Postage Stamp of the Week: George Vancouver

I've been thinking a lot about Canada lately, Vancouver in particular. Eliza and I visit a couple times each year; most recently, we took a fun trip with her parents a few weeks back.

I love Vancouver for, among other things, its urban/natural beauty, its diversity, its food, and most importantly, its proximity to Seattle (about a three-hour drive, depending on the wait at the border). Though Vancouver is in the same so-called bioregion as my Seattle home, it is indeed part of a foreign land, which feels like a parallel-universe US. And though the Canuck metropolis is a manageable, non-overwhelming size, there's always lots of cool new stuff to discover.

Two of my favorite Canadian books are Mondo Canuck, an exploration of Canada's underrated pop-culture landscape, and City of Glass, Douglas Coupland's love letter to his hometown of Vancouver. Since my last visit I've also read Coupland's Souvenir of Canada, and have just begun Souvenir of Canada 2 (and hey, there's even a spinoff documentary, which I'll hafta see). In all three of his books, I dig Coupland's personal, anecdotal, engaging take on his country's history, culture, eccentricities and whatnot. Nice.

Anyway, here's a Canadian stamp released over the summer, commemorating the 250th birthday of Vancouver's namesake, who in 1792 became the first European to visit the area.

Perky "Canada" has own government, laws. Blame Canada.