content: So very nearly a 3 star - this place is 2.5 (why can't yelp do half-stars like flixster?)... the place is a conceptual hodge-podge priced for the super-rich. I felt uncomfortable there - but a lot of that has to do with my occasional social anxieties. Still, Canal oozed pretentious asshole (present company excluded). I can't even call it douche because douche can't afford this place on their waiter wages. \n\nEven if I had this kind of money, I wouldn't go here ever... it's just not for me. I liked some of the concepts and the runway and curtains looked kinda neat... but then the exposed pipes on the ceiling looked like a cross between cool and gross as some of them appeared to be sewage lines - why would I want to have a meal with sewage lines running along the wall right next to my plate? \n\nThe menu was also this odd hand-made confusion... everything about this place was one-off. Even the appetizers had attitude - a simple bacon and cheese finger sandwich clearly aspired to be more. It was delicious, but c'mon. I didn't drink anything - I simply had a diet coke. The server was very nice, but brought my coke out with a huge lemon slice on the rim which left seeds in my drink. Odd. It's relatively new though, I'm sure the kinks will get ironed out over time. \n\nI'd like to see a fancy-pants place like this serve a turd pate - like plate up the shit they scoop out of shrimps and garnish with mint leaves - and charge 80 bucks for it... I bet people would eat it and pay for it. Bah. \n\nSarah and I wandered around the mixed shops and arrived at the end before realizing it was more than one store. They all sold the same crap - most of it was grossly overpriced. Again - this goes beyond douche - the clothes were more stylish and simple and much more expensive than douche can afford. To be honest, much of it was quite nice -but still, if I had a billion dollars, I'd feel like a fraud paying 800 bucks for a casual jacket or 300 bucks for a t-shirt. Wasteful. \n\nI am surprised that this sort of thing has permeated this far south - I thought it was a North Scottsdale thing. I'm discouraged because I don't like the crowd this sort of place will attract, but at the same time I like what it'll do to my property value. The reputation Scottsdale has really bums me out because I live here and I love it here. There are so many places to go where you don't have to encounter the douche-ness. It's just becoming increasingly more difficult to convince anti-Scottsdale people to come. Eventually everyone here will be bobble-headed plastic robots with too much money and no taste... I'll be consumed or assimilated or destroyed.\n\nI do have a feeling that the bottom will fall out and this mansion of cards will crumble to the ground - Scottsdale is living beyond its means. Or perhaps 'if you build it, they will come' is the thinking. This is a strange time indeed. \n\nIt was my first Yelp event and I realize Sarah and I were antisocial - I attribute much of it to the setting... which was unsettling.