#Vancouver Public Library

[sciencetylia]

The Vancouver Public library is winning. 🏳️‍⚧️💖

Text reads “Trans People welcome.”

[rabbitcruiser]

A fire devastated much of Vancouver on June 13, 1886.  

[iheartvelma]

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[oddphotos362]

[onceandfuturelesbian]

saw someone on ao3 with the username “thelesbianlibrarian” and i just need to say- THATS MY DREAM JOB RN

i worked in the library in hs and loved it so much but have never heard anything back when applying to local libraries

and if u couldn’t tell, im also a lesbian. very lesbian. lesbianing it up. very much a woman into women. gaying and slaying. here and queer. dyke wishing she had a bike.

[catgirltitties]

Vancouver Public Library

[serthra]

Looking Up

A different angle, looking up at the curved patterns of the VPL building.

The downtown Apple Store will do photo walks now and then and best of all, they are free! We joined one late last year, a bit of extra practice with the phone is always good and fun :)

Saw that they sometimes do them in Richmond too, will have to keep an eye on the schedules.

iPhone, Vancouver Public Library, Vancouver, BC, September 2024

[bronzecats]

National Rainbow Week of Action in Canada

In this post I have compiled all the information I could find regarding upcoming events for the Rainbow Week of Action. There are two online events, and dozens on in-person events across the country.

"Within the Rainbow Week of Action, we are pushing governments and elected officials at every level to take action for Rainbow Equality and address rising anti-2SLGBTQIA+ hate. As such, we have identified calls to action for every level of government. These calls to action can be reviewed here."

Event list below:

Events are listed in date order, provinces in general west-to-east order. I have included as much detail as possible, please reference the links at the bottom of the post. At this time, there are no events in N.W.T. and Nova Scotia. Last updated: May 14th, 9:53pm PDT. Please note that I am not officially affiliated with / an organizer of these events, I have simply compiled all the dates to share on tumblr. Original post content.

B.C. EVENTS:

15th: Fernie; Fernie Seniors Drop-In Centre, 572 3rd Avenue, 6:00PM. (Letter writing and Potluck)

17th: Vancouver; šxʷƛ̓ənəq Xwtl'e7énḵ Square - Vancouver Art Gallery North Plaza, 750 Hornby St, 5:30PM. (Rally)

19th, Sunday: Abbotsford; Jubilee Park, 5:00PM. (Rally)

ALBERTA EVENTS:

15th: Lethbridge; McKillop United Church, 2329 15th Ave S, 12:00-1:00PM (letter writing)

17th, Friday: Calgary; Central Memorial Park, 1221 2 St SW, 5:30PM. (Rally)

17th: Edmonton; Wilbert McIntyre Park, 8331 104 St NW, 6:00PM. (Rally)

SASKATCHEWAN EVENTS:

17th: Saskatoon; Vimy Memorial Park, 500 Spadina Crescent E, 5:30PM. (Rally)

17th: Regina; Legislative Grounds, 2405 Legislative Dr, 6:30PM. (Rally)

May 18th: Saskatoon; Grovenor Park United Church, 407 Cumberland Ave S, 6:00PM. (Art event)

MANITOBA EVENTS:

16th: Carman; Paul's Place, 20 1 Ave SW, 7:00-9:00PM. (Letter writing)

19th: Winnipeg; Manitoba Legislature, 450 Broadway, 12:00PM. (Rally)

ONTARIO EVENTS:

15th: Barrie; UPlift Black, 12 Dunlop St E, 6:00-7:30PM. (Letter writing)

15th: Chatham; CK Gay Pride Association, 48 Centre St, 5:00-6:30PM. (Letter writing)

15th: Peterborough; Trinity Community Centre, 360 Reid St, 12:00-3:00PM. (Letter writing)

16th: Midland; Midland Public Library, 4:30-7:30PM. (Letter writing and pizza)

16th: Ottawa; Impact Hub, 123 Slater Street, 2:00PM. (Letter writing)

16th: Toronto; Barbara Hall Park, 519 Church St, 11:30AM. (Rally)

17th, Friday: Barrie; City Hall, 70 Collier St, 6:00PM. (Rally)

17th: Cornwall; 167 Pitt St, 5:30PM. (Rally)

17th: Essex; St. Paul's Anglican Church, 92 St. Paul St, 6:00-8:00PM. (Letter writing and pizza)

17th: Hamilton; City Hall, 71 Main St W, 6:00PM. (Rally)

17th: Kitchener; City Hall, 200 King St W, 6:00PM. (Rally)

17th: London; City Hall, 300 Dufferin Ave, 6:00PM. (Rally)

17th: Sarnia; City Hall, 255 Christina St N, 1:00PM. (Rally)

17th: Sault Ste Marie; City Hall, 99 Foster Dr, 11:30AM. (Rally)

17th: Ottawa; Confederation Park, Elgin St, 5:30PM. (Rally)

22nd: Renfrew; 161 Raglan St. South, 7:00PM. (Letter writing, fashion and makeup event, and pizza)

QUEBEC EVENTS:

May 15th: Lachute; CDC Lachute, 57, rue Harriet, 12:30PM. (Letter writing event)

NEW BRUNSWICK EVENTS:

17th: Woodstock; Citizen's Square, Chapel St, Next to the L.P. Fisher Public Library, 12:00-1:00PM. (rally)

17th: Saint John; City Hall, 15 Market Square, 12:30PM. (Rally, flag raising)

18th, Saturday: Fredericton; Legislative Grounds, 706 Queen Street, 1:00PM. (Rally)

NOVA SCOTIA EVENTS:

May 17th: Middleton; NSCC AVC RM 121, 6:30-8:30PM (letter writing and pizza)

P.E.I. EVENTS:

May 15th: Charlottetown; Peers Alliance Office, 250B Queen Street, 6:00-8:00PM. (Adult drop-in)

May 16th: Charlottetown, Peers Alliance Office, 250B Queen Street, 6:00-7:00PM.

May 17th: Charlottetown; PEI Legislative Assembly, 165 Richmond St, 12:00PM. (Rally)

YUKON EVENTS:

16th: Whitehorse; The Cache, 4230 4 Ave, 2:00-7:00PM. (Letter writing)

NUNAVUT EVENTS:

May 16th, Thursday: Iqaluit; Four Corners, 922 Niaqunngusiariaq St, 5:00PM. (Letter writing)

Reference links:

About the Rainbow Week of Action.

Website letter writing events list (does not include all events)

General events website list (does not include all events)

Instagram general events image list

Instagram letter writing / pizza party image list

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Come see me on tour!

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/02/16/narrative-capitalism/#bezzle-tour

My next novel is The Bezzle, a high-tech ice-cold revenge thriller starring Marty Hench, a two-fisted forensic accountant, as he takes on the sleaziest scams of the first two decades of the 2000s, from hamburger-themed Ponzis to the unbelievably sleazy and evil prison-tech industry:

https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250865878/thebezzle

I'm taking Marty on the road! I'll be visiting eighteen cities between now and June, and I hope you'll come out and say hello, visit a beloved local bookseller, and maybe get a book (or two)!

21 Feb: Weller Bookworks, Salt Lake City, 1830h: https://www.wellerbookworks.com/event/store-cory-doctorow-feb-21-630-pm

22 Feb: Mysterious Galaxy, San Diego, 19h: https://www.mystgalaxy.com/22224Doctorow

24 Feb: Vroman's, Pasadena, 17h, with Adam Conover (!!) https://www.vromansbookstore.com/Cory-Doctorow-discusses-The-Bezzle

26 Feb: Third Place Books, Seattle, 19h, with Neal Stephenson (!!!) https://www.thirdplacebooks.com/event/cory-doctorow

27 Feb: Powell's, Portland, 19h: https://www.powells.com/book/the-bezzle-martin-hench-2-9781250865878/1-2

29 Feb: Changing Hands, Phoenix, 1830h: https://www.changinghands.com/event/february2024/cory-doctorow

9-10 Mar: Tucson Festival of the Book: https://tucsonfestivalofbooks.org/?action=display_author&id=15669

13 Mar: San Francisco Public Library: https://sfpl.org/events/2024/03/13/author-cory-doctrow-bezzle

22 Mar: Toronto: Wendy Michener Memorial Lecture: https://events.yorku.ca/events/wendy-michener-memorial-lecture2024/

24 Mar: NYC: Word Books (with Laura Poitras): https://shop.wordbookstores.com/event/word-presents-cory-doctorow

29-31 Mar: Wondercon Anaheim: https://www.comic-con.org/wc/

11 Apr: Harvard Berkman-Klein Center (with Randall Munroe) https://cyber.harvard.edu/events/enshittification

12 Apr: RISD Debates in AI, Providence, details coming soon!

17 Apr: Anderson's Books, Chicago, 19h: https://www.andersonsbookshop.com/event/cory-doctorow-1

19-21 Apr: Torino Biennale Tecnologia https://www.turismotorino.org/en/experiences/events/biennale-tecnologia

2 May, Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, Winnipeg https://www.eventbrite.ca/e/cory-doctorow-tickets-798820071337

5-11 May: Tartu Prima Vista Literary Festival https://tartu2024.ee/en/kirjandusfestival/

6-9 Jun: Media Ecology Association keynote, Amherst, NY https://media-ecology.org/convention

Calgary and Vancouver – details coming soon!

[rabbitcruiser]

Vancouver was incorporated on April 6, 1886.

[mlm-blues]

Vancouver public library reposted you omg https://www.instagram.com/p/DMdx8d7TbZB/?igsh=MXFmMjJnb2EyeWZ3Mw==

vancouver public library are true mlm supporters 🙏🏽

[oddphotos362]

[human-i-think-idk]

Just had the craziest dream about meeting Will Wood and Chris Dunne outside the Vancouver Public Library

Dream Will Wood was very polite 10/10

I will post the whole dream if even one person wants it

[rjzimmerman]

Excerpt from this story from Revelator:

Every June, cities around the globe celebrate Pollinator Week, an international event to raise awareness about the important roles that birds, bats, bees, butterflies, beetles, and other small mammals serve in pollinating our food systems and landscapes. These crucial species are declining worldwide, with many on the brink of extinction.

Cities have responded to this crisis with a variety of urban initiatives designed to foster pollinator habitats and in the process transform once-stark cement landscapes — as well as pocket parks, curb strips, and highway dividers — into lush, welcoming areas for pollinators and humans alike.

In Washington, D.C., ambitious pollinator projects are abundant on rooftops of public, office, and private spaces, ranging from the renovated D.C. Public Library’s main branch to National Public Radio’s headquarters, which hosts an apiary. Throughout the District of Columbia, municipal code requires buildings to maintain the tree boxes and curb strips outside their properties. This often leads to creative landscaping on the smallest of scales.

It’s not just businesses. Parks and other public spaces also play an important role. For example, Fargo, North Dakota’s Urban Pollinator Plots Project aims to establish more than 50 acres of high diversity, forb-rich, native prairie plantings in urban parklands.

“I think some of the bigger challenges are just simply the establishment of the prairie,” says Sam DeMarais, a park forester in the Fargo Park District, who oversees the program. “It’s a skill set and a knowledge base that really takes a keen eye and some diligence on doing it properly. Everyone thinks you can just plant the prairie and let it go, but that’s not really the case.”

Fargo’s and Washington, D.C.’s programs are each over 10 years old, and time has brought knowledge of what works and doesn’t, and the ability to adapt. But less-established initiatives across the country could provide even more clues. A new project at the Port of Vancouver, in Washington state, aims to add a small native plant and flower pollinator garden in the port’s mitigation bank in the Lower Columbia River watershed. It could serve as a case study in introducing pollinators into industrial areas. In Michigan, the nonprofit organization Detroit Hives showcases how to transform vacant lots into pollinator-friendly habitat, a program that recently contributed to Detroit joining the Bee City USA program. Researchers in Puerto Rico are examining the relationships between animal and plant resources in urban areas on the island, and conducting interviews to learn more about public perspectives on plants and wildlife.

But why stop at the city level? Pollinator programs around the world can look to Ireland, where the entire island, north and south, has implemented the All-Ireland Pollinator Plan, a program that brings together community groups, local authorities, councils, businesses, farmers, and others to create a pollinator-friendly landscape.

[philtstone]

as if you havent already filled enough indulgent prompts for me already—Juliet & Gus, "competition"

also cleaned up and posted on ao3

Juliet's always been the jealous type, but she's never been jealous of Gus.

Maybe for like a week, right after Vancouver, she had a mild freakout over how it would all work. Which was normal of her, Juliet maintains. Shawn was historically bad at saying no to both of them, they were trying to keep things a secret at work, it was so so so new in ways that blended the heady butterflies and anxiety about the future into one single entity in her stomach, and, well. She was suddenly very personally aware: there were things Gus knew about her boyfriend that were probably so hyperspecific that they completely escaped her scope of imagination.

The little thread of anxiety tied to this particular knowledge started to dissolve the first time Shawn called her in the middle of the night when he couldn't sleep. And besides, she had thought -- wasn't this all just a great opportunity to get to know Gus better, too?

Juliet is a pragmatic woman and a strategist and the initiator of their local public library's Feminist Fantasy and Friendship book club. Over the last fifteen years, the number of times she's felt like she's competing with Burton Guster for Shawn's attention is so small it's kind of irrelevant.

"Juliet!" Gus follows the sound of his pained voice through the door. "It's been three hours! He's not answering his phone!"

Juliet closes the front door and sighs. "He's fixing the dishwasher."

Gus's scarf is hanging lopsidedly from around his neck and the top of his perfectly round head glistens with the remnants of a spring rainstorm. He raises both eyebrows. "Shawn. Our Shawn? The Shawn we know. Is fixing the dishwasher."

"Didn't he do it for a living for like three weeks back in ninety nine?" Juliet asks, taking Gus's coat from him and ushering him into the living room.

"Well, yeah," says Gus, in a tone that implies the mutual understanding that Shawn is annoyingly handy when he isn't distracted by twelve other more interesting things and/or being deliberately useless. "I just didn't think he'd have the patience to sit down and do it. Especially when he was supposed to come over three hours ago to go over these case files with me. I gotta pick up Junior from daycare in twenty minutes!"

Wordlessly, Juliet nudges him closer to the half-shut kitchen door. Gus pauses, frowning, then tilts his head as Shawn's animated voice floats through to them, a sample of the bits and pieces of conversation Juliet's been neglected for all afternoon.

"... then he goes over and stands by the record stand -- cue music -- have I played Try A Little Tenderness for you yet? Not exactly in this household's hall of fame, but one of the greats for sure. Now, music starts playing, and he starts dancing -- bam bam beeeenyon, hang on, I gotta demonstrate -- now imagine you're Andi, and you're standing over there, looking appropriately reserved and restrained 'cause life is just complicated, you know?! You're trying to figure out how to be a person in high school."

"Aaaab aaab baa."

"Exactly! Don't worry, you don't have to go to high school for ages. Maybe by the time you do high school the aliens will have invaded. Mol, note to self -- if aliens invade, make sure they do experiments on me first. You and Mommy and Uncle Gus are too important to be experimented on."

"Baaaa."

"That's right, because I love you. So back to Andi -- it's hard, 'cause she totally stands out, you know? But that's only because she has a great personality, and get this, the general population of the world is not interested in good personalities. You're definitely gonna have a great personality, but if anyone doesn't like you they'll have to go through Mommy, right? Then me, and then Gus probably third -- Hm, no. Me, Grandpa, Selene, then Gus. Your Uncle Gus is a sensitive soul."

"Abbbrrrabababa"

"Right. I think you might have the most personality of anyone I've ever met, including myself and the inimitable Rod Steiger impersonator I met once in Arkansas. It's just been obvious from pretty much the second I held you; you know your dad's a great judge of character. So anyway, Ducky starts dancing -- oooh, I just had a thought. How do we feel about pineapple Fruit By the Foot in a cheesy chili dog? Here me out -- same concept as a pizza -- but with maximum shelf life for the fruitiness. We gotta try that one on Uncle Gus ..."

Gus blinks at the door, then at Juliet, then back at the door.

"I'm not that sensitive," he says defensively. "I am fully prepared to fight a man and or woman and or other self-identified gender to protect your daughter, Juliet --"

"Gus, focus!"

Gus clears his throat and straightens up.

"All afternoon?" he asks.

"It's so sweet," Juliet whispers miserably, "I don't think he's ever had a more captive audience."

There's a mild clang from inside the kitchen, and Molly's bubbly shrieking laughter. Gus's eyebrows climb by the inch up his forehead. He looks like he doesn't know whether he wants to laugh to look sympathetic or shed a few emotional tears; Juliet can relate.

"And you've been ..."

"In the kitchen, doing boring tax stuff. They've been so caught up in their conversation it's like I'm not even there."

"Jules, she's six months old."

"Don't laugh at me."

"I'm not laughing! I feel neglected too. Three hours, remember?"

Molly laughs again, clapping her hands. Shawn's started singing Try a Little Tenderness and is surprisingly on-key until it suddenly gets muffled by what Juliet presumes is the screwdriver he's been using to fix their kitchen appliance.

"I am not jealous of my baby," she says determinedly, bringing forward a vehement finger. "And neither are you." Gus holds his hands up in surrender.

"I'm Switzerland. And have to pick up my own baby. Tell Shawn I stopped by."

"Tell Selene she has to finish chapter five by Sunday."

"Man, I have to finish chapter five by Sunday. Selene's read all the way ahead to the sexy stuff."

"Gus!" Juliet shoos him away in distress. "She's not supposed to do that! We're meant to experience the book together in friendship!"

"I am not going to be discussing fairy smut with a room full of adults, Juliet, I don't care how a book club works. I am attending this out of the goodness of my heart because you are a valued member of my circle --"

"Go pick up your kid, oh my God."

Gus huffs, shrugging his coat on. "And you go rescue yours from another hour's worth of Pretty in Pink. You know, he did this to me once when we were in ninth grade?"

"Oh, me too. Third month together. The whole thing."

"What number are we at by now?"

"Eighty-seven watches. And counting."

The realization that exposing Molly's baby eyeballs to movie screens isn't very good for her baby brain has had a surprisingly mitigating effect on Shawn's own movie watching habits. Juliet supposes that he's found a decent workaround; Shawn's nothing if not a good storyteller. And it's not like he forgets any of the details.

" -- exactly! The subtlety? The delicate traaamble of her lip? You're named for her, you know. One of the greatest actresses of all time --"

"Amm mama!"

"Bye," says Gus. The front door slams shut. More clattering of tools from inside the kitchen.

"Jules! Sweetheart! Where are you? We miss you in here!"

Juliet can't help but smile.

"Coming! And you know that's the sound she always makes when she needs to nurse, Shawn." The kitchen door swings open to the sight of Shawn on his side, wedged into the dishwasher's depths, and Molly in her high chair with slobber all over her fist. Juliet feels her heart melt anyway when Molly reaches for her. "Hi baby," she coos.

Shawn extracts himself from the innards. "Not true," he says. She takes a seat at the kitchen table and situates Molly and undoes her nursing bra. "I can read the intonations. This was a genuine emotion, beyond need for boob --"

"Mmmhmm," Juliet says.

"-- and I missed you," Shawn finishes, sincerely.

Juliet's smile grows big and bright and silly. She pets Molly's head, tilts her head at him. She has no idea if their dishes will be washed anytime soon.

"Gus was here," she says. "He's jealous of our six month old. You should call him." Then, unable to help herself, has to start laughing at the expression of deep distress that immediately overtakes Shawn's face.

[have-you-been-here]

Vancouver Public Library, Central Library - Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada