Settling in

When we last left our heroes, they were in Adelaide hoping to find jobs. Find out what happens next for our Two Nuts!

Adelaide is a lovely city. So lovely in fact that apparently no one works. That or all the jobs are taken and no one is looking to hire. Either way, the job search in Adelaide proved fruitless, with not even a glimmer of hope, for nearly 3 weeks. 

Then, a light! Blake was chosen for a job interview...in Melbourne? Turns out, he'd been applying outside of Adelaide! Blake accepted the interview, and we quickly made travel plans for him to head up to Melbourne for the day. He flew out at 6am, interviewed in the afternoon, and flew back to Adelaide in the evening. We continued to cross our fingers in the hopes that someone in Adelaide might want to hire us...but alas there was none. After not hearing anything back from Blake's interview, we started talking about when we would know we needed to throw in the towel and trudge back to the states with our tails between our legs. As if on cue, Blake's phone rang with a job offer!!

Having searched in vain for nearly a month, we felt we had to take the opportunity! Even if it was in Melbourne - our least favorite city we had visited...and way out in the suburbs at that. 

So we traded the quiet comfort of Adelaide for the bustling metropolis of Melbourne and then quickly for the sprawling suburbs to the East. 

In our first few weeks we made it into the city a few times, and as it is summer here, it's been getting quite hot. Here I am waiting for the bus, obviously looking so very cool that Blake felt the need to document it. 

With Blake gainfully employed, I set about finding work for myself. After learning that my American resume (one-page overview) was too short, The standard here in Australia is two to three is common and expected, I beefed it back up with ALL the details and promptly got a call for an interview! Not to be outdone by the relatively quick turn around on Blake's job, I interviewed on a Tuesday, accepted an offer on Thursday, and started the following Monday! Alas, Blake and I have now traded our traveling clothes for office clothes, pictured below. 

Blake is working in IT at a local City Council for the municipal government, and Sonja is working as an Administrative Assistant for the division head of a large social enterprises non-profit company. Unfortunately, Blake and Sonja's offices are 25km (15 miles) apart, about the distance from Columbia Heights to Bloomington. In the part of the city where we are, Airbnbs and Public Transit make for a tricky combination to provide reliable and timely transportation to work. In addition, there's only one bus that serves the Industrial Park where Sonja's office is located, and it's a very short, infrequent route. With the reality of these challenges setting in, we made the decision to purchase a vehicle.

We were referred by our Host to a rinky-dink little used car lot where the owner gave us a deal on a 2001 Kia Rio. It's got a few dings and scratches, and one big dent, but it runs great, or at least we hope it will for the next 6 months or so. We are now set up like proper adults with jobs and a car. 

In Summation:

Good News: Blake and Sonja have jobs and won't go broke!
Bad News: Blake and Sonja are not coming back to the USA just yet.
Good News: Our working holiday restricts us to working 6 months, so both of these jobs are contracts that end in May, so expect us back in the good ole USA sometime Summer 2019.
Bad News: You'll just have to wait for the epic coming home party until then.