Monthly Archives: October 2008

Halloween In Vancouver

Since Halloween is happening tomorrow evening (Friday night of all nights) I figure I would post some of my shots from the family visit to the Stanley Park Halloween train. We got there at about 6:15 PM and waited for 2 hours to actually get on the train. While we waited we walked around and checked out the “haunted farm”, face painting and a few other treats. I suggest getting there early, cause there were tons of people.

When you take the train ride expect people to jump out at you from the bushes, there are people all over the place when you take the train ride. They did a really good job putting this event together and was well thought out. Overall it was fun to check it out, but waiting a couple hours in the cold with 2 kids was a challenge, lol.

Tomorrow afternoon Burnaby Heights in North Burnaby is having the annual Halloween on the Heights. Basically the kids go trick or treating to all the business between Willingdon and Boundary road on Hastings street.

Photos of Stanley Park Halloween train, last night:

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Reflecting On The Past

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It’s 6:41 am on a Saturday morning and I feel like I slept enough, so I woke up at 5:49 am or something and here I am now writing another blog post. Yeah I’m weird, tell me something I don’t know ok? I was thinking about how fast life changes, hell I’m going to be 38 next month!! I can remember when my dad was in his 40’s and I am almost where my dad was. He is turning 70 years old next week on October 31st of all day. I can’t even believe he’s 70 already. Time goes way too fast.

It’s weird for me to get to this age, having my kids look up to me for love and guidance. I thought that I would be the kid forever. I thought high school would never end. I thought I wouldn’t live past 30. I thought lots of things, most of which have been passed.

Many times I wish time would stand still, but it just keeps on rolling. Soo many good things have happened to me in the last 10 years, but some of my coolest memories will always be of growing up. Things were sooo simple when I was a kid, all I had to do was worrying about playing outside. I didn’t care about money, I had no worries, my parents did all the worrying for me. Eventually we all grow up (hopefully), and hopefully you parents gave you a great childhood like the one I had. It wasn’t materialistic or anything of that nature, it was all about family. My parents were ALWAYS there, and they taught through their actions how to raise a family the RIGHT way. Hopefully I can have an impact on my kids the way my parents did to me.

All the thoughts blaze through my head:

The endless summers camping in Birch Bay, Washington with Vince, Mike, John, Marisa, Anna, Sabrina, Josie, Tania, Frank, Joe, Angelo and a ton of other family friends in my age group.
making go carts from stolen shopping carts
using my 10 speed bike as my SUV vehicle
doing graffiti on the back of warehouses around Joyce Skytrain station.
working at McDonalds on Lougheed Highway (for $3.65/hr) with Vince, Mike, Tom, Giorgio, Stefano and my brother Roberto.
Sunday picnics at New Brighton park in East Van or Hume Park in New West or Central Park in Burnaby or….
The Sunday drives to Granville Island to pick up sea food.

Thanks for a great childhood ma and papa, it will be something that I will remember forever..

C.V.

Pre Approved For A Mortgage – Condo Shopping Very Soon

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Well I finally got pre approved for a mortgage yesterday from Peter Kinch who specializes in investment mortgages. Now I am locked in at the current interest rate for 3 months while I go condo shopping. I am now waiting on my real estate agent Antonietta Santoro to return from Italy next week. When I find someone who I trust I stick with them, building relationships is important. Antonietta has helped me buy all the places I own here in Vancouver, and I couldn’t be happier with the purchases I made because of her.

I have been checking Craigslis t’s real estate section to see what the prices are like and like I said in previous posts, I’m thinking a 2 bedroom for $190,000 to $220,000 is a good investment. And with the Canadian dollar dropping right down to 80 cents today my U.S. pay checks are getting bigger and bigger.

The funny thing is this when people talk “recession” I start to smile, why? Most people stop spending, stop buying houses and so on. This is good for me because then houses drop and there is way less bidding competition. I have always been one to go against the grain of society, hell I was doing graffiti for over 20 years. I sort of like to be the “outsider” in some ways. I’m not into following the crowd. I have always said that if you follow the crowd you get the same results as the crowd, thinking outside the box has proven beneficial to me over and over. Obviously I’m not like in all aspects of my life, but some areas I tend to stray away from what “most people do”.

Anyways it’s a nice crisp day here in East Vancouver, I would like to bike to the coffee shop this morning. I will see how my insides feel in a little while and take it from there.

Have a good one kids.

C.V

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How I got To This Point In My Life

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Do you ever sit down and think how you go to where you are? I do and it’s interesting, at least to myself. I was thinking of how I got into doing internet marketing and the history may surprise you. As I mentioned in other blog posts I started doing graffiti and the age of 12 years old way back in 1982. Because of graffiti I met other kids in Vancouver doing the same thing. One fellow I met was Ephx in 1986 (he was called Rip 1 at the time 1986). Years passed he moved to New York, then San Francisco and then he did move back to Vancouver and I bumped into him in the late 1990’s, probably around early 1998. He was into computers for the past few years and he learned web design on his own.

Me, I was a cabinet maker and hated every f*cking minute of it. I started to think of going back to school for web design, which I did in October of 1999. I pinpoint Ephx as the reason I jumped into web design and computer graphics.

Fast forward to early 2000, when I bumped into an old high school friend Rob downtown on Smithe street. We exchange numbers and meet up sushi a week or so later. I was working as a web designer by this time and he was waiting tables, no big deal.

After that we don’t speak for about a year or so I believe. By this point Rob has also gotten into web design working for a local studio, but at the same time has his own freelance company called Padrone Media. Me, I get laid off and start applying to over 100 local web design companies and also applied to Padrone Media. I sent emails to any place that had a website basically. 2000 was the dot bomb era and it sucked bad, I was getting laid of every few months.

Anyways, a week or so later he calls and explains he’s doing web design, no big deal. I eventually found a job and we kept in contact. Then in January of 2003 he messages me on MSN showing me some site pulling $3600 a month. We both got into making informational sites that had Google AdSense on them, people click the ads and you make money . A few years later we both evolved and started buying traffic from Google, and affiliate marketing is where I am now.

I point my reasons for being where I am to 2 people Rob and Kevin. I did the work but by knowing those 2 people they influenced where I am right now. It’s always interesting to see the path that took you to where you are today.

Bell TV Or Shaw Cable?

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I had Bell TV Satellite for a little over 2 years and when I really wanted to watch satellite such as in the winter months when it was snowing or raining really hard the satellite would be down. If snow accumulates on the Bell receiver then you loose the satellite signal. I called them tons of times to complain about this and they just said to go clean the receiver. Well my receiver was up about 40 feet in the air. Who in their right mind is going to pull out a ladder in the middle of a snow storm to clean their satellite receiver? Just a wee bit dangerous isn’t it, jackasses. Also when it rains hard it sometimes it has the same problem, no satellite signal. And it tends to rain here in Vancouver, especially in the winter, DOH.

Anyways enough was enough. So we switched over to Shaw Digital Cable, less bullsh*t, and now everything is bundled together (digital phone, Internet & digital cable). Bada Bing.