Going to Canada eh ?

Well what is it you ask ? It looks like a ski jump except it finished over quite a deep lake. Then you realise that in winter the lake is going to be frozen solid enough to allow ski jumpers to land on it. Its going to be really cold over winter but apparently snow boarding is fun even if driving is not.

One of Dave’s favourite places to swim is Discovery Canyon. This is a man made feature where water from a near by lake is pumped up to feed a waterfall and rock pool arrangement. Admission is free but you can hire a rubber ring or inner tube (pronounced toob)for $4. If you can wedge your bottom in the tube you can ride the rapids all the way down.

Parents are advised to take plenty of insect repelant.

Next time you Brits complain about the post spare a thought for “us” Canadians(notice how I slipped that in seamlessly). We mentioned a while ago the you had to allow 10 days for a letter to cross the country. Also be aware that not all houses have letter boxes. In some of the smaller towns you have to go to the Post Office and get your mail from your very own PO Box. Ours is now 2637 in Blackfalds which is just North of Red Deer. In more out lying areas you can see a stack of PO boxes at the end of road serving houses in the area.

Many Canadian homes are built with a basement half above and half below ground so that it is 6 or 7 steps below and the same above ground level. Originally the idea was the basement housed the furnace(=boiler), washer, drier and second bathroom. Now the trend is to divide the property in two 2 flats or suites and rent one or both out.

This is what has happened to the place we will be living in. It will be interesting to see how this works out as there is only one thermostat to control upstairs and downstairs and the consumer unit is shared but there seem to be seperate breakers for each room.

We tried to get phone, internet, and Tv all from the same company only to find that Shaw could not do phones in our area and Telus could not do TV. The TV feed is via cable subscription (no licence fee) and it will be interesting to see if internet via the TV feed is better than via the phone line.

We have been using the services of a government funded company called career assistance network to help find jobs. Basicaly they re wrote our cv’s in to Canadian formatted resumes and gave us tips on where and how to look.

I had had an interview in Calgary the other week in response to an application via the Monster job search web site. While I was waiting to hear a result I sent a mail shot ( both snail and E) to local companies. One company phone on the Weds, interviewed on Thurs and made an offer Friday. I made them wait 20 mins before accepting, dont want to appear too keen.

This meant I could cancel the interview that was set for Monday as would be starting work. I then had a call on Saturday from another recipient of the mail shot who wanted to interview me but had to turn him down as well. Meanwhile still no news from the Calgary company.

On the housing front the condo that we said we had lost the other week became available again, however as we were waiting to hear from Calgary we were not in a position to proceed and so lost it again. We also lost another flat we like for the same reason. So we are back to the classified ads and driving around looking for To let signs.

David has a day camp at a local sports center which should tire him out and with me at work Lin will be on her own for the first time in 6 weeks. Hope she enjoys the peace and quiet.

We went to one of David’s favorite places by the river and saw a fire and rescue truck towing a boat followed by a fire engine.
At first we thought there was someone stranded in the river but it turned out to be a training exercise in their new boat.

In all there were 3 engines and two ambulances. Over here the fire and rescue service also runs the ambulance service.

This is a petrochemical refinery at Joffre about 25 Km from where we are staying. It is right in the middle of nowhere and makes quite an impact on the skyline.

Proof that you can take a picture of a rainbow.

We found out where to take the plastic drinks bottles for recycling and when we thought we had enough to make it worth while Peter took them in. The facility also dealt with wine bottles and beer cans so the smell was quite overpowering (a bit like a meeting room on the second day of a sales meeting).

The other thing that was apparent was we were small operators by comparison to the other people there. We had about 8 carrier bags full, most others had between 1 and 3 supermarket trolleys piled high.

There were about 6 operators receiving the empties. You emptied your collection into a big tray in front of the operator and they the sorted and counted by hand and gave you a receipt which you then took to the cashier for payment. This was quite a slow process and the result of 20 mins standing in line was $4.35 . Next time we will either have to collect for longer or drink more.

We have been looking at apartments and condos this week in an effort to get away from living in a one motel room . Our choice has been limited as many will not take children or pets and Lin needs something with easy access.

We thought we had the ideal place in Penhold but by the time we went back to says yes (less than 24 hrs later) it had been let to someone else. Curiously though the to let sign was still outside it 2 days later so we are wondering if the owners were reluctant to let it to unemployed immigrants.

We finally got our Social Insurance numbers today, they had been posted in New Brunswick on 27 June. Times like this you realise the Royal Mail aren’t so bad after all. Speaking of which out holiday videos have re appeared. Last March we sent our video 8 tapes away to be copied onto DVDs but they were never returned. We had many unsatisfactory email and telephone conversations with the company that did them. They were saying things like ” no one at home when the postman tried to deliver” and “I don’t know I ‘ll get some one to call you back”. We had given up hope and then last week they were delivered to Andrew back in the UK . Looks like they really were lost in the post.

The other day we bought a multifunction scanner/printer with the facility to print straight from the camera’s memory card. I can’t seem to find and exact equivalent in PC world but it looks as thought we paid in dollars approx what it would have cost in pounds. There was an extra provincial environmental levy of $8, presumably to cover the future cost of disposal/re cycling. And of course there were two instruction books and labels, English and French.

Tire= Tyre

Gas= Petrol or Gas or indigestion (no confusion there)

Lots= an area of land not a quantity eg parking lot = car park. Though several carparks could be lots of lots.

Pavement= road surface

Sidewalk=pavement

East Indian= Indian as in inhabitant of the indian sub continent including Pakistan etc

First Nation People= the other sort as in first inhabitants of North America etc.

Fries= Chips

Chips= Crisps

Cream Crisps= Cream Crackers

Yield= Give Way

Trunk=Boot (except on an elephant)

Sodding=turfing