Tom doesn’t want to mention this news for fear of jinxing it. He’s still a little stunned. I expect wacky things to happen all the time so I however am quite willing to tempt fate. We’ve all got jobs at the same place, except for Jacko because he’s not got a permit of course. We all lined up at the 50’s diner this morning as per the instructions on the sign advertising the forthcoming opening and hiring of staff. There were about 25 people turning up this morning and almost all of them got jobs.

The guy interviewing asked what jobs we’d like and Matt went for server and Tom and I choose busboys as we’re not so confident in our serving abilities but in retrospect, we could probably have asked for server positions as well, especially as we were at the front of the line so we had first choice of positions.

So we’ll get a place tomorrow and we’ll be all sorted, except for having to work everyday. The diner opens on Monday so we have a few shifts this week cleaning the place as the health inspector will be checking shortly.

Poor Saddam, I feel sorry for him. I’m not saying I agree with his evil ruling style, but the newspapers here are so pro-USA that I can’t help feeling on his side.

The internet timer is counting down so I’m going to wrap this up. More soon.

The broken link has been fixed for the other movie.

I’m less tired and my flu has almost gone, so things are looking up. There are several good job leads for tomorrow. We’ll be up early. I might enhance my resume with some non-facts. If we’re still jobless mid-week, things will be grim.

There’s still trouble with accents but smelly man has become more friendly. I’ve got hope.

One of us has a job!

But it’s only a temp job for today and maybe tomorrow. And it’s Matt’s.

In other news, we’ve dropped by a bunch of irritating restaurants which refuse occasionally to even take our resumes. One told Jackson to come back at 1-2pm today, and the shop was shut.

Our new ‘roomy’ in 205 has helpfully told us that all we have to do is go out and ask for jobs everywhere. This has worked better for him as he has about 10 years restaurant experience.

This man is really irritating. He snores, he yells at other people for snoring, he makes a myriad of snorting, breathing and farting noises whenever he enters a room, he’s obese and walks around in a towel on occasion to demonstrate this, he talks without listening, he assumes he knows everything, he thinks saying ‘mate’ to Australians is clever, he keeps on asking us what we’re doing that night, he has soulless eyes, he snacks incessantly, and once ambushed us in the cafe.

I may have to kill him.

(4 days till tLotR:tRotK !!!! )

I am tired and sick. Someone’s given me the flu. I hate these early sunsets. It’s screwing with my body clock. And it’s cold. Damn cold. And dry, which doesn’t help my sore throat and dry eyes. I’m going to have to wear a third layer. Not everything is bad though. More pics are up of Canada.

There were 8 other job hunters walking along the strip of hotels yesterday. Things are looking bad. I bet Jackson doesn’t even read my blog let alone his past messages.

No, we don’t have a lighter.
No, despite your insinuation that our dinner looks good, you’re not getting any.
Yes, we’ve heard that asking to see the manager about jobs is supposed to work, but it hasn’t for us.
No, we don’t like you. Can you go away?

It’s cold here. It takes two minutes outside for our ears to start hurting so we have to keep ducking into shops to warm up. The air is extremely dry and thin so we can’t run much without panting and being thirsty. It also means that the snow is always powdery and dry, which is good when you want to run straight down hills and ignore the paths. It makes snowmen harder to make though.

No, we haven’t found jobs.
No, we aren’t going to the pub because we can’t afford to.
No, we don’t smoke and don’t have any lighters/matches/cigarettes.
No, we don’t want to talk to you crazy Canadian loonie who can’t understand us. Please just leave us alone to play 500.

And finally to address some rumours about me falling through some ice into the river. I did get wet but only up to my armpits as I stuck my arms out to either side of me onto the ice. I was at no point in any danger because I am an amateur stuntman and I had Jackson, an experienced stunt coordinator to help pull me out.

A few numbers relevant to our exciting canada working holiday:
1: the number of us out of money.
1: the number of us who actually got here with $4000.
1: the number of weeks Andy and I have been looking for jobs.
1-3: the number of weeks we’ve been told is reasonable to look for jobs.
1.5: the number of weeks until ‘Return of the King’ comes out.
oodles: the number of resumes I’ve sent out in the hope of getting a job.

Anyhow, we don’t really want to have to bugger off, as that’d be quite a waste of a lot of money. I may have a fairly stable financial position currently, but that’s only coz this is my first overseas trip and hence my parents have been more than generous in throwing in extra funds.

Anyhow. Off to hunt for more jobs! I’m sure I saw one hiding under the rug in the hostel today.

Incidentally — Andrew fell in the icy river yesterday, just in case he doesn’t see fit to tell you. It wasn’t really his fault — he was just jumping up and down on the edge of the ice and it happened to break where he thought it would.

Some pics of Canada. Can you spot where the jobs are?

Ah, the joys of hostel accomodation. If you want to really save money, stay in a place with 10 beds to a room. You’re bound to have at least one really irritating person that way. Let me introduce some of them:

Matt. Andrew. Jackson.
OK, you probably know these ones already. And if you don’t, I’m sure Andy will put up some pictures soon to re-educate you.

Guy in white shirt and pants near the door.
Very affable, with a quiet voice. Oddly, he’s from New York. He sits on the bunk above Jackson and cheerfully admits that he can’t tell the difference between us. He admires our ability to transform from lazy bums to clean, nice job-seekin’ people though. He was a bit surprised to find out that at least 50% of us were computer geeks. And that another 25% could juggle.

Smelly Man.
Our senior roommate sleeps under Matthew. Or rather, used to. Matt has since evacuated to the bed under Andy for one very sensible reason – Smelly Man is smelly. Of cigarette smoke. I’m not sure what he does with his ciggies but when he comes back in after a smoke the stench manages to engulf the entire room. As has in fact happened as I type this. He’s also prone to long political discussions with Guy in White Shirt and Pants, often concerning the U.S.

Bradley.
A newly 31-year old Australian. Tall, thin, with a high pitched voice but appealing manner, everyone in the YWCA seems to know and love Bradley. Except that after three weeks, he finally got a job the other day, and moved out this morning. This is a bit sad as you can never be too sure who’s going to take people’s places.

Mike.
A tall Canadian who was down to about two dollars when by accident he got himself hired as an electrician’s apprentice at the pub one night. This sound and simple strategy for job seeking is one that I found my subconscious warming to, but luckily enough of my brain remains to dismiss this as a one-off. Mike put his alarm clock radio a fair distance away from him due to positioning of powerpoints, and it fell to me to wake him up the other morning, when the alarm started blurting out awful static. He disappeared after one night however. Hopefully he’s not sleeping outside, as we’ve all pretty much decided this is fatal.

Demented Andy.
A french bloke with massive tattoos on one arm, who looks rather like Andy would, if

• the wind changed while he was playing Igor
• Someone beat the front of his face soundly
• He developed a reasonable level of psychosis
• He took to wearing bandanas.

This guy scares me, but luckily he appears to have moved out.

This morning, we met a new canadian construction worker. Our friend in the white clothes informed him we were the laziest Aussies ever. I may have to kill him.

So does anyone know where I can find a job here? Nevermind.

Canadian skiing is more fun than Australian skiing, even judging by the number of Tom’s bruises.

I’m at Calgary Bus Station, and it’s quite cold. Andy and I just walked through some snow to get here. It was a terrible and arduous journey, but we made it alive. Well, I had to eat Andy’s leg.

But he’s fine about it. Though he keeps spurting blood.

Kill Bill was good.