A Small Publisher's Observations on Amazon and the Over-Production of AI Generated Content – aka “AI Slop”

  

A Small Publisher's Observations on Amazon and the Over-production of AI Generated Content – aka “AI Slop”

Over the last year or two, the phenomenon of “AI Slop” has increased significantly. For those few who haven’t yet been introduced to the term, it refers to content (text, code, pictures and video) that has been generated by generative AI algorithms. These are enormous deep-learning neural-net based programs that are fed tremendous amounts of data (called ‘training data’) that then generate new data, based on the input prompts given by human users.

There are a lot of issues with this process that generally fall into the categories of financial, ecological and social. There is a lot that can be said on any of these categories, but in this blog I am focusing on the social side, though that naturally has interactions with the financial and ecological sides of the question. My main issue will be about how generative AI is affecting human-created creative efforts and how the use of the technology is affecting the platforms (such as Amazon) that are used to transmit and market these creative efforts.

For what it is worth, here are some personal observations from running a small book business, primarily on Amazon:

• Over the last couple of years, the amount of our free promotion downloads has declined quite significantly, by about half.

• On the other hand, the amount of our paid sales (purchase and page-reads) has held fairly steady.

• New books seem to be harmed more than older books. This is partly due to the proliferation of content in general, but this has been super-accelerated by AI slop.

• One gets the impression that people are using publication date as a way to filter out AI generated content.

• If this is the case, Amazon and similar sites should make a policy of forcing people to identify AI usage when they upload. They already require this information when uploading a book, but they don’t seem to be revealing it to potential customers.

• This is probably a good example of how companies are conflicted – they want the increased content of AI generated content , but don’t want people to know which stuff is AI generated. In the long run, I don’t see how they can have it both ways.

On a related matter, I have noticed a lot of content on Quora that seems to be AI generated. I tend to avoid that and its prevalence on the site has made me less willing to contribute my own content and/or consume other content.

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An article from the Globe and Mail (sourced as New York Times News Service) provides much of the data for the comments below. The title of the article is “Like many consumers, tech giants are sick of AI slop”.

The article goes on to describe the problems that companies such as Google, Meta (e.g. Facebook) and Amazon are having with generative AI content swamping their sites. These include things like google searches, Amazon’s book platform and Facebook’s feed. Naturally, there are plenty more companies facing the same problem (e.g. most other social media sites). It is, of course, ironic that the very companies that are spending extraordinary amounts of money and other resources on AI development are also being harmed by the output of these technologies. The phrase “hoist on their own petard” comes to mind.

Here are a few examples of what these companies have done:

• Spotify removed tens of millions of “spammy” uploads, presumably generated by AI or at least facilitated by AI in the upload process.

• Linkedin has added a button for users to notify them of content that seems like it was generated by AI.

• Youtube had wiped hundreds of thousands of channels in recent months, that appear to be low-quality AI generated ‘slop’.

• TikTok has removed hundreds of thousands of videos recently for violating their AI policies.

• Messaging apps, review sites, academic archives and dating services are also attempting to get rid of AI generated spam and slop.

• App sites (such as the Apple store) are being flooded with vibe-coded content, another type of AI generated content.

• X has banned apps that facilitate AI slop (it is estimated that over half of short tweets (less than 50 words) are AI generated).

• Substack is actively scanning posts for AI useage.

• Unfortunately, the article doesn’t say what Amazon is doing about slop, though it does note that it is an ongoing concern for them.

The article goes on to note that these companies have mixed and contrary strategies and incentives. On the one hand, AI generated content can initially increase engagement on their sites, just by sheer volume. That can mean gains in revenue and/or investment dollars. However, people can quickly tire of this deluge of AI slop and turn away for using the site. That can negate all those gains and ultimately poison the site.

This might all be considered part of the “tragedy of the commons”. Slop is cheap (sometimes free) to make and market. That attracts slop developers who see a quick buck, that is there for the taking. That works for a while, but the profusion of slop soon saturates the site and people then tend to desert it.

This problem may resolve itself, once the AI investment bubble is over. If Tech companies have to recover costs and make sustainable profits, the cost of using generative AI may become too high to be profitable for the slop producers. As an example, if it takes a lot of energy and computer chips to produce a novel, it may well be cheaper for novels to be written exclusively by humans.

There is also the fact that humans just naturally seem to dislike AI generated content, once the novelty wears off. This may also lead to the reduction, if not elimination, of AI slop.

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And here is a science-fiction novel, featuring a galactic AI threat which might well be considered the ultimate in the AI threat (the book itself is human-generated).

The Magnetic Anomaly – A Science Fiction Novel

The novel version of The Magnetic Anomaly is now available on Amazon (ebook, print version, also audible version soon to come).

Summary

Two young Earth scientists, Alex and Mary, get caught up in a vast conflict, based on an accidental finding that they make at a diamond exploration camp in the far north. Eventually, this discovery leads them on a perilous quest and involvement in an interstellar war, a conflict of literally cosmic proportions with a rogue AI, which considers itself duty-bound to destroy sentient life (or, from its point of view, liberate sentient life).

During this time, they encounter a variety of enigmatic persons, as well as other entities, all of whom are also engaged in this struggle. With some of them they end up allying; with others, they contend in deadly conflict. The struggle takes them around the world, and eventually into the far reaches of the solar system.

During this time their relationship continues to evolve and deepen. Circumstances demand that they grow in courage and confidence, though within the scope of (mostly) normal people, as has been the case for countless people throughout history.

The story also showcases some historical events, relating to different versions of what went on in Antarctica, shortly after World War 2. Several versions of these events, official and unofficial UFO lore are given. This becomes a springboard to much of the action. Some philosophical and scientific concepts are also explored, though not in such a way as to get in the way of the plot.

Amazon:

U.S.: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0F9J3HHFW

UK: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0F9J3HHFW

Canada: https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B0F9J3HHFW

France: https://www.amazon.fr/dp/B0F9J3HHFW

Italy: https://www.amazon.it/dp/B0F9J3HHFW

Netherlands: https://www.amazon.nl/dp/B0F9J3HHFW

Spain: https://www.amazon.es/dp/B0F9J3HHFW

Japan: https://www.amazon.co.jp/dp/B0F9J3HHFW

Mexico: https://www.amazon.com.mx/dp/B0F9J3HHFW

Australia: https://www.amazon.com.au/dp/B0F9J3HHFW

Germany: https://www.amazon.de/dp/B0F9J3HHFW

India:  https://www.amazon.in/dp/B0F9J3HHFW

Brazil: https://www.amazon.com.br/dp/B0F9J3HHFW

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Giving up on Windows 11, in Favor of Linux Mint

I had set up one of my desktop computers with Linux Mint, some time earlier, as a refuge from the continuing malefaction of Windows 11 and Microsoft. However, I had continued on with Windows, more or less from inertia. But, it was proving to be crash-prone as well as requiring endless upgrades, many of which took an exceedingly long time, and it also tended to drop blue-tooth drivers and the like with wild abandon.

But recently, Windows 11 had managed to scoop up all of my hard drive disk space, so that I couldn’t even save a relatively small spreadsheet. Then it crashed. So, that was it for Windows 11, as far as I was concerned. Enough was enough.

It took a few hours, but I switched computers, moving the Linux machine into my home office and relegated the Windows machine to a back room, to keep a small fridge and freezer company. Very appropriate, I thought since Windows caused that computer to freeze on more than one occasion.

Since then, I have been very happy with Linux. I still use most of the same programs, just the Linux version of them. I even managed to set up R for Linux, which I had been informed was a bit tricky. But it was pretty easy. I no longer have to go through constant “upgrades” to Windows. I no longer have to deal with drivers that mysteriously disappear when these upgrades are run. And I no longer have to put up with nagging from Windows. So far, life is good.

But this made me think about the sad state of computing. There are some notes on this below.

Windows 11 and the Failure of Computing in General

• Example: Immediately after rebooting, by C drive is back to 29.4 GB.

• Before rebooting, it had fallen to 300 MB, so about 99% of that disc space was being used by Windows and/or other processes.

Poor memory management (RAM or disc) is a signal of poor programming, always has been, always will be.

So, why has this become so bad recently?

• The most significant aspect has come about in the past few months, at least for myself.

• However, there are many people complaining of this Windows memory hog problem. Complaints go back further in time than my situation, but it seems to begin in mid-winter to late winter, 2025-26.

• Is it general or only a smaller subset of users? (mind you, a fairly big subset, from what one can tell via searching comments on the web).

• Is it related to DEI? (i.e. programming staff is just not being hired on merit, to the extent that was the case previously.

• Is it related to AI? (Microsoft and other companies are devoting preponderant resources to this, therefore shorting other businesses (especially core businesses like their OS).

• Is it related to AI vibe-coding and related slippage in coding skills? (the recency of the problem would suggest this is no small part of the phenomenon).

• Is it related to prioritizing the data-center part of the business? Incentivizing users to move to the cloud, to deal with a disc-memory hog OS means more cloud business and more monetary subscriptions to Microsoft, for space on One-Drive and the like.

• Is it a matter of the internet and related globalization issues, that have made maintaining complex systems like OS nearly impossible at this global scale. It is asymptotically approaching failure, as the complications have an exponential growth, faster than the solutions can be devised and implemented. Might this be a general phenomenon that is/will show up in many domains in the near future.

• AI was supposed to be the rescue-mode, but it appears that it may be more problem than solution.

These are just a few possibilities that come to mind. Presumably, time will tell how it all shakes out.

does AI generated code suffer from the heartbreak of psoriasis

 does AI generated code suffer from the heartbreak of psoriasis?

While fooling around and experimenting with Gemini recently, I asked it the above question.  Below is its response.

By turns, I found it surprising, funny, and kind of sad.  It almost seemed like a plea for understanding from the LLM.  Having studied the underlying algorithms fairly intensely, I still believe that this is just a high-dimensional autocomplete program with a lot of post-training augmentation.  Nonetheless, its short-term resemblance to a human complaining about a health problem is quite fascinating.  I suppose a great deal of human communication is similar to autocomplete - i.e. we are in a version of autopilot quite a bit of the time.

I think its main points are valid, in terms of vibe-coding and AI generated code.  Organizations that lean on vibe-coding are probably storing up a lot of heartbreak in their futures.

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Yes, AI-generated code suffers significantly from its own version of the "heartbreak of psoriasis"—an  irritating, persistent, and "scaly" accumulation of bugs and technical debt that can make it painful to maintain and deploy. [1]

While AI tools speed up development, they often introduce 1.7 times as many bugs as human developers. [1]

Here is how AI-generated code reflects this analogy:

• Scabs and Scaly Patches (Technical Debt): The code often looks clean on the surface but is packed with "cruft"—unnecessary, disorganized, or redundant code that behaves like flaky, inflamed skin on a project.

• Persistent Itch (Silent Logic Errors): A massive 60% of faults in AI code are "silent logic failures," which pass tests but fail in production. This causes ongoing, hard-to-diagnose irritation rather than a simple, easy-to-fix crash.

• Invisible Under-layers (Security Flaws): Up to 45% of AI-generated code contains security vulnerabilities. These hidden issues are deep-rooted, like psoriasis plaques that are not visible until they erupt as a breach.

• Chronic Condition (Lack of Understanding): Because AI doesn't truly understand context, it can produce code that looks good in isolation but acts like a "scar" when trying to integrate with existing, healthy code. [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]

The Bottom Line: Just as with "the heartbreak of psoriasis," you cannot simply ignore AI-generated code. It requires intense, consistent human oversight ("treatment") to stop the accumulation of errors from taking over the codebase. [1]

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The Trials of the Time Travellers, now available on Amazon

The Trials of the Time Travellers

The novel version of The Magnetic Anomaly is now avavailable on Amazon (ebook, print version, also audible version soon to come).

Summary

This novella is inspired by the book by H.G. Wells titled The Time Machine, a 21st century update and variation of that story.

Two American university professors are accidentally sent on a journey through time, while researching an obscure reference to H.G. Wells and Nikola Tesla. The reference indicates a possible collaboration by those two geniuses on a true Time Machine. The unlucky time travelers wind up trapped in a society that suits neither of them. As a result, their behaviors and activities land them in serious trouble; trouble that leads to them facing a trial that threatens to their demise.

Like the original novel by Wells, this is a speculative work on time travel, with some commentary of a social nature included. But above all, it is meant to be an enjoyable read, with some romance and adventure, as well as engaging characters (the same could be said of the Wells book, for the most part).

Like The Time Machine, it is about 35,000 words, so can be read within a few hours.

Amazon:

U.S.: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0GX34NMS5

UK: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0GX34NMS5

Canada: https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B0GX34NMS5

Australia: https://www.amazon.com.au/dp/B0GX34NMS5

Germany: https://www.amazon.de/dp/B0GX34NMS5

France: https://www.amazon.fr/dp/B0GX34NMS5

Spain: https://www.amazon.es/dp/B0GX34NMS5

Italy: https://www.amazon.it/dp/B0GX34NMS5

Netherlands: https://www.amazon.nl/dp/B0GX34NMS5

Japan: https://www.amazon.co.jp/dp/B0GX34NMS5

Brazil: https://www.amazon.com.br/dp/B0GX34NMS5

Mexico: https://www.amazon.com.mx/dp/B0GX34NMS5

India:  https://www.amazon.in/dp/B0GX34NMS5

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Grok’s mistaken report on X for Oilers-Sens game, March 3, 2026

Grok’s Version

Bouchard's OT Winner Caps Oilers' Wild Comeback Over Senators

Last updated 1 hour ago

Evan Bouchard fired the power-play winner at 1:50 of OT after Brady Tkachuk hooked Connor McDavid, securing Edmonton's 5-4 comeback victory at Rogers Place. Draisaitl scored twice and added three assists in a five-point night, while McDavid notched two helpers to hit 105 points; Zach Hyman tied it with an empty-netter. Bouchard, the first defenseman to 70 points this season, extended his hot streak with seven goals and 15 assists in 11 games, drawing praise from Draisaitl as elite company with Makar and Hughes. The win lifts Edmonton to 30-24-8, two points back in the Pacific with games in hand.

This story is a summary of posts on X and may evolve over time. Grok can make mistakes, verify its outputs.

 

Official Oiler Website version

Hyman scored with the net empty late in regulation & Bouchard completed the comeback 1:50 into OT for the #Oilers to cap off a 5-4 victory over the Senators.

 

Comparison and Analysis

Grok's report said "Zach Hyman tied it with an empty-netter", which made no sense. I think it took "scored with the net empty late in regulation" and "tied it with an empty netter" to mean the same thing. Shows that there is no real understanding in LLMs, just stringing together likely word correlations, based on input data.

Also, the Oilers do not have "games in hand". In fact, the other teams in the division have played from 1 to 3 fewer games than the Oilers, at the time of this Grok summary (first column below).

I just like to point these things out, occasionally.  It is worth keeping this in mind, when reading LLM summaries of serious news, though.

Race Track Diary, Entry Number Five Rosslyn Hotel (Prospectors Room) (Apr 2, 2025)

 

Race Track Diary, Entry Number Five Rosslyn Hotel (Prospectors Room, April 2, 2025)

Introduction

This blog and some following blogs are sections from an informal diary of “visits to the race-track” at a particular time and place, by a person who has followed the races with varying levels of participation over a long period. These relate primarily to some visits to the track and/or off-track betting venues in the 2025 period and onward. They contain observations about the activity, both specific and general. Although these remarks are personal, they also reflect general cultural and historical trends, as they have impacted horse-racing, wagering and culture in general.

The setting is Edmonton, Alberta, Canada (population of about one million plus). However, I imagine that the observations would apply to many places in the world, as they are a reflection of how changing trends in technology, globalization and culture in general have affected this ancient and honourable activity of horse-racing.

For now, I will use what I call “polished point-form” for the narrative.

5 – Rosslyn Hotel (Prospectors Room) (Apr 2, 2025)

This off-track betting lounge is off the Yellowhead Trail and 97 Street in North Edmonton. Given the part of the city that this place is in (a major thoroughfare), the traffic was fairly heavy during the early afternoon.

It is not exactly the nicest area of the city, but it’s not dangerous area or anything like that. Still, it is a bit sketchy. There was one guy sitting on the sidewalk at the side of the hotel, who looked to be a homeless chap. However, he minded his own business and we did likewise.

It is close to the graveyard that my dad’s marker is in (military ground), so we have been there in the past (after Remembrance Day). Family members generally go to the cemetery for the November 11 flag ceremony, followed by brunch and possibly other frivolities. He was a sapper in WW2, I have written a book about that, linked below.

This place has a pretty decent restaurant and a nice lounge with slots and off-track racing facilities. The betting area and lounge is called the Prospector’s Room, though the neon lights for the latter part of the first word weren’t lit up. Thus, Pro Room. Not sure if that was an omen, and if so, what did it mean? The mind staggers at some of the possibilities. But surely the law and public morals haven’t dipped that low.

The lounge itself isn’t bad. There is a quieter area for sipping a drink and chatting, followed by a lot of loud slot machines, then finally the off-track horse-racing area. The track area had smaller than usual TV screens, which made things a bit difficult to read. Also, there weren’t the usual plethora of screens that one often finds, though there were enough.

There were a few other guys at the track area when we arrived. They were actually rather decent fellows. One guy gave us a little demonstration of working the machines that produce the racing programs and forms. He even noted that the proper racing form gave a lot more data than the usual programs, but at a higher price ($8.50 vs $2.50). I knew all that, but I played along anyway. His help was useful, though, since these machines can be rather counter-intuitive, until you get used to them.

Then we sat down and I noted to my brother Craig that I had forgotten to bring a pen to aid in handicapping. Quickly, a pen slid down the long table that we were standing at, from one of the fellows down the table. I guess he didn’t need it any longer. I thanked him, he nodded.

Along with the other fellow’s help at the program printing machine, I was reminded that the old comradeship of the horse player community still existed, here and there. Craig said that they probably thought I was a newbie to the horses, since I had a sort of sports jacket on, which may have made me look slightly out-of-place. It was nothing special, though, just some $140 job that I got from Tip-Top the previous year for Christmas.

It was mostly bucket-puller tracks running on this day (i.e. harness racing). The only thoroughbred tracks seemed to be Meadowlands and Turf Paradise, if I recall correctly.

I chose to play Turf Paradise, out of Phoenix again. I would have preferred Santa Anita (Los Angeles/Pasadena area), but it wasn’t running this day. That was probably a bad choice, as Arizona allows its tracks to charge very high takeouts (the money held back from bettors). Craig also played Turf Paradise, while waiting for his precious harness racing at Woodbine/Mohawk (Toronto), which started later in the afternoon.

I have done better at Santa Anita than Turf Paradise in the past. I don’t know if that is because it is a higher class track (thus better, more predictable horses, or so one assumes) or if it is just random luck on my part. The sample size is too small to draw definitive conclusions, obviously.

There was only one screen per track, so it was tough to follow the odds as the betting progressed, for each individual horse. The odds were focused mostly on the exotic pools, so you had to infer the odds per horse. That was a little bit annoying.

In the first set of races, I had a couple of close calls, betting exactors and or quinellas (I usually bet a favourite and a longer odds horse whose chart shows some promise). But they were nipped at the wire and close isn’t good enough.

I had a win on the last race, but the betting machine acted funny. It took my voucher (the bet) but then wouldn’t accept my bet. After a little while, I gave up on it. It was only a $4 voucher, I thought, so it didn’t really matter.

Then, the combination that I was trying to bet on did actually come in. It didn’t really matter much – the bet only paid about $6.50 on a $2 bet, since it was a favourite and a second favourite that came in, thus low odds, even on a so-called exotic bet. At most, I was out a sawbuck.

I had joked to Craig about that possibility, before the race started. I had even shown him the 1-8 combination that I wrote down on my program, as my intended bet (a quinella, where you bet the top two horses in either order). A young fellow in front of us gave me a consoling look, after overhearing Craig and myself talking about it. I am not sure what he said, as he had a rather incomprehensible Jamaican accent. But he seemed sympathetic to my situation, so that was cool.

There was another Jamaican fellow there who was quite excited by everything, cheering his horses on them damning them when they lost. He was an older guy, but he appeared to know the younger guy. These two seemed to be part of the after-work crowd now, as it was later in the afternoon. There was another fellow, of ambiguous ethnic background, who was also quite chatty. But he wasn’t too intrusive, so that was ok, as well.

I guess that’s a cultural thing. Some people (like Craig and me) like to feign an almost indifferent attitude to winning or losing (i.e. we can take it in our stride); others love to get into the excitement and emotion of the moment. It’s all relative, I guess.

There was also a guy in a wheelchair, who played the races for a while. He always stayed very close to a betting machine. It seemed like he might be lacking a leg or two, as he had a blanket over that part of his body. But, good for him, if racing got him outside of the house and interested in life.

I always said that gambling was the one dependable life-long “vice”. Drugs, booze, tobacco and wild women can shorten your life and bring you to a lot of other grief. Betting a few bucks at the track is just a pleasant mental challenge and few laughs, as long as you keep the investment within reason. Not everybody does, of course. As Hamlet would say, ‘there’s the rub’.

After that last race at Turf Paradise we called it a day. We took a route back to my place that went through downtown, but overall, the traffic was surprisingly light. Craig pointed out highlights as he drove, particularly the haunts of the down-and-out that he has observed (e.g. “there was encampment under this bridge last year”). He finds that interesting, an ongoing barometer of the state of society.

So, it was not a winning day, but there was some interesting race-track sociology to observe.

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Since I am running a book publishing blog, here is a plug for a horse-racing oriented short story that I wrote.

A Dark Horse, A Gothic Tale

In “A Dark Horse”, a gambler’s desire to hit a big win seems to lead him to make a Faustian bargain with a supernatural evil.  Or is it all just a string of unnaturally good luck?

The story is just $0.99 U.S. (equivalent in other currencies) and about 8000 words. It is also available on Kindle Unlimited and is occasionally on free promotion.

U.S.: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01M9BS3Y5

U.K.: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B01M9BS3Y5

Germany: https://www.amazon.de/dp/B01M9BS3Y5

France: https://www.amazon.fr/dp/B01M9BS3Y5

Italy: https://www.amazon.it/dp/B01M9BS3Y5

Netherlands: https://www.amazon.nl/dp/B01M9BS3Y5

Spain:https://www.amazon.es/dp/B01M9BS3Y5

Japan: https://www.amazon.co.jp/dp/B01M9BS3Y5

India: https://www.amazon.in/dp/B01M9BS3Y5

Mexico: https://www.amazon.com.mx/dp/B01M9BS3Y5

Brazil: https://www.amazon.com.br/dp/B01M9BS3Y5

Canada: https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B01MDMY2BR

Australia: https://www.amazon.com.au/dp/B01M9BS3Y5

Here’s an interesting review from Goodreads

(BTW, the writer has never met the reviewer and was not even aware of the review until very recently – You can look up the review on Goodreads, if you like)

A Dark Horse

Every gambler is bound to run out of luck eventually, right?

By far my favourite type of horror is psychological horror. I was quite pleased with how Mr. Olausen frightened his audience without spilling a single drop of blood or so much as hinting at anything gory. He knew exactly what hints to drop for us that made us deliciously dread the next scene simply by throwing out hints about who or what the dark horse might actually represent. This is the kind of stuff I love getting scared by, especially as Halloween approaches.

It would have been helpful to have more character development in this short story. While I certainly wouldn’t expect to see as much time spent on this as I would for a full-length novel, I did have trouble connecting to the main characters due to how little I knew about them and how much their personalities seemed to remain the same no matter what happened to them. If not for this issue, I would have felt comfortable choosing a much higher rating as the plot itself was well done.

I must admit to not knowing much about gambling at all, so I appreciated the brief explanations the narrator shared about how placing bets works and why some people have so much trouble walking away from a bet. While I will leave it up to experts on these topics to say how accurate everything was, I did enjoy learning more about the main character’s addiction and what he hoped to gain from betting on just one more game or race. It gave me a stronger sense of empathy for folks in his position.

A Dark Horse – A Gothic Tale was a deliciously chilling story for the Halloween season and beyond.

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And since I mentioned my dad’s time in the army, here is a book about his unit that I wrote:

The Sappers' War: A History of the 12th Field Company Royal Canadian Engineers, Oct 1943 to Sept 1945

What follows is a review of the history of the 12th Field Company, Royal Canadian Engineers, primarily relating to the time that the company was in the Italian and Northwestern European theatres during World War II. Though the book focuses on the experiences of a particular company of Canadian military engineers, it also discusses some of the wider issues of the second world war and how it affected the people wholived through the era, civilian and military. Among those are my father (a sapper or military engineer) and mother (a war worker in wartime Britain and ultimately a war bride).

Thus, this is meant to be an informal and unofficial history of the company, written by an interested party in an effort to understand what these men went through during this period, and how that experience affected them and other people who lived through the war. The military aspects of the company's history are there (e.g. training, fighting, building bridges, detecting mines, maintaining routes), as are the cultural factors that influenced them and their times (e.g. the movies that they watched, the drinking they did, the many diseases they faced, their interactions with the Italian, British and other civilians that they lived among, their worries for the future). Some focus on life on the British home front is also given, via the experiences of my mother and her family.

Since many people had family and relations that lived during this time, it is my hope that the account will be of general interest to them, and to any that have a particular interest in this critical interval in history. Also, though the text relates specifically to Canadian sappers, I believe that many of the experiences will be common to the soldiers and loved ones of other nations who lived through the war, especially Americans and those from Britain and the British Commonwealth.

The primary sources of this document are the 12th Field Company War Diaries and related orders, with some material from The History of the Corps of Royal Canadian Engineers, Volume 2 as well as various official histories by the Department of National Defence. Various other published sources are used as well, especially when discussing the wider issues of the war or the army experience (e.g. Churchill’s history of the war), or conversely when relating very specific episodes of the war (e.g. Popski’s Private Army in late 1944). Personal accounts of my father’s or mother’s stories also augment the narrative. I have tried to fit those in during appropriate time periods, though some stories are more general and have therefore don’t necessarily relate to the time period being discussed. Nonetheless, they do help capture the essence of “being there” during the war years.

The War Diary is a day by day account of the primary activities of a given unit, as recorded by personnel in the headquarters staff of that unit, and signed off by the commander of the unit. As such, it is an official record, though the writers often brought a bit of their own character into the document. Naturally, as a relatively brief document it can’t hope to capture the complexity of the individual stories of 280 or so men, so the family lore generally has no corresponding entry in the War Diary, though there are sometimes tantalizing hints and near-verifications of these personal accounts.

There are a number of other sources for the book, from official histories to popular history books. I include quotations and references from these works (an eclectic mix), as I believe that they also shed light on different aspects of this period of time, and besides that, are just interesting accounts, in and of themselves.

U.S.: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09HSXN6Q2

U.K.: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B09HSXN6Q2

Germany: https://www.amazon.de/dp/B09HSXN6Q2

France: https://www.amazon.fr/dp/B09HSXN6Q2

Spain: https://www.amazon.es/dp/B09HSXN6Q2

Italy: https://www.amazon.it/dp/B09HSXN6Q2

Netherlands: https://www.amazon.nl/dp/B09HSXN6Q2

Japan: https://www.amazon.co.jp/dp/B09HSXN6Q2

Brazil: https://www.amazon.com.br/dp/B09HSXN6Q2

Canada: https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B09HSXN6Q2

Mexico: https://www.amazon.com.mx/dp/B09HSXN6Q2

Australia: https://www.amazon.com.au/dp/B09HSXN6Q2

India: https://www.amazon.in/dp/B09HSXN6Q2

Horse-racing: Canadian Derby Day - Century Mile 5 (August 23, 2025)

A diary entry about a day at the races, 2025 style. 

• This is the fifth visit to Century Mile.

• My brother was now able to attend events away from his house again, so we decided to hit the track again.

• It was Derby Day in Edmonton Alberta, the Canadian Derby, the race with the highest purse of the season, in these parts. For this year, the purse was $200,000. It is a bit of a route-race, at one and a quarter miles.

• There were also some more high-stakes races on this day, fairly long distance races as well (over a mile): the Oaks, for $100,000, the Speed to Spare at $100,000, and the Distaff Handicap for $75,000. So, a big day at the local track, one with several races that can really test the stamina of the horses, and also make good use of the track’s one-mile oval.

• In earlier years, these purses were likely higher, when adjusted for inflation. But, crowds were also bigger, as were the handles (the amount of money bet on a given day at a given track). And, you only had one track to play, the one that you were actually at. So, all the money went to those horses. Now, the money is split among many tracks, though I don’t know the actual details of how that is done.

• The length and intensity of the local thoroughbred horse-racing meet is also very abbreviated compared to earlier years, only 2 or 3 days per week during the late spring, summer and early autumn months. Harness races take over in the later fall and winter, again with only two or three days per week.

• So, horse racing was a bigger draw during that time, as it was almost the only legal form of gambling in most areas. This is compared to earlier years, where horses ran most days of the week during a meet, with each of the several meets lasting 6 weeks or so. Unfortunately (for horse and horse-racing aficionados) the growth in other gambling venues and related opportunities has tended to make horse-racing fade into the background.

• But people still love an event, especially one that gives them an opportunity to dress up in fancy clothes, should that be their desire. Thus, the casino/racetrack was very crowded on this day. A fairly decent smattering of the people in the crowd were dressed up, in the fashion of the traditional derby event. That is to say, large showy hats, dresses and skirts (of varying length) for the women and somewhat dapper hats and vests for the men, along with the odd bolo tie. I thought it was kind of cool, especially on the distaff side, to use horse-racing parlance.

• As for myself, I did have on a white button-up shirt, with dark blue corduroy pants and black leather shoes. In modern times that might be thought of as a bit dressy, I don’t know. I mostly wanted the white button-up shirt for the heat (white reflects heat and the shirt was also short-sleeved). The pants and shoes just went along with that.

• We got to the track fairly early – at about 2:00 in the afternoon. The local race card wasn’t scheduled to start until 4:30, so there was plenty of time to kill.

• The first signs of how busy it would be was the presence of parking attendants to wave cars into the correct part of the parking lot. This was not normally the procedure; one could generally find parking quite easily. We half expected to be charged for parking, but somewhat surprisingly, this did not occur. I was reminded of a visit to Spruce Meadows in Calgary, which featured a similar platoon of parking attendants. Of course, that was for show-jumping, rather than racing.

• The next things to notice were signs announcing a $30 per person admission to the race-track grounds, which is extremely steep, compared to my experience at race-tracks in the past. But, there were plenty of people lined up to give them their money.

• As far as we were concerned, that hardly seemed like a good idea, so we gave it a pass. We headed for the casino, which is attached to the track (or perhaps one might say the track is attached to the casino). This area was plenty busy as well, with the betting section for the horse players mostly occupied. That being so, we took up some seats in a nearby section of the casino, thankfully not far from the horse-racing betting machines and racing cashier.

• This was a pretty good spot, with some nice seating, either sit down tables or bar-stool type high tables. So, settled down on to some chairs at a high table, bought a few beers and waited to see how things would develop.

• As noted above, the casino was already crowded, with a good proportion of the patrons dressed for the races. I don’t know if they were going back into the racetrack grounds later in the day, or had just decided to skip the $30 admission for the privilege of standing in the hot sun for hours. As far as I could ascertain from when we walked by the track, on the way to the casino, there wasn’t actually a lot of seating outside, in the racetrack grounds proper. That’s not like the old track, which had a capacious grand-stand and plenty of space along along the ground and near the rail, as well as a somewhat toney clubhouse. On big days it might also have corporate seating set up in the infield.

• With a long day ahead of us, we perused the off-track handicapping possibilities. My son and I settled on Del Mar, a track not far from San Diego California. Brother Craig paid some attention to that, as well as putting money down on races at some other tracks, such as the harness races at Woodbine and the thoroughbred races at the local track, once they eventually got going.

• Generally speaking, our betting went well. Scott and I suffered a few losses, but each of us picked up a healthy purse on a couple of quinellas, later in the card. That put us well over the top for the day. With reasonable money management, we kept things that way.

• I noted a young woman coming back from watching one of the races. She had that happy aura of someone who just won a race. Shortly thereafter, I was amused to see Scott score a decent win. It was interesting to see how winning some money pleased Scott, as he also came back beaming from winning his bet. That said, he wasn’t unduly demonstrative, avoiding the yelling and cursing at the horses, that some patrons enjoy while observing the race. He makes good money at work, so that wasn’t really the issue. But there is something very pleasing about winning a bet, especially one that you put some serious handicapping effort into.

• There were some folks who were getting quite excited while watching the races, oscillating between joy and disappointment, depending on what position their horse was at, any any given point in the race. I am reminded of a famous football coach, who discouraged too much unrestrained emotion from players who spiked the ball in the end-zone. He said “you should act like it’s not the first time you’ve been there.” I tend to go along with that, as does Craig and now, Scott too, apparently. I guess it is a family trait. Mind you, it would be inhuman not to show some emotion after winning (or losing). The trick is, to maintain balance and perspective.

• Both Scott and I are very analytical by nature, as well as highly educated in math and statistics (he has a PhD in physics, I am math/physics with much post-grad coursework in statistics). So, we do lean towards quite numbers-oriented handicapping. Craig does a little of this as well, but also relies on his instincts and hunches regarding underhanded odds manipulations, that may or may not go on behind the scenes.

• Scott’s mom (my wife) had also given him some cash to bet for her, so he was playing for the both of them. I think she did this more out of a desire to play some part in the events, even if from afar. But I think it pleased Scott to know that he was making some play-money for her.

• As I said, it was very crowded in the casino and got more crowded as the day went on. That necessitated a lot of quick moves to avoid bumping into people, as one walked back and forth between our table and the betting machines in the adjoining section of the casino. But, that all turned out ok. People, including myself, were on their best behaviour. It is interesting what a bit of dressing up will do, in that respect.

• It also meant heading into the racing section of the casino, to watch the race on one of the big screens, as our section’s TV screens were dominated by baseball and golf. While I was waiting to see how my horses did after one race, a nice middle-aged lady struck up a conversation. I guess I must have had some of that happy aura going on as well, since my picks had come in, though a jockey’s inquiry made the wait a little nerve-wracking.

• While watching another race, I noticed an unclaimed pencil on an empty table. Scott had neglected to take a pen or pencil, so I scooped it up for him. Then, a fellow came back, and looked at the table, glancing around with a quizzical expression. I guess I must have unknowingly filched his five-cent pencil. Well, so be it, I thought, as I walked back to our section of the casino. He should have taken better care of his valuables, especially five-cent pencils, which can be pretty damn handy at the track. Besides, he could pick up another one, at one of the Sport-Select terminals in the casino.

• After a while, the local races began. The second race was interesting. It wasn’t one of the feature races, but rather a cheap claiming race, but an unusually long one, a mile and five-eighths. The winner ran wire to wire (led all the way). At one point, it seemed as if it was tiring and would be beaten, but it dug in and called up some reserves of energy, finally winning going away, as they say. It was a very impressive performance.

• We didn’t actually stay for the Derby, but Craig did make a bet on the race, parlaying a bunch of other wins. Unusually for him, he bet to win, and his horse did come in first, paying $5.90 to win, which is a pretty good price, since it was the favorite.  He had bet a fair bit on the race, so he did ok, it put him over for the day, I think.

• So, we left early in the evening, having all finished the day in the black (though Craig didn’t know it yet). Scott even won some money for his mom, so all in all, a good day at the races

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  And, I suppose I should try to flog a book, so here's a short story with a horse-racing aspect to it:
  

  A Dark Horse

  In “A Dark Horse”, a gambler’s desire to hit a big win seems to lead him to make a Faustian bargain with a supernatural evil.  Or is it all just a string of unnaturally good luck?

  The story is just $0.99 U.S. (equivalent in other currencies) and about 8000 words. It is also available on Kindle Unlimited and is occasionally on free promotion.
  

  U.S.: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01M9BS3Y5

  U.K.: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B01M9BS3Y5

  Germany: https://www.amazon.de/dp/B01M9BS3Y5

  France: https://www.amazon.fr/dp/B01M9BS3Y5

  Italy: https://www.amazon.it/dp/B01M9BS3Y5

  Netherlands: https://www.amazon.nl/dp/B01M9BS3Y5

  Spain:https://www.amazon.es/dp/B01M9BS3Y5

  Japan: https://www.amazon.co.jp/dp/B01M9BS3Y5

  India: https://www.amazon.in/dp/B01M9BS3Y5

  Mexico: https://www.amazon.com.mx/dp/B01M9BS3Y5

  Brazil: https://www.amazon.com.br/dp/B01M9BS3Y5

  Canada: https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B01MDMY2BR

  Australia: https://www.amazon.com.au/dp/B01M9BS3Y5

  
  

  Here’s an interesting review from Goodreads

  (BTW, the writer has never met the reviewer and was not even aware of the review until very recently – You can look up the review on Goodreads, if you like)

  A Dark Horse

  Every gambler is bound to run out of luck eventually, right?
  
  By far my favourite type of horror is psychological horror. I was quite pleased with how Mr. Olausen frightened his audience without spilling a single drop of blood or so much as hinting at anything gory. He knew exactly what hints to drop for us that made us deliciously dread the next scene simply by throwing out hints about who or what the dark horse might actually represent. This is the kind of stuff I love getting scared by, especially as Halloween approaches.
  
  It would have been helpful to have more character development in this short story. While I certainly wouldn’t expect to see as much time spent on this as I would for a full-length novel, I did have trouble connecting to the main characters due to how little I knew about them and how much their personalities seemed to remain the same no matter what happened to them. If not for this issue, I would have felt comfortable choosing a much higher rating as the plot itself was well done.
  
  I must admit to not knowing much about gambling at all, so I appreciated the brief explanations the narrator shared about how placing bets works and why some people have so much trouble walking away from a bet. While I will leave it up to experts on these topics to say how accurate everything was, I did enjoy learning more about the main character’s addiction and what he hoped to gain from betting on just one more game or race. It gave me a stronger sense of empathy for folks in his position.
  
  A Dark Horse – A Gothic Tale was a deliciously chilling story for the Halloween season and beyond.

   

  .

 On the Road with Bronco Billy, now on Audiobook – An Interesting Road Trip in a Big Rig

Something to listen to during a long drive, whether or not you are a long-haul driver. Or maybe just at home, while contemplating a road trip

On the Road with Bronco Billy

Sit back and go on a ten day trucking trip in a big rig, through western North America, from Alberta to Texas, and back again. Explore the countryside, learn some trucking lingo, and observe the shifting cultural norms across this great continent.

Amazon U.S.: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00X2IRHSK

Amazon U.K.: http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B00X2IRHSK

Amazon Canada: http://www.amazon.ca/gp/product/B00X2IRHSK

Amazon Australia: https://www.amazon.com.au/dp/B00X2IRHSK

Amazon Germany: http://www.amazon.de/gp/product/B00X2IRHSK

Amazon France: https://www.amazon.fr/dp/B00X2IRHSK

Amazon Spain: https://www.amazon.es/dp/B00X2IRHSK

Amazon Italy: https://www.amazon.it/dp/B00X2IRHSK

Amazon Netherlands: https://www.amazon.nl/dp/B00X2IRHSK

Amazon Japan: https://www.amazon.co.jp/dp/B00X2IRHSK

Amazon Brazil: https://www.amazon.com.br/dp/B00X2IRHSK

Amazon Mexico: https://www.amazon.com.mx/dp/B00X2IRHSK

Amazon India: https://www.amazon.in/dp/B00X2IRHSK

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What follows is an account of a ten day journey through western North America during a working trip, delivering lumber from Edmonton Alberta to Dallas Texas, and returning with oilfield equipment. The writer had the opportunity to accompany a friend who is a professional truck driver, which he eagerly accepted. He works as a statistician for the University of Alberta, and is therefore is generally confined to desk, chair, and computer. The chance to see the world from the cab of a truck, and be immersed in the truck driving culture was intriguing. In early May 1997 they hit the road.

Some time has passed since this journal was written and many things have changed since the late 1990’s. That renders the journey as not just a geographical one, but also a historical account, which I think only increases its interest.

We were fortunate to have an eventful trip - a mechanical breakdown, a near miss from a tornado, and a large-scale flood were among these events. But even without these turns of fate, the drama of the landscape, the close-up view of the trucking lifestyle, and the opportunity to observe the cultural habits of a wide swath of western North America would have been sufficient to fill up an interesting journal.

The travelogue is about 20,000 words, about 60 to 90 minutes of reading, at typical reading speeds.

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