Raining Cats and Dogs

In Vancouver, we're sensitive about our reputation as a rainy city. In 1998, many Vancouverites became enraged when actor David Duchovny joked, "Vancouver is a very nice place, if you like 400 inches of rainfall a day."


With the Olympic-sized attention arriving here soon, our rainy self-consciousness has resurfaced.

I thought it might be therapeutic to crochet some raindrops. So I made 14 of them, stitched cat and dog heads on each, gave them names, and felt well-adjusted again.

Raining Cats:


Raining Dogs:


To share this rain therapy, I searched for a public space to hang these raindrops. I chose the Davie Village Community Garden because it's the downtown site of a yarnstorming from sunny last summer:

Photo by ChromaticRat on Flickr

Photo by danielabsilva on Flickr

After some rainstorms, Jessica Glesby's knitted wall has seen sunnier days:


The wooden trellis above the garden, however, remained clear and that was where the Raining Cats and Dogs found their new home last week.




My girlfriend MJ was videotaping while her mom guided my installation of the raindrops. Here's a video of the stringin' up process!

The cat and dog faces are enjoying the sight of human faces looking up at them for a change.

(There are more photos on my Flickr. I'll update this blog post as the Raining Cats and Dogs installation inevitably evaporates.)

As all eyes focus on Vancouver for the 2010 Olympics, I hope these raindrops show that we Vancouverites can be proud of the rain that makes our streets shiny and our lush trees grow.




If we remain a little insecure about our rain, our citizens can try repeating MJ's defiant catchphrase: "Yeah, it rains in Vancouver. So what?"

We're just dancin' and singin' in the rain!



UPDATE - September  9, 2011:

Find out what happened to the last raindrop here!