a speech about our company, the latest products and how we could help arrest the spiralling maintenance costs in various institutions like hospitals, nursing homes, schools etc. His Shakespearean voice sounded so pleasant, his accent so superior, clear and precise. His speech was peppered with special phrases and words which have such a hold over our lives. There were plenty of ‘however’ and ‘furthermore’ to be heard, plus ‘one ought to appreciates’ ‘it is often said’, and ‘in the light of’. I listened with rapture to his resounding and superior diction, wistfully thinking ‘if only I could speak like that, everybody else seemed to be under the same spell as they listened to Declan’s intonations.

He spoke with gusto, letting the words dissolve slowly on his tongue. But apparently he got carried away by the spell of his own words. He must have listened too much to himself because suddenly he stopped, looked up at me and asked in front of everybody: ‘Peter, what are we talking about?’

The shock I felt was instantaneous. ‘About the resilience of our floorings, their ball bouncing properties, space indentations versus point indentations’. I threw him a lifeline, which he took up immediately and away he went, massaging our eardrums with his speech. I had thus saved the day.

Returning to the current situation, to our Monday morning meeting, I found Declan dealing with sales promotion campaigns, such as giving product presentations to groups of architects. But the largest company promotion was planned for the end of the year - an Apprentice of the Year competition to be held in Sydney, with all important personalities from the trade and Government attending.

‘Peter’, he faced me with a challenging glance ‘I would like you to contact the offices of Albermann & Silver for a lunch-time promotion. They are currently working on important projects, as you are aware of, and I am not sure that they are fully informed of our product range.’ He nodded in self-confirmation. ‘Please give them a call and arrange for a suitable day and time.’

‘Yes, of course,’ I heard myself say, ’now that we have received new samples and catalogues I could make it a really good product presentation!’ ‘Splendid, Peter, I leave the details up to you!’

‘And everybody else, that is, Lionel and Ken, please prepare a list of suitable prospective clients we could approach with similar activities.’ Everybody nodded in agreement. ‘Norma, what do you have to say?’ he handed the meeting over to her. Whereupon Norma burst into a lengthy litany about customers who do not pay their bills. She looked at us representatives with eyes saddened by such human depravity. I noted down some well-known habitual recidivists from my own sales territory and felt a trifle shameful as if it was my own fault.

When she had finished, Norma almost lovingly stroked her thick concertina folder, then took it in her arms and walked out of our meeting. Her back was straight and her chin held high as her mission was accomplished!

‘Well, gentlemen, I thank you for coming and wish you all a successful week! And then Declan followed up with his standard joke: ’Don’t sell too much, ha, ha’

With coffee and biscuits consumed, we slowly filed out of the meeting room and into our main office where we found our desks littered with little notes and messages.

‘Here are some more messages for you, Peter!’ the gentle voice of Marilyn reminded me. Looking up from my clipboard, I noticed again her reddish, sad eyes.

Taking the set of messages I started a conversation: ‘Thank you, Marilyn. And I’ve brought you something from the towns I’ve visited, something for your souvenir spoon collection.’ I handed her three silver-looking spoons with special heraldry at the end of the handle. She had asked me once shyly whether it was possible for me to bring her the occasional spoon from my country trips and I had accepted this as one of my standard tasks. From then on, after every trip, I would bring her some spoons and she must have had a sizeable collection by now.

‘Marilyn, what’s wrong with you? You seem to be very sad or upset today’ I probed. ‘Is there anything I may help you with?’ Whilst her gentle eyes welled up with tears that ran down her pussycat face, she confided in me that Frank, her boyfriend, had been unfaithful to her. It was something she had never expected and this is breach of trust was destroying her.

This was serious! I tried to comfort her as best as I could and she did appear to be a bit relieved to have the opportunity of confiding in someone. .

A phone call interrupted our sensitive moment. Norma was pointing to my desk where a receiver, seemingly impatient, was waiting for me.

‘Hi Pete, it’s Lyle Barkman here. How are you today?’ It was a retailer and he sounded like he wanted something from me. ’Pete, as you know, business is a bit quiet at the moment and I wonder if it is possible for you to recommend me a bit. As you know, I have a floor layer and some staff in the shop……….’

I felt embarrassed about being asked for help. ‘Of course, Lyle, I know you give good service and the standard of your flooring installations is excellent. I shall gladly recommend your services. Would you post me some business cards of yours? I would make good use of them. Don’t worry, times may be tough but we see this through together.’

‘Thank you very much, Pete. I appreciate your help!’ Lyle assured me.

As soon as I replaced the receiver, the phone rang again. ‘This is Joan Madison from the Coonan hospital. We have a complaint about your flooring: it is difficult to maintain……’

I knew from experience that there is no use in trying to convince someone over the telephone about the simplest way of maintaining the floor. By the way she described the floor getting darker all the time, I knew they did not change the mopping-up water in the bucket. Naturally, the water gets dirtier and dirtier until it cannot clean any more but leave a dirty slurry on the floor surface.

The best way to handle this was to go there, get the cleaning staff together and demonstrate this most simple procedure of mopping and changing water in the bucket. I always did this with cheerfulness and used to end the demonstration of a clean floor with the words ‘There you are – and I am only a rep!’ Therefore, I made an appointment with Joan to go and give my cleaning demonstration.

After this phone call, I got up, ready to leave as I had a list of calls waiting for my visits and the office was getting busier by the minute. Marilyn, sweet little Marilyn, was talking to people on the switchboard, finding out what they actually wanted before switching them through to the appropriate person.

A temporary accounts girl was busily processing a stack of data in front of her, accomplishing this task with nimble fingers racing over her keyboard. She was oblivious to everything around her, utterly absorbed by the task.

Norma was on the phone again, speaking with tardy customers about overdue payments with a fixed expression on her face that seemed to say: ‘Don’t give me that excuse!’

Then she dropped everything, stood up, straightened her dress with the flat of her hand then quickly walked through our large office into the ladies room.

I followed her with bored eyes. ‘Nothing unusual here’, I thought, but the pneumatic door may have not been working properly because it took a longer time to close. Just before it did, I had a glimpse of Norma absentmindedly hiking up her dress before entering a cubicle, revealing large grey bloomers before the slow-closing door blocked this not very pretty sight!

‘Oh, for heavens’ sake, pull yourself together!’ I reprimanded myself and impatiently walked out of the office.

My last glimpse was of Declan still talking to somebody in his elegant office and waving me ‘Good bye’ with an elegant wave of his hand that showed off a golden Rolex watch.

Peter Frederick

http://www.peterfrederick.org

http://www.life-on-the-road.com

Would you like to leave a comment?

AN INCREDIBLE ENCOUNTER.

(An excerpt from my book 'LIFE ON THE ROAD - a Salesman's Lot!')

Having completed my turn into Hills Avenue and

gazing automatically ahead towards the veterinary

surgery, which was about half way to my destination, I

saw something that made me sit bolt-upright. Outside

the entrance of the vet’s were two men dancing!

‘What?’ My tranquil eyes snapped wide open and I

looked again. Although still far away, I could definitely

make out two men dancing. They were about the same

size and holding each other in an embrace while dancing

to the tempo of an imaginary English Waltz.

‘What is happening to me?’ I looked again, this time

squinting, yet there they were, still dancing! All the time

I was getting closer and seeing them more clearly. On

and on they danced, on the spot, in front of the entrance.

But having nearly reached the two, I suddenly noticed

that they were not two men, but one man and his Great

Dane! They were holding each other the same way:

upright, hands and paws at each other’s shoulder blades,

staring into each other’s eyes with utter concentration,

but neither saying a word. The man was rather elegantly

dressed in an expensive suit and his face was almost as

red as a stop sign from embarrassment and effort.

Wondering what the problem was with the two and

slowing down almost to a halt, I suddenly perceived the

true situation. The man was trying to get the Great Dane

into the veterinary surgery but the dog didn’t want to go.

Obviously the man had tried brutal force by positioning

his dog in the doorway and trying to push him through.

The dog had, in return, reared up on his hind legs and

got a hold of his master exactly the way he, himself, was

being held. Every time the man tried to push the dog

through the glass door into the waiting room, the big dog

took evasive action. Obviously, he was smarter than his

owner because every time the man tried to push him hard

against the door, he did not push back - oh no! Instead,

he quickly side-stepped so that the man found himself in

the doorway, with the dog on the footpath side!

So he had to resume his original position again, with

the dog in front of the door and him on the road-side.

Another push against his dog was parried again with

a side-step (actually a ‘Quick-Step’, as they teach in

dancing schools) and, once more, he found himself in the

doorway instead of his dog! A step forward, side-step,

reverse position and, again, round and round they went.

If it had been a dancing competition and somebody had

played the tune of the ‘Tennessee Waltz’ they would

have won a prize for sure! They just kept looking at each

other very seriously whilst pirouetting on the spot.

I had to drive on and was long past the two when

I glanced into the rear vision mirror and saw that they

were still dancing. And they really did look like two men

dancing! Except one of the two had his trouser bottom

rather low, with spindly, unattractive, legs sticking out!

Peter Frederick

http://www.peterfrederick.org

http://www.life-on-the-road.com

COMMENTS FROM MY READERS........

....I'll vouch for that! What a wonderful journey Peter!

ELLY HAMILTON - MELBOURNE

I am the guy from Finland who you met briefly on, I think Oct 17, in Melbourne, at a book fair where I bought your book. This is just to let you know that I have read the book and that it did meet the expectations of being both entertaining and interesting.

MIKKO PIILI - FINLAND

I am enjoying the read, making me laugh. Always a good thing. Best wishes and thanks yet again.

DAN STOJANOVICH - MELBOURNE

Got your book, Life on the Road and absolutely loved it! What an insightful adventure. Great job, Peter!

KAYLIN McFARREN – USA.

May I invite you to download sample chapters from my websites and leave your comments here?

Peter Frederick

http://www.peterfrederick.org

http://www.life-on-the-road.com

YOUR MANUSCRIPT HAS BEEN EDITED – NOW THE NEXT STEP!

This article deals in concise form with the next steps an author needs to take to make his book a reality. Dealing with the many phases of pre-print preparations and the many pitfalls waiting along the way, an author needs careful guidance before he can proudly hold his published book in his hands.

When you have your manuscript returned from your editor, in digital or physical form, it will be marked throughout with red corrections and sometimes delivered with an overall report. Now, your real work begins! By sitting down and carefully correcting your manuscript as indicated, you will gain a lot of knowledge about your style of writing and of your weak points. This process enables an author to become a better writer.

SUBMITTING TO A PUBLISHER

Now is the time to take action! If you wish to proceed the ‘conventional’ way and send a copy of the manuscript to a publisher, together with the accompanying papers, e.g. Synopsis, Chapter outline, Character outline, Marketing proposal and your Cover letter. The best method of posting it would be ‘overnight-express’ and we must not forget to include a self-stamped, self-addressed, envelope.

Carefully record in your diary the date of posting to have a check on the waiting time. Most publishers will send you their confirmation of receipt of your manuscript with an approx. turnaround time, normally between three and six months. However, we need to be honest here and recognise the fact that only two or three percent of all submissions are being accepted and work out from this our own chance!

SELF-PUBLISHING

This is the reason why more and more authors self-publish and should this be your taken direction, it is time now to get quotations from printers. These may include the designing of cover, inserting pictures or illustrations, obtaining an ISBN number etc., or merely for the typesetting, print and binding of everything you supply him with. There can be a lot of flexibility, depending on your precise negotiations with your printer.

BOOK COVER – FRONT AND BACK

A commercial artist may assist you with the book cover and the best way would be to provide him with a sketch of what you envisage. However, here again, I have to repeat myself: checking references, previous work, reliability, price etc. is a must!

It is also possible – and perhaps the best way - to design the book cover yourself by using a specific software, designed for this purpose. There is also a need for blurbs, short articles for the inside of the front cover and for the back, messages that are selling the book for you. By browsing in a book store, you will find out what exactly is needed. The pages with the various blurbs will have to be given to the printer, together with the manuscript

THE PRINTING OF YOUR BOOK

And now, the time has come to approach printing companies for a quotation. Yes, again, it is important to check out customer satisfaction by asking for references. price, reliability and communication with previous customers are very important. You need to stipulate exactly what you want to have done and what you are providing them with. For example, they may have their own, in-house, artist who can work from your sketch for a cover. The more books you have printed, the higher the printing costs will be, however, the unit price per book will get lower. This is important when you sell the books through a distributor later on, as the cover price or rrp. will determine your author’s income.

When negotiating quality of paper, cover, binding etc. the printer will lapse into printer’s terminology we authors may not understand. I suggest that a lay person should purchase a paperback book of the appearance and quality you envisage and lend it to him as demo. Good printers will then, before they go into production, supply you with a prototype of your book and, if it is up to your expectations, you give them the authority to commence printing. But before you do so, check the delivery time the printer has quoted you.

By the way, you never give out to anybody your original manuscript but a copy! Whilst a commercial photo-copying shop may charge a sizeable amount of money for printing out an extra set, there may be a friend with a laser printer doing this for next to nothing. (Inkjet and bubblejet printers would not be economical to use for this purpose!

The printer or the artist may ask you for the ISBN number of your future book which either you can provide or the printer does this for you. Carefully check what is included in the total price to avoid surprises.

If the printer does the typesetting for you, he will give you at the conclusion of his contract, a cd, containing the book’s artwork and typesetting. You need to keep this at a safe place for eventual future re-prints, excerpts etc.

It may be practical to let a fully-fledged printer handle everything provided he passed your scrutiny with flying colours!

ISBN - BARCODE

Now a few words about the coveted ISBN number. The book printer may obtain this for you but carefully check on your itemised invoice that you have been invoiced at the correct price for this, alternatively, you may purchase it directly from the company Thorpe and Bowker which controls the sales of these bar codes worldwide. Their internet website makes it possible for anybody to purchase it online and obtain a so-called ‘original’. When completing the necessary forms online, you need to nominate yourself as publisher because that’s what you really are! You are only outsourcing the various production steps, all in your name.

With a printer who is prepared to hand you a prototype of your book for your final inspection, you cannot really go wrong. Just make sure you cooperate with him or his representative as closely as possible to avoid misunderstandings as they are costly.

Modern printing places do not take long to print and soon you will be the proud author with a stock of books – your own creation!

We have dealt with the various production steps that have to be taken on the long path to the finished book and learnt to look out for pitfalls and other traps. Beside gaining knowledge of the industry it is mainly the careful checking out of the many business entities we are engaging verifying their soundness that will make us in the end a successful author and book publisher!

Peter Frederick

http://www.peterfrederick.org

http://www.life-on-the-road.com

YOUR MANUSCRIPT IS COMPLETE – NOW WHAT?

Obviously, all your good work has come to fruition and you are finally holding your completed manuscript in your hands! Of course, you have been re-reading everything many times over and, to your dismay, have always found misspellings and sentences that need improvement. It is amazing how difficult it is to detect one’s own shortcomings. You virtually need to have a split personality and go over your writing with the eye of a different persona.

As the next step, you are looking for an editor. There are many freelance editors advertising their services in writers circles and it is a good method to start looking at the ones advertising at you state’s Writers’ Centre.

There is a paramount need to ask for an editor’s references, for previous authors to contact, or for writing projects they have completed, their university training and for their fee. Like with a resume’ for a job applications everything needs to be investigated and followed-up to avoid financial and literary consequences.

Some editors prefer to have the manuscript sent to them printed out, some insist on an electronic transfer of the manuscript. Some insist on contacting you and to discuss every word they find while others are happy if you tell them that you accept their improvements in advance. By approaching several editors, you also get an idea of the standard fee. The rule here is that the height of the fee is no guarantee for quality and neither is paying a bit more for extra good work or payment in advance!

Once such editor, I contacted, is also the editor of a science fiction magazine and his correspondence was peppered with words like ‘new world order’ ‘astro this’ and ‘space that’! And her quoted fee, too, was astronomical! Some editors do very little work for their money, claiming that they were not ‘ghost writers’, another editor insisted on being paid in advance and then did not touch my manuscript for two months. Upon cancellation of the contract, she wanted a cancellation fee. One editor seemed to be perfect in every way, but she was booked-out for almost a year with other assignments for a large publisher. One editor quoted turn-around time two weeks which was obviously far too short for a voluminous manuscript, another editor sent my manuscript back only half-way through because he’s lost his interest. There are myriad things that can happen and it is very important that a first-time author checks and re-checks these editors before contracting one.

After the manuscript has been returned, physically or electronically, the author then needs to go over his writings once more and change the corrections into clear print.

Once this tedious work of probing for the right editor has been completed, it will not only result in getting a person whom you will enjoy working with and the waiting period for the edited manuscript will be a pleasant period instead of one filled with anxious nail-biting.

Peter Frederick

http://www.peterfrederick.org

http://www.life-on-the-road.com