Canada, episode 3: A moose (or rat) aboot the hoose

Well this has just gone and become a weekly apology folks but I guarantee that posting will become more regular from Thursday when we get the internet into our brand new house. More on that in just a moment.

Now where was I? O yes with the bloody Aussies in the Samesun Hostel.

Well it got a lot harder to put up with their whooping and hollering late at night after about a week at the hostel, as I got myself a job that requires me to get up at 5.30am.

I'm being a little dishonest when I say that I got myself the job as it was actually Chatty Garry that secured it. Chatty arrived over to Vancouver with Lafino and Dave the Scouse two weeks before me. The lads are all from roughly the same area as myself and Dave also works for Beaver Landscaping while Lafino is mowing lawns with one of our bitter rival landscapers.

Undoubtedly those of you who haven't developed their sense of humour since you were 12 will have had a chuckle by now at my employer's unusual company name. My mother reads this blog regularly so you can all make up your own individual filthy jokes and I'll just assure you that the job is with an actual landscaping company and not a beautician.

Anyways, having this job meant that I became all the more keen to get out of Oz-fest as I was only getting a few hours sleep a night and falling asleep at the wheel of the lawnmower worryingly often.

So I consulted Craiglist, a website/bible over here that features everything from house and job listings to a Douche of the Day section where random pictures of unsuspecting members of the public are posted, allowing others to ridicule them for their own enjoyment.

Myself and Nobbly looked at a number of places, including a one bedroom apartment that would have required us to share very close quarters and no doubt have our neighbours think that we were that cute gay couple from down the corridor. No thanks.

After a number of non-runners, however, we found a house in Kerrisdale, quite a swanky location which is inhabited almost completely by wealthy Asians. Being neither wealthy nor oriental meant that myself and Nobbly stuck out like a pair of poverty stricken and pale sore thumbs on our first walk around the town.

The place itself is a bit of a fixer-upper but seemed nice and in need of a small bit of work, mostly on the exterior. Most important was that it was a five bedroom, meaning it would be able to accommodate ourselves and the rest of our friends who were winging their way over in the next few days.

On our first night there however, we realised that we wouldn't have to wait for the rest of the gang to arrive to welcome a houseguest. As Nobbly sat on our front porch, a great big dirty rat (he claims) casually strolled up the tree out the front of the house, which leads straight up to the bedroom of poor Nobbly's room.

I attempted to calm down my quivering roommate after his encounter with the rodent. However, my coolness quickly evaporated when I opened a cupboard to find rodent droppings inside. A phone call to the landlord was made demanding that he recruit the most sadistic and thorough exterminator known to rats.

A few days have passed and we're still waiting on a reply from the landlord who we now suspect may be a dodgy character and not in the loveable Artful Dodger way either.

More before long on the arrival of the rest of the house and an update on how our relationship with the rats is developing.