Heck, I lived in Spain for three years and only saw the merest portion of the country, mainly the province of Andalucia, where the base was. Most of my vacations were actually spent in Germany, where my daughter lived and then that was always small towns outside of Ramstein AFB. So. little. time. to see it all.

Zmayhem will definitely and unquestionably be taking a trip up to Seattle this year, because those are ridiculously cheap tickets (I just looked and was quoted $77 each way, but that's still ridiculous in a good way) and it's rental-car-driving distance from Portland, which has also been on our must-visit-soon list for far too long (and tickets to which remain ridiculous in a less-good way). We just have to get a calendar and start plotting.

Playdate!

I lived in England for a year and feel like I barely scratched the surface.

That, and I went to a Ed the Happy Clown place as well. If you don't get it, don't worry - you probably don't want to.

Thanks for giving me images of penis amputation and The Man Who Couldn't Stop before breakfast, Frank.

t tangent

...so I'm trying to remember the name of an artist whose work I saw when I was in Canada 17 years ago. I'm pretty sure she's known by 3 names, although I can't remember whether it's Firstname Surname-Surname or Firstname Middlename Surname format. Um. And her artwork tends to crop up in New Agey contexts - on postcards and book covers and posters and suchlike. She draws/paints people (First Nations/Native American, mostly, or maybe entirely?) with their spirit animals superimposed over them, iirc. And I cannot for the life of me remember what she's called.

I know it's a bit of a reach, but anyone in the hivemind got any idea who I'm talking about? At all? Maybe?

t /tangent

Fay, is she Canadian herself? Also, is she First Nation?

edit Here's a list of First Nation artists - she might be on here: [link]

Susan Seddon Boulet? [link] She was an Oakland, CA artist (which is why I know her name, but if this is actually who you're thinking of I'll plotz).

No freaking clue. I don't remember her name pinging me as being of any particular ethnicity - something European, though - which is to say maybe English, maybe French, maybe something else altogether. Nothing that screamed 'First Nations!' though, I think.

The style is realistic representational art, pretty distinctive portraits in...er, perhaps watercolour, or perhaps watercolour with pen-and-ink? But there's this doubling effect of the person, with their spirit animal ghosting over them - all shamanish. I had several of her prints when I was 18, and subsequently have noticed her artwork cropping up in New Agey shops/book covers/postcards/posters from time to time.

And the prize goes to Sparky! As soon as I read your post I yelled YES, and upon clicking - that's the very woman! You win at the internets! Thank you!

Ha! I knew I'd seen some of her pictures. There was a local new agey store that sold her stuff. The Bear Woman seemed to be very popular. Unfortunately, that store closed many years ago. They had some nice stuff, sigh.