wc_canuck's Profile

take out the essential oil and up the rubbing alcohol component to half and half an dyou've got a decent spray on deodorant too - perfect for people like me who are allergic to all the chemicals that come with usual deodorant...

got my wedding dress at a thrift store, and a few years later, it went back to a different thrift store. I hope someone else was able to enjoy it for their special day as well!

urgh. who got to make *that* decision? I'd say go as dark as you're allowed or as light as you're allowed and then make your shutters black and your window sills white. I'd hate to be in that kind of neighbourhood. At least I get to look at this everyday:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/flyer_901/3195726089/

Canadian, so perhaps that affects things, but...

how is this an issue? my parents had a poster in their bedroom that was suggestive - but it was also so popular that when they sold their house the buyer wanted to have he poster too, and I recall many of my parents' friends smiling to themselves when they saw it. I didn't know why, at the time (I was a child), but it dawned on me at some point and it's just always been part of who they are and what their house is. Nobody ever had a problem with it, as far back as I remember (mid 70s onward) and I grew up in a small prairie town in Alberta. Can't get much more conservative than that up here.

Honestly? My kids see my body naked every day. If they're going to get worked up about a painting, well...

I feel like I'm at Sans Souci, but Sans Souci is on drugs. Too much stimulation for me! and at the same time, too dark and heavy.

However, what I *do* like very much is the fact that it's a very personal space. Nobody else coud do it this way and pull it off. It's quirky and it's all its own.

I think I've just been grading too many first year essays...and after a certain point I get cranky. But the poster is quite amazing. And the post, for what it's worth, had two bits of "it's" bizarreness and has been fixed, so I'm happy.

Vancouver Specials are hideous but unbelievably spacious inside. ONe of the big things is that their ground floors are also dark. If they can be reinvented, then why not?

re: raising the ground floor: many people in Vancouver can only 'own' their homes if they have basement trolls - poorer people who pay rent that helps prop up the mortgage. One way of making those basement apartments a bit more livable is to raise the main floor. However, that doesn't change the fact that the rich folk (the only people actually *able* to fork over over 1.2 million for a house), use the poorer people who will never be able to afford a house in the city, to pay their mortgage. Many of these basement suites aren't cheap: you're still paying 800-1000 for one. In some instances, that's over 30% of the monthly mortgage payment...

Bitter? yes, perhaps. But I was one of those basement dwellers and I know many others who were (and are) and I know how much 'owners' rely on them, but how little they're really interested in doing to make it work for the folks that are making it possible for them to live like kings (and queens), and how hard it is for those who live on the poorer end of society to find decent housing in Vancouver.

highly controversial and over priced closets that will just end up pushing out more of hte people who have literally nowhere else to go. You can get far better and far bigger for that price, and in a neighbourhood that's so close to downtown that you'd think you were there (south false creek, oak/11th area, nice places with super simple commutes that probably take no longer to get to the downtown core than these 'lofts' in the DTES. The 'market' will sell anything, even a closet, if people think it's cool

If you're into critical commentary on popular culture, you should check out Brian Jungen's work. He's a Canadian First Nations artist who uses Nike products to re-imagine his own culture. Here's a sampling: http://www.catrionajeffries.com/b_b_jungen_work_34.html

Here's what he has to say about his work: "It was interesting to see how by simply manipulating the Air Jordan shoes you could evoke specific cultural traditions whilst simultaneously amplifying the process of cultural corruption and assimilation. The Nike mask sculptures seemed to articulate a paradoxical relationship between a consumerist artefact and an 'authentic' native artifact."

most artificial trees last far longer than twenty years. Our department secretary has had hers for twenty now and was thinking of giving it to the church and buying a new one, but chose, instead, just to continue using the old one.

We have an artificial one for allergy and cleaning reasons. I sneeze like mad for the first week a real tree is in the house, and then vaccuum every day for the next three weeks (which, by the way, also leaves a carbon footprint).