It took me a while but I got together a crude

looking resume and sent it to the "slush pile" but we'll see what happens. I'll do a follow up on Wednesday, if they don't call me first that is. I'm thinking they might have all the staff they need but if they don't call me, I won't lose any sleep over it. It's a high end paying job that pays double then what I'm getting know. I'm going to try and keep my current job and if I get this one, work it part time but we'll see how it goes. It's slightly off the beaten track and not connected to a LRT. I can take the #2 bus there and after a block or two catch any bus across the street to the LRT. I wouldn't mind say working the new job (if I get it) 11am to 4pm and hustle to my current evening job a block South from Corona. I'd have my weekends off of course. Lodge meetings pending and all of that. 

This Friday marks the 50th anniversary of the assassination of JFK. Most likely Coast will have the anniversary of the event as their #1 topic.


Pure Speculation is just winding down. A bit of a call out here to the small annual sci-fi convention just wrapping up at the Ramada over there on Kingsway Ave. I would have liked to have gone but the weather and work kept me away. Now if it was in say September, at the same venue this time next year I could ride the Nait line and take a shuttle bus there, easy. I don't know what the attendance was like last year. This current edition of Pure Spec is nostalgic for me because it is the same location as the first SF con I ever attended my first year here in Edmonton. It was called "Non-con" and it was in 1979. I was living in the Riverside Towers working at the Army and Navy warehouse (behind the Grand Hotel) as mentioned in another post. The last time Non Con was there I think was in 1989. I remember going by on the bus (they had it during the Summer back then) seeing the marquee sign James P. Hogan. I was broke but I would have loved to have been there. The 1979 Non-Con was when I was in love with Ellen and we had a "thing" going on. Those years from October 1978 until March 1980 were great. After that Richard came in on the scene and that's when it more or less ended. Hard to believe that was 34 years ago.   

I'm shaking my head over this one: Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau's recent add on TV syas he wants an economy that helps all Canadians and not just a few. In other words he's slamming the oil sands. What Justin doesn't want the public to know is that the oil sands is already benefiting all Canadians coast-to-coast. About 20,000 people a year are migrating to Edmonton because this is where the jobs are. Translation: Anyone from Canada can come to Edmonton look for work and get a job here. Justin likes the oil sands because he can tax it taking dollars out of Alberta to shore up the heavy tax burdened areas like Ontario and Quebec. There is a caveat though for anyone looking for work here: Edmonton and Alberta is a boom-to-bust type economy. Some years, we're strong others like around 2007-08 for example are bad. More than 470,000 new jobs were created between 2002 and 2012 here in Alberta. Alberta’s average unemployment rate in 2012 was the third lowest in Canada at 4.6%. We're slightly above that now. Sure the energy sector represents 36.1% of our economy and there seems to be no immediate signs it's slowing down. Yes Justin has his sights on Alberta because he knows this is where the money is. It's his meal ticket. Remember this is the same guy that bought into Theresa Spence's fake hunger strike from the on-off idol no more "movement."

At the moment its -12 out there but with the wind chill it feels like -18 but its supposed to warm  up to about -3 by Friday. It's very treacherous going just outside our place from across the street at the light standard there. Anne said she wiped out a couple of times yesterday. One of my colleagues yesterday wore a pair of winter boots with built in cleats. I'd love to know where he got them. I've got a pair of strap on cleats that more or less do the job but I forgot to bring them along with me yesterday. I only need them a couple of times a year. Anyway, that's all for now.