There’s a hell of a lot of decisions to make when organizing a wedding, and for most of the important ones I had nothing to do with them for mine.  Probably the best decision made for our wedding, apart from the actual getting married bit, was hiring Photobooth Vancouver [pbv] for two hours of photobooth services.

Lydia had found them at a indie bride event at the same venue we were getting married, the Heritage Hall, and decided that they were the coolest thing she’d ever seen.  So for $300 an hour we had two hours of photoboothing for our friends and family to enjoy.

The guests loved it, and as with your traditional photobooths they all got their own photos to take and keep at no charge to them.  Then about two weeks later we got a disc full of all of the photos that had been taken through out the night so that we had a new and fairly novel way of remembering our wedding and those people who were there.

Granted I personally don’t look particularly good in any of the photos, having swelled to the fattest point in my life just in case I needed some extra padding for the wedding, but they’re still great to look at.  And trust me, the photobooth is about the only thing that anyone remembers about the wedding.

So if you’re organizing any kind of party or event I’d give serious consideration to having Photobooth Vancouver there.  It’s great fun, and it’ll be a great way to have a unique souvenier of the event.

85,000 people took to the streets Monday, suffering hour long line-ups to be one of the first to try Vancouver’s new, expensive, Japanese rush-hour simulator – the Canada Line. I got to try the Expo line with everyone else at Expo – that was neat. Hopefully everyone that got to try the Canada Line – AKA “The path of least resistance to YVR or Richmond” – yesterday had a similar experience.

The Tuesday morning numbers were far lower, said Translink, which I’m assuming means it was merely a sane amount of travelers, and not 100 thousand gawkers. Translink however seems to think the numbers will increase in September, as the now redundant B-line buses are shut down or re-routed (mainly, the 98 B-line.)

For a flickr slideshow of people’s photos of the big day, click here.

I’ve had in recent days three things sloshing around in my brain, all of which I only realized today are all thematically connected, as they are all, for lack of a better term, city art. Which is to say it’s not urban art (graffiti, posters, building murals), or art about the city, but art that exists only because the city allows it to exist as part of the city.

The first is an old throwback, which is one part world’s-lamest-scavenger-hunt (as there is only one thing to find and you win nothing… plus, I tell you where to look, so, not much actual hunting) and one part segue. Remember those Spirit Bears that dotted the city a couple of years back? Well, I think there’s one on the roof of the optometrist shop, South-East corner of Broadway and Quebec. It’s either that, or I’m hallucinating. Either could be fun.

[photo - City of Vancouver]
And there’s the segue, as this year the City of Vancouver and the BC Lion’s Society has unveiled the third animal in their Spirit of Art series (after the aforementioned bears and the Orcas from 2004) -the Eagle. I only became aware of this because you can’t miss the pastel blue bird sitting outside City Hall as you pass it. And as much as I’m in favour of helping the children (more on that soon), I’m not a big fan of the Eagles – the choice to put them upright on a wingtip seems awkward, and in fact it took me a second to register that it was a bird. But, there are still a lot of birds to go (the city will be rolling them out over 2009 and right up to the start of the Olympics) and part artists have made some amazing works – Darth Vader bear? Bookshelf Orca?

Finally, how did it miss that we have art manholes? Walking down Main Street the other night I literally tripped over the tadpole (frogs? fradpoles? togs?) design as I was crossing at King Edward (East side of Main, South side of King Ed), and a little research revealed there were two designs – anybody know where I can see the bubbles design?
[photo - me]

As cool as they are (well, the fradpoles at least), I like the traditional Chinese decorations in one. The salmon and raindrops on water is nice, and the woodgrain idea was inspired – totally should have gone with that one?

What else is out there? I think we should start sharing more of the artistic bits and bobs we see around town – send us your flickr links!

So I’m watching TV.

(ooops, this was in my drafts, not posted last night.)

I could not get into this hallway. It is a back entrance to the former Storyeum site – exit to Cordova St.

Thus ends this week’s theme.

Join us next week when our theme is….

Aug 3 – Aug 9 – Summer produce
(Oooooooooo)

The best thing about rain in late July in Vancouver is that downtown and Gastown don’t smell like pee.

This leaf is from a tree right outside my front door.

All the leaves, the pollen droppings and much of the pavement around the tree is covered in this shiny, sticky substance that clings to everything that the leaves, the pollen droppings and the pavement touch…

including the bottoms of shoes so all these bits of pollen droppings end up in my house.

What’s up with these trees?

If you aren’t doing anything tonight, there’s a “Celebration” of the Cuban Revolution at Trout Lake, meeting up at the beach concession stand.

So here is a photo taken in my neighbourhood.

This is what I had for breakfast. Thus ends this week’s theme post.

Catch us for week 3: July 27 – Aug 2, when the theme will be Hallways.