Marketing. If you could see me right now you would see a guy who doesn’t want to think about marketing. Every time I think about marketing I wonder if I had chosen to go the traditional publishing route instead of going the indie route, if I would still have to market my books, or if my publisher would just do it for me and I could spend all of my time writing detective novels. I’ve been told that it would be much the same, and that I would still be out there peddling books, but then it is other indie authors who are telling me that, so I don’t know.

A friend has told me many times, in fact every time we talk about it, that what I really need is for Oprah to read my books and then recommend them to her audience. Then I would sell hundreds of thousands, if not millions of copies, become rich and famous, and then I guess live happily ever after. Great idea for a novel, actually, but while I’m waiting for Oprah, I probably need to continue to work on the marketing myself.

While the Oprah plan would be the great way to make money, so would winning the Publisher’s Clearing House Sweepstakes. I wouldn’t have to do any marketing. I could just be rich enough to write books and not worry about it. I’m not counting on either one of those, though. Whenever I am working on marketing, I think about why I’m writing the novels in the first place. I mean, fame and fortune would be nice, but from firsthand experience, I think that anyone who writes books just to become rich and famous would be just as well served to play the lottery twice a week and save the time. I’ve been talking to other authors recently, and I’ve started looking at it from a more realistic angle. Sure, I’m not getting rich, but every month a royalty check gets deposited in my account. Not enough that I can buy a beach house in Nantucket, but I’m richer than I would be if I hadn’t written them. Sure, Oprah’s people are not calling my people, but there is the nice review of Lonelyfarmer,com that Michael Tidemann wrote last week that then got picked up by a half dozen or so newspapers around Iowa and southern Minnesota. So fame has not completely eluded me. Fame is relative, and while I’m not yet quite Oprah famous, I’ll take it for now.

So the question is, if not for fame and fortune, why write them? And the answer to that one is easy. Just last week I happened to walk into Café Milo for a cup of coffee. Café Milo is, of course, the coffee shop that I use as my inspiration for the fictional Filo’s Coffee Shop in my books. (As a side note, my books are for sale at Café Milo if anyone is looking for one.) As I got in line to order my cup of coffee, the man in front of me turned and said, “I really like your book. I’m reading the first one and I’m looking forward to the second.” That’s enough. For me, that is all the fame and fortune that I need.  I’m writing them so that people can read them and enjoy them. Even if Oprah does discover me one day, that will still be what it is all about.

When Max and Skip left the police department, the department was still using the ten code to communicate with dispatch and among officers. The ten code is a series of 99 numbers preceded by a ten. For example, 10-1 is that the radio signal is weak and that it is not being received well enough to understand it. Any cop who has been around a while will start talking ten code, even when they are at home. One cop might casually call another and ask, “ten-six?” They are asking the other officer if they are busy at the moment. Sometimes they will leave off the ten, and just use the number. “Twenty-five me at the Hilton” means “meet me over at the Hilton parking lot.” So the conversation would go, “one-twenty-eight,” (the other officer’s call number), “are you ten-six?” The other officer answers, “negative,” then the first officer says, “twenty-five me at the Hilton.” Then the officers meet to supposedly exchange some information, but really they are just going to shoot the shit.

Cops don’t always use the ten code, though. Often they use plain speak, which is just saying what they want to say. There are some ten codes that are not always best used. For example, 10-21, send me a wrecker, and 10-22, send me an ambulance, can easily get confused, especially when the officer calling it out is all pumped up on adrenaline, performing CPR and trying to stop the blood flow on an accident victim who is bleeding out on the pavement in the middle of the night on a busy street. The last thing they want to do is to make a slip and get a wrecker instead of an ambulance. So they will dispense with the ten code and scream over the radio, “we need an ambulance.”

Max never understood why the department used the ten code. If it was supposed to be a secret, it wasn’t. Even back in the early eighties, before the internet, every police groupie out there had a scanner in one hand and the ten code in the other. Anyway, sometime after Max and Skip retired, the ten code started to go by the wayside. Today most of the younger cops have never heard of it.

Some of the most-used ten codes when Max and Skip were still patrolling the streets, which they still use today in their daily conversations, are in bold type below.

The Ten Code.

 10-1 Signal weak, Cannot copy
 10-2 Status is OK
 10-3 End transmission
 10-4 Message received
 10-5 Relay
 10-6 Busy
 10-7 Out of service
 10-8 In service
 10-9 Repeat
 10-10 Fight
 10-11 Dog
 10-12 Standby
 10-13 Weather / Road conditions
 10-14 Report of prowler
 10-15 Civil disturbance
 10-16 Domestic Disturbance
 10-17 Complainant
 10-18 Complete assignment
 10-19 Return to ….
 10-20 Location
 10-21 Call by phone
 10-22 Disregard
 10-23 Arrived at the scene
 10-24 Assignment complete
 10-25 Meet with Somebody
 10-26 Detaining subject to expedite
 10-27 Drivers license information
 10-28 Registration information
 10-29 Check for records or warrants
 10-30 Illegal use of radio
 10-31 Crime in progress
 10-32 Gun (Unless specified as other Weapon)
 10-33 Emergency
 10-34 Riot
 10-35 Major crime alert
 10-36 Correct time
 10-37 Suspicious subject
 10-38 Traffic Stop
 10-39 Urgent – use lights and siren
 10-40 Silent run – no lights and siren
 10-41 Beginning tour of duty
 10-42 Ending tour of duty
 10-43 Information
 10-44 Request permission to leave patrol
 10-45 Animal carcass
 10-46 Assist motorist
 10-47 Emergency road repairs needed
 10-48 Traffic signal needs repair
 10-49 Traffic light out
 10-50 Accident F – Fatality PI – Personal Injury PD – Property Damage
 10-51 Wrecker
 10-52 Ambulance
 10-53 Road blocked
 10-54 Livestock on highway
 10-55 Intoxicated Driver
 10-56 Intoxicated Subject
 10-57 Hit and Run Accident
 10-58 Direct traffic
 10-59 Convoy or Escort
 10-60 In the Area
 10-61 Subject Near Officer
 10-62 Reply to message
 10-63 Prepare to copy
 10-64 Net clear
 10-65 Net message assignment
 10-66 Message canceled
 10-67 Clear to read net message
 10-68 Dispatch information
 10-69 Message Relayed
 10-70 Fire
 10-71 Advise nature of fire
 10-72 Report progress on fire
 10-73 Smoke report
 10-74 Negative
 10-75 In contact with
 10-76 En-Route
 10-77 ETA (Estimated time of arrival)
 10-78 Assistance is Needed
 10-79 Coroner
 10-80 High speed pursuit
 10-81 In-view patrol
 10-82 Reserve lodging
 10-83 Welfare Check
 10-84 If meeting, advise ETA
 10-85 Will be late
 10-86 Request authorization for overtime
 10-87 Pick up checks for distribution
 10-88 Advise present telephone number
 10-89 Bomb threat
 10-90 Alarm
 10-91 Unnecessary use of radio
 10-92 Alarm
 10-93 Blockade
 10-94 Drag racing
 10-95 Subject in custody
 10-96 Mental subject
 10-97 Check signal
 10-98 Jail break
 10-99 Wanted or stolen