So, I keep seeing these signs all over town. I also once saw the old Jamaican lady who was making them, or maybe she was just collecting them, singing some gospel in the east end. But they are turning up more and more often — if you live or work in downtown Vancouver, chances are you've seen them.

What I like the best about them is the arrow pointing down from "Repent" to "Sinner", as if no-one would have noticed the second word had it not been pointed out. The emphasis is so deliberate and genuine that I find it quite charming.

They are all like this, all in magic marker, all on the same corrugated glossy cardboard-like material. Recently, a standard has developed — red "repent", black "sinner" on white cardboard. The size is approximately 3" by 7" (7cm by 18cm), but the porportions vary from instance to instance.

The designer I share my office with is a little bit disturbed by these harbingers of a righteous millenium. After I showed him the large version of my scan, which I wanted to use as desktop wallpaper until it starting weirding me out, he told me that he saw four or five in a row on his way home, including one inside the front door of his building.

I'm not sure whether, if I was God, I would appreciate the service of the signmaker or not. I guess it can't hurt. If the four horsemen come riding in for Y2K, I think they'd probably spare her.

That's it. Now go here.