Thanks to the internets AND the Canucks, Sarah Harris found me while searching for some Canucks blogs (I think). The thing is, she lives in the UK and loves the hockey! I’ve never met Sarah in person, but she’s sent me cool stuff from Jolly Old England – like this awesome Will and Kate totebag – and we’re buddies online. One day I will meet her in person – I’m sure of it – but today, I got to see her sketchbook in The Sketchbook Project. It’s a tour of hundreds? Thousands? So many art books created by people all over the world.

I made the most of my half hour visit – they have a tight schedule and have to close up at 7 pm. I didn’t leave until 7:20, actually, so they gave me a break/I kept holding up the show. Would you like to see the books I got to see? Here you go!

You can see more beautiful pages out of the art books right here.

I just may stop on my way home from work tomorrow, too.

Lelainia met me at the event and I took her photo with her traveling sketchbook.

Her book is about to carry on to Los Angeles…Oakland…Toronto…Atlanta…

Glorious!

On my way back from taking some documents to their destination on Burrard Street, I spotted this horse and carriage and HOPED it was for a gypsy wedding! Finally! My dream of shooting a gypsy wedding would be realized and all I will have left on my dream wedding photo list will be a winter wedding where the bride and all the bridesmaids wear both capes AND muffs, like this! Please! If you’re out there! And you’re looking for the perfect photographer to shoot your capes and muffs wedding, PLEASE CALL ME! I’m standing by for your call!

Sadly, no gypsy wedding in sight for me. I think it was just for a movie because this horse ‘n buggy was parked right outside a government building. Ah boo. Oh man, if Johnny Depp was in this movie, I’m going to be so sad because I could have had my other photo dream paparazzi shoot fulfilled! In my dream, I wouldn’t be chasing him or anything, he just waves at me, makes direct eye contact and walks away. And that’s it. I wouldn’t have to talk to him or anything – perfect for me!

Dare to dream.

In other news, I accidentally created a photo of Howe Street that makes it look like I took it at least 60 years ago.

Whoa. My camera + computer = time machine!

It was a lovely day today. In fact, it’s time to get the fans out of the garage! It was pretty warmish in the house when I got home from work! Yeehaw! It’s summer time.

Strawberry season is right around the corner! Come on sunshine! We want big juicy ones!

I mostly remained calm as soon as I realized the parking meter ate $16 of my dollars. There was a technical difficulty with the machine. But after I called ALL the numbers dotted around the posters, emailed the Impark people directly and left the note above on the windshield, I was rewarded by having a car to drive after the big fancy work dinner tonight! Hooray! Thank you, Impark! Even though I didn’t talk to a single person, I didn’t get a ticket or towed. Their system works! Well, it worked for me this time, anyway.

I went for a lovely staff dinner tonight and enjoyed/overindulged in the most un-vegan dinner on the planet. After dinner I had some time before picking up Mike, so I went for an after dinner stroll down Robson Street, over to Georgia…

…took some photos outside the Vancouver Art Gallery. It was quiet there tonight. So, I hopped in the car and went to the Olympic Village and took photos of the city from there.

I like that this one turned out like a painting.

I’ve been such the social butterfly that this is the second night in a row that I wasn’t home before 10:30 pm. Phew! So I’ve got big plans to come home tomorrow right after work and hang out in my pajamas. I’ll be living large on a Friday night.

…only solutions” – John Lennon. Someone shared this quote with me today and I had never heard that before. I think this is a good perspective to have because I must confess…my craft room door has never been heavier. My sewing machine peddle has never been more stuck. And my crochet hooks and knitting needles have never been stiller. Time to get into the solution and finish up that big scrappy string quilt I started 3 or 4 months ago.

I took this photo tonight and I’m not sure why The Sails are all lit up in these colours – they’re usually just white. It must be fancy night at Canada Place!

I’ve spotted some Terracotta Warriors this week in various states of paintedness. They are a huge step up from those painted bears from years gone by.

If I were to paint a picture of Donner and Oscar swatting and batting each other, this is exactly how I would paint it – if I could paint, that is. Since I can’t, I sure am glad this artist painted these tigers slapping each other.

RAWR!

I should have taken a photo of the placard, but I’m pretty sure the artist is Kathy Zhang and the warrior is named “TWELVE”. I’ll verify this because I should be more diligent giving credit where credit is due. I’ll go back and do that.

In other news, I’m getting used to my new schedule – riding a half empty bus to and from work. It’s awesome. Even the streets are quieter just an hour or so after most people get off work. Tonight the weather was warm and smelled like almost summer. Fresh, warm, air.

At this time of year, I’m almost tulip-ed out, but I not where there’s a bowler hat involved in the background. I am REALLY enjoying seen the trendy men out and about these days. I cannot get enough of their bow ties, their high water pants, and their oldy-time hats. Quite enjoyable. Maybe an artist decorated a Terracotta Warrior as a groovy hipster. I will keep my eyes peeled for that one!

Yesterday, on our way back to the car, we spotted a gaggle of groovy hipsters walking across the street. I wished more than anything I had my long lens with me so I could get a close up of his jacket, but since the best camera is the one you have with you, I did my best with my short, manual focus lens. I also used the zoom function in the photo editing software. WE do have the technology.

Floods really are in style these days! Dude completely pulled this whole look off. I admire his confidence.

I think Don Cherry would want this jacket. And so does this guy’s friend. Why is she biting his sleeve? I can’t explain it.

Speaking of biting…this graffiti was on the wall (spotted by Lelainia – I walked right by it. GAH!) in the alley behind the Opus store.

Danger Sharks, indeed! Shark Week in the alley off Hastings!

When I dropped off Mike this morning for work – he works across the street from the Vancouver Convention Centre – we spied The Joker sitting in a line up along with a guy dressed like Rorschach from Watchmen. How did I know who Rorschach was? I didn’t. Mike told me. Someone reads comic books around here! Anyway, it’s Comicon in Vancouver! But they seem to call it Fan Expo. Whoa! Nerd alert! But I do love nerds a lot, so I mean it in the nicest possible way.

Since at 8:00 this morning I was still in my pajamas and wearing Mike’s crocs and didn’t have my camera with me – I know! What the heck? If I had my camera I would have just pretended I was dressed up like some comic book character that wears pajamas and crocs and would have TOTALLY taken their photos. Instead, I came back to Mike’s office a bit early, plunked a loony in the parking metre and enjoyed taking these fabulous nerds’ photos for 12 minutes. Yup. Street parking is crazy expensive right there. It’s about $6 an hour. THIS is why I drop Mike off on the weekends.

I was so excited when I opened the above photo once I got home to find I had snagged a photo of a tiny Harry Potter in the bottom left hand corner. He’s adorable. I thought I had missed him, but nope. I got lucky. I have no idea who the guy in the centre of the photo is supposed to be. Mike thinks it’s Boba Fett without his helmet on. I think it’s a good guess.

Other characters loitering around the Vancouver Convention Centre grounds included:

This Jedi checking her phone. Maybe she was sending Obi Wan Kenobi a special message?

This girl with pink hair.

If I wasn’t starting a new job on Monday, I would love to do this to my hair. But I would make my pink hair even bigger with lots of back-combing, hairspray, and hair pieces.

Perhaps I could try this hairdo instead. It’s more understated.

Cat ears! Of course, my set of ears would have to be black. You know. For the boyz.

I think this crowd of three is off for coffee. I do adore the bat wings on her head.

See this spooky mask?

There was a person hunched over fixing the mask. It looked like he/she was in a black garbage bag, so if you were in a dark room, all you’d see is a trippy mask floating around. Whoa! Weird! Cool!

After seeing all those people, this guy in the bat mask seemed totally normal to me.

I did recognize one couple from the TV show, Game of Thrones.

The girl is Daenerys Targaryen (I had no idea that was her name. My name for her is, “The blonde queen chick” and the guy next to her is her advisor, but I can’t find his name because there’s about 2,000 characters in this TV show and all I know is that Peter Dinklage is the imp AND was the “Angry Elf” in the movie, ELF with Will Farrell – one of my all time favourite movies EVER. Now, if there was ever an ELF convention, I would be first in line in my Elf costume, I can assure you of that. I would gladly pay $40 for a photo with Will Farrell.

The Hulk is charging $40 for photo ops this weekend, so I think that’s fair for Elf as well.

I think I’ll put on some proper clothes and footwear tomorrow morning to drop Mike off at work and see if I can see any other fancy dressers. I got all those photos in 12 minutes today! I can only imagine what I can get if I had half an hour or longer!

I wore my Canucks jersey to work today, and so did a few other people in the city. Maybe it was just me, but there seemed to be a quiet hush over the WHOLE CITY. Could it be possible? All over hockey? I think it’s possible. I’m so glad they won tonight because tomorrow, the whole place is going to be happy. I know that for a fact. Because the Canucks won tonight, tomorrow the bus ride will be better, people will be smiley-er, and it will just feel more cheerful all around the town.

In other news, I have been taking all kinds of photos with my phone using the instagram app for android (the google phone). I love using it. I just wish I could upload it to my blog – mini-blog style! The photos look cool with all the funky filters and messy edges. I just love it.

ALSO, tomorrow’s my last day of work at my current job. I’m using my very last vacation day on Friday.

EEK!

I think tomorrow may be a heavily documented day.

First of all – thanks for your comments yesterday about what really makes you happy! FOODS seem to be a popular theme, along with pets and pals and family. I loved reading them all!

I nearly forgot about the cheery blossoms at the end of Granville Street until this morning. The blossoms were out loud and proud. It was sunny and clear this morning and the flowers just lit up the bottom of Granville Street.

I headed down toward the trees, and found a semi-dried up starfish below the hand rails.

I wonder how he got there. Maybe a seagull dropped it? But it looked pretty flat, so maybe it was a person who left it there? I couldn’t bear to see it on the cold cement, so I put it in the dirt nearby with some flowers. Poor thing. He was still a little bit soft. He’d been out of the water for some time. At least he got to see the cherry blossoms in his last moments.

I found a groovy hipster under one of the trees with his groovy laptop.

And there were plenty of commuters making their ways to and from work.

Here and there, some blossoms dotted the grass below…

Tomorrow is the Cherry Jam downtown. There’s a concert under the blossoms on Burrard Street at noon. It should be lovely. I’ll let you know how it goes!

Oh, and two more sleeps until we go to Calgary. Yippee!

I’m not sure what the display is for, but it doesn’t matter to me. It’s some kind of art display with positive messages.

It was on a window on Seymour Street – right across from the BCIT downtown campus yesterday.

Look at all those Post-it notes! People in Vancouver really love those things. Here’s a closer look at what people stuck on the window.

Family, friends, food, money…the basics. That’s happiness 101 right there.

FOODS! I like that one. That person is very enthusiastic about FOODS!

Look!Crocheting! I swear I didn’t put that one up there. It was there when I got there.

And this one is very intriguing…”Drawing Charlie Chaplin images like – his shoes, his hat, his silhouette!” I decided to look up how long ago Charlie Chaplin was famous. Even though he died in 1977, he really was most famous between 1919-1939. That was a long time ago…before the Second World War, and yet, people still think about him, write about him, and draw his image. He still makes the “What makes you really happy” display in 2012. That is staying power.

I’ll upload a few more photos of this display on my flickr account if you like that sort of thing.

And hey, if you feel like it, leave me a comment! What makes YOU really happy?