Tuesday, February 13, 2007

New Job


I successfully applied for my first new job in over 8 years last week. Yes folks, you are now looking at the new Night Shift Shuttle Bus driver for the Arts Factory Hostel. I work the shift from 10:00 at night until 4:00 in the morning, driving people back and forth to town. The greatest part is, is that the ride is only about 300 metres. Pretty hectic I tell you. I also have to mention that I almost failed my drivers test.......the first test in over 10 years (had to do one for that summer that I worked at the library in Saint John.....long story). This whole other side of the road thing was stranger than I thought. It also didn't help that it was a standard and I, ah, don't really drive standards. Definitely made for an interesting drive. The highlight was when I tried to turn into the parking lot and I put the wipers on instead of the blinker. My new boss said that I was lucky they had an automatic bus or I would have been looking for other employment. Great thing is is that it covers my accomodation, and its only once every four nights. Not too shabby I must say so myself. Staying up late and hanging out with drunk people..........I think that I am kind of a natural at it.


The animals in this country are absolutely crazy. You probably aren't even going to believe me but just to give you a couple of examples..........the other night I was walking in the campground and just when I was about to take another step I stopped because I saw something move. When I shined my light down, it turned out that it was the head of a snake. When you here snake, you probably picture the foot long grass snakes that you see back home. Well, not this guy. This was a Python that was over 2 metres long..........2 %#$* metres!!!! A huge fat python crossing the path. It was the biggest snake that I have ever seen in real life, and it was only about 30 feet from my tent. That's what I mean about crazy. AND, I don't even want to get into what the spiders look like here. Go on the internet and look up what a giant wolf spider looks like. My buddy found one in his tent a couple of days ago. For those of you who know, I'm not exactly fond of these little bastards. I guess I'm facing all my fears these days! Ha.

The surfing is coming along, but far from an expert. Greg asked me the other day if I was riding in barrels. Just so you all know, that is still a couple of years away. I have however started riding on green water (that is the part of the wave that hasn't broken yet). Surfing is an amazing rush. You can sit out on the water for a couple of hours and only catch 4 or 5 waves, but those 4 or 5 make it all worth. I guess I wouldn't call sitting out in the ocean in the sun grueling though. Ha.

We head our first rain storm here the other day and it was pretty tough on the campground. Lots of people got flooded out. My shit got pretty wet, but overall, I survived OK. Living in a tent is cool when its nice, but I wouldn't be lasting long if it rained all the time.

Oh, and by the way, I forgot to tell you about the wild turkeys here. They are little bastards. I guess you could call them the racoons of Australia. Ha. One of them bit through my tent the other night and ate some bread that I had in there. Needless to say, me and the turkeys don't get along real well. Lots of people in the campground get a kick out of me chasing these little bastards around. Lets just say that I'm looking forward to Thanksgiving.

I went to a super awesome music festival here the other day called Good Vibrations. Got to see some of the best DJ's in the world and some crazy bands like Rahzel, Jurassic 5 and the Beastie Boys. I was a little disappointed though, because I ended up missing the old Snoop Dogg himself, but I'll guess that will have to be for another time.


Anyway, that's it for now. Have to get going as I have to work tonight.....ha!!! I love it.

16 comments:

  1. Anonymous12:54 PM

    ryno;

    that looks oddly similar to the mystery machine....i could have sworn i saw scooby doo in the background there. oh wait, thats just a giant python with a turkey on his back!!! LOOK OUT!!

    what kind of pension comes with this new job of yours?

    mmmmk, beh bye.

    Slyman

    PS-THERES A SPIDER ON YOUR SHOULDER! BOO!

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  2. Anonymous6:41 AM

    Dude,

    Come on. Seriously, i wold like to request a room in the hostel if you can book me one!! I am currently fighting off irish women, scorpions and Matawa (Saudi Religious Police), the last thing i need on a "vacation" is to have you and me runnning around fighting off the crazy turkey's, giant snakes and wild spiders...Ill pay for the room...seriously!!!

    Help, Aldy.

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  3. Anonymous1:38 PM

    Dude, please get me a room in that hostel!!!! Book now, i will pay you for it, you can stay in it whenever you want and you can add 15% service fee!! and i will supply Rum and cokes for one week...I AM TERRIFIED OF SNAKES!!!!!!!!!!!!! I did'nt sleep for my first 5 days in Africa!!

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  4. Anonymous2:25 PM

    Hi Ryan,

    Sounds like you are still enjoying your adventure. Good for you. Marion and I just got together for two weeks down south (Miami/cruise). We had a great time. I only have six weeks to go in Bosnia. I wouldn't mind the snakes, waterfalls, turkeys and kangaroos etc. but the spiders would probably deter me from ever sleeping in a tent in Austraila. There should be a law that they have to wear bells on their backs so you can hear them coming and KILL them.

    Have fun and stay safe.

    Love,

    Philip

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  5. Philip...I love it...bells...crack me up! I forgot about your fear of spiders too!!!

    Glad to hear you had a great trip...looking foward to seeing you lots this summer!!!

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  6. Aldy...Mom will never forgive you for SLEEPING in her bed while she was away(and we will never let you forget it)...what was that...10 years ago now!! Ha ha.

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  7. Anonymous4:01 PM

    Dude...

    Looked up Wolf Spider on Wikipedia... NOT cool. I think Thor and Tara's take on your life is just about bang on.

    ALDY! Bad news when you're being chased by Irish women AND the thought/s*x police in Saudi - keep runnin, brotha! Also... you passed out in Ryno's mom's bed? S'wrong wit chu?

    Still Losin My Mind in the T-Dot.

    Stinch

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  8. Anonymous5:32 PM

    The itzy bitzy spider went in my Ryan's tent. Down came the rain and washed the spider bent. Out came the sun and dried up all the rain so the itzy bitzy spider found Ryan's tent again.

    If it's a wolf spider then make your tent out of bricks - apparently that stops a wolf.

    Are you sure these turkeys you are talking about aren't "Turkey Vulchers"?

    Stay away from all those bats, snakes, spiders, and vulchers. Surely you can find some cuddley pussys, I mean pussy cats to befriend instead of all those scarey creatures.

    "Stay Calm, Be Brave, Wait For The Signs"

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  9. Slyman,
    There's not much of a pension with this job. I guess if this is the Scooby Doo van, then I must be Shaggy. Watch out for those Scooby snacks.

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  10. Aldy,
    Looking forward to you showing up. For those of you who don't know, Aldy is coming to visit me here in about a week's time. Yeah baby! Don't worry though man, I will hook you up with a proper room so that you don't have to worry about the snakes. Unless the snakes decides to try to get into the room.

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  11. Dirt,
    I definitely don't think that Tara would be very fond of the living conditions here. Especially given that she considered herself to be roughing it when you guys were living in your old luxury apartment in Fredericton. And yes, the shuttle bus thing definitely can't be considered a 'job'. Ha.

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  12. Tara,
    Nice analogy!! I have now realized that 10pm is the ideal start time for me. I am pretty much in my prime through the hours of 10pm to 4am. And just so you know, I have a natural wakeup (no alarm clock) EVERY single morning now. Yes, I call it happiness.

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  13. Philip,
    You DEFINITELY would not like the spiders here. If you are ever looking to face the fear of them, this is certainly the place for it. I have only mentioned the sightings of the giant ones. There are also tons of 'mid sized' ones around (aka. still bigger than any other spider I have ever seen). And yes, I like the bells idea.

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  14. Mom,
    Woohoo! Thank God that you finally got a new monitor. You should go back through some of the old pictures now that you can actually SEE some of them. I will work on getting some wildlife pics. I am kind of hoping that I don't have anymore encounters with giant pythons though.

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  15. Stinch,
    They are scary little bastards they are. I think that I would rather run into a black bear then one of those guys.

    And if the Thought Police were actually on to Aldy, I think that they already would have eliminated him years ago.

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  16. Colin,
    Nice rhyme! I like the brick idea.....especially since I just had to go through another bout of rain here. I also like the pussy cat idea, but sometimes those are the scariest creatures of all!

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