A Ship Out of Its Harbor: "Unemployment is capitalism's way of getting you to plant a garden." ~Orson Scott Card

While not finding a job yet has been frustrating, I would be lying if I said that waking up at 10, taking 2 hours to drink my coffee, then going into the city to check out museums, see movies, and go shopping all followed by several episodes of Dexter season 5 is not the worst thing that's ever happened to me.

Brad and I moved into our apartment last Saturday, and so far we are loving it. We are sharing a house with 5 others. One kiwi, Flo, who is a student, her Scottish boyfriend Craig, an English guy Rich who works construction, and two Korean chefs H.H. and Kenny who work nights and we hardly ever see. Everyone is really nice. Brad and I have a furnished bedroom with a fridge, microwave, toaster, kettle, flat screen TV and unlimited wireless internet (a rare treasure in New Zealand). We share the full kitchen, 2 bathrooms, and laundry with everyone else. Flo, Craig, Brad and I have gone out once, but mostly play Trivial Pursuit and drink Speights. Life is tough.

This is what happens when Brad tries to buy bedding. It was not pretty.

Before...

Definitely before...

View from our deck

...and after!

More after

Now wasn't that worth the struggle, Brad?

Front door

Kitchen

The job hunt hasn't been entirely fruitless however. I did land a week-long job at the University doing a space survey. No, I'm not working for NASA. I go around several buildings on the campus with my little clipboard and mark off how the rooms are being used, if the lights are on, etc. And I get a name badge. You can imagine I will look pretty intimidating between the clipboard and badge, so hopefully someone will notice me and hire me as a secret service agent.

I've also had 2 job interviews. One was at Pier 24 restaurant which is a beautiful new resort right on the beach. While I don't have any waitressing experience, I think I may have tricked them into considering me for the position anyways. I'm supposed to find out by the end of today if I got it or not. Yesterday, I went for an interview at a retail store and wanted to run out after 2 minutes. The owner was a huge snob who proceeded to ask me if I was planning on going away on the weekends (umm, yea) and then drilled me about whether or not I had applied for other jobs (umm, yea) as if that was any of her business. Needless to say, I don't think they will be offering me the job, but that is no loss. Cross your fingers about Pier 24... I hear Elton John in staying there when he plays Dunedin in November!

So finding a job has been the main focus, but in between I've been enjoying taking the 13-minute bus ride to the beach: