Share / save this post

Bam! Mother nature bitch-slaps you from behind…

Share / save this post

Share / save this post

Tonight, the snow made it especially worthwhile, and it’s pretty darned good most other times (except when it falls below -20°C as it did last night — that’s just kaka).

The spotlights shot out from the roof of the Air Canada Centre. I just wafted toward them like an inebriated moth.

Some team had just played another team and people paid ridiculous sums for the privilege of watching. Now they emerged, not looking terribly cheery.

My constitution feels a bit stronger now. Also, no $25 for parking — that makes me feel pretty healthy.

Share / save this post

Share / save this post

That attractive graphic is from the following story: http://www.thestar.com/news/article/905944–everything-you-need-to-know-about-winter-cycling-in-the-gta

Yup, everything you need to know about winter cycling in the GTA. Title sounds really interesting, doesn’t it? Soon as I saw it I was imagining something like comparisons of routes or interesting techniques to help you keep your balance, that kinda stuff. Instead, the article opens, “With the right clothing, gear and techniques, even the most casual cyclist can keep rolling all year round.”

Clearly the Star’s definition of “casual” is a bit different than mine. Have another gander at that illustration … casual cyclist? Really?

Then they get into the “everything you need to know” part:

• Ride slower
• Anticipate stops
• Be aware
• Reduce tire pressure
• Know the conditions
• Turn safely

Okay, so taking some air out of your tires might not be common knowledge. Maybe. And it is useful (increasing the tire contact area allows you to stop better), but the rest of these points can be boiled down to simply: be careful!

The rest of the advice is almost as trite: dress warm (I never would’ve thought of that myself), keep your bike maintained (because it rides better when it’s seized up), oil your lock so it doesn’t freeze (below -10°C oil does shit), and wear goggles if you find you can’t see. Oh yeah, and wear your “pinko” badge so that you can proudly display how anti-car you are.

They should’ve called the article “Obvious winter cycling tips for slow people who may never have experienced winter”.

I don’t bike much so I don’t have much to offer on this topic, but I’m pretty darned sure they could’ve done better.

Here are a few walking tips (since that’s what I do best), hopefully not so obvious, and hopefully actually useful. And no, this more than likely isn’t everything you need to know.

Power Walking

This isn’t that walking technique where you stick your hips out and take long, funny-looking strides (even though that is actually pretty effective), this has to do with simply increasing your walking speed while simultaneously reducing your effort.

Here’s how most people walk (shot, incidentally, in front of my Ray John video backdrop — almost there!):

Note that the rear foot is bent as the leg pushes against the ground, propelling you forward. The standard walk.

In the power walk, your foot stays mostly straight and usually doesn’t go quite as far back:

Instead of pushing yourself forward, here you’re mostly pulling yourself by focusing on extending your leading leg farther out in front and using the backs of your leg to pull your body forward.

The difference is hard to spot but if you’re using it you’ll notice an immediate increase in speed. I mean you will literally feel yourself lurch forward.  And all you really have to do is concentrate on pulling yourself along the ground; concentrate on using the muscles down the back of your legs, even squeeze your ass at the end of each stroke. It’s amazing how fast you’ll suddenly be able to go, and I find it doesn’t take nearly as much effort as the standard “push” walk.

Winter Walking

The winter walk is simply an extension of the power walk. Believe it or not you can actually maintain an almost equal pace to that on dry pavement simply by stiffening your legs.

I only have one real pair of winter boots and I only use those when the snow gets too high to wear anything else. All my other shoes are slippery on just about anything else – snow, ice, wet grates, pavement marking, stone, etc. I’ve found that by keeping my legs stiff, barely bending my knees, and by using the same power walking motion (pulling instead of pushing), I can move at a great clip across just about anything.

This technique works mostly because of the pulling motion … the force against the slippery surface increases as your leg gets closer to your center of gravity. In regular walking, you exert most of the force down and then back, almost forcing your foot to slide out from under you as you become unbalanced.

By keeping your legs stiff you’re keeping the force relatively steady … not pushing too much here nor there and potentially setting yourself up for a slip at that point. By bending your knees you’re introducing another dynamic into the equation and it becomes that much more difficult to control.

Stair Walking

This technique also applies mostly to slippery surfaces, but don’t let that stop you! It actually comprises of two parts: the walking up the walking down. And yes, very different.

While walking up stairs, what you want to do is to place your whole foot on the next step as flat as you can get it. Some people put only half a foot or they “toe” it up the stairs, but as this is the foot that’s propelling you forward, you want to give it as much surface area to grip with as possible (think power walking). Get that whole sucker on there!

On the way down it’s the exact opposite; here you want to toe it down, or hit each lower step with only the first half of your foot first. In this case, if you put the whole foot flat on the lower step you’re forcing yourself to lean back a bit, often resulting in your rear foot sliding out from under you before you’ve had a chance to step down (kind of like a “push” step but in reverse).

And there you go, three actual useful tips that you may not have considered and that don’t imply that you’re an ignorant dolt. And I didn’t even waste a great infographic!

Share / save this post

Haha!

Ah, but I kid. This is actually a serious problem for Toronto retailers. Last year we lost 12 people in an avalanche at the lower-level Starbucks…

Share / save this post

Of course, this all has to do with my insistence on integrity. You see, I may resort to describing the glistening contours of the thing that emerged from my bowels this morning, but only if that thing actually took form, and I’m really hurting for a topic. So when I make a bowl of miso, I may freely incorporate it into the discussion, and title, and rest assured it’s better than just any old shit.

This particular bowl of miso also has a history.

I was walking near the lakeshore on Cherry Street pretending to be Rain Man and taking pictures of random stuff in the sky. Here’s one I call “Wapner’s on at three”:

The wind in that area is out to murder people; not hurt or maim, murder. I pulled my hands out for, maybe, three seconds to take that picture and I nearly lost them both to exposure. I need to get a glove fund started or pretty soon I’ll be the famous stumpy blogger who mashes out his photos like he mashes out his posts, poorly. I’m not good with stumps.

By keeping my hands in my pockets, I managed to defrost them long enough to take a few more pictures, but the closer I got to the lake the more it was looking like the wind would have its way with me before tossing my bedraggled corpse over the side of the bridge into the dark, choppy waters below.

And I gotta tell ya, that just didn’t sound like fun at all.

Huddled in my coat and hands stuffed as far away from danger as possible, I double-timed it out of there. The two surviving photos are entitled “I’m an excellent driver” and “Wapner’s on at three redux”, respectively:

Okay, so I’ve just escaped a savage death at the hands of the elements but I’m still not out of the woods; now the miso comes into play.

In that God-forsaken land where there is naught but wailing and gnashing of teeth, there stands a gaily lit T&T Supermarket. The T&T carries probably the most extensive assortment of Asian / Taiwanese goods outside of Asia / Taiwan, many of which I picked up a taste for during my expat years. The winters during that time were cold and damp and my rock-solid cure for them was hot miso and cold sushi. Well, mostly the miso. The sushi came around on one of those little conveyor belts — the fish was kinda secondary. Plus they had killer wasabi.

So I ducked into the T&T and, completely separated from the maelstrom outside, picked through green onions to the soothing sounds of Gordon Lightfoot. I wandered the aisles pretending to be shopping for chopsticks or … woks or … live squid or … tampons until I warmed up enough for the daunting journey back home.Well, since I’m writing this I clearly made it home without losing any extremities. This time. Next time, I may not be so lucky. (really gotta start that glove fund!)

So the miso, which I hadn’t planned on, turned out to have a death-defying story to it in the end. It made the ingredients somehow more … special:

The fish balls are actually a Taiwanese hot-pot thing (a zesty communal broth in which everyone at the table cooks their food), but go pretty well with the soup. Bit sweet – maybe cut them up next time. There was another, un-fried variety in the store but when I saw the ones I eventually picked I noticed that they a) were fried and b) contained fewer preservatives (presumably by virtue of being fried). Sold and sold!

Oliver vouches for the authenticity of the fish balls and the veracity of this post. And I didn’t even have to resort to any racy titles or descriptions of bowel movements!

Share / save this post

I then typically follow up by popping open a browser (this is usually at work), hitting TCL, and showing them last year’s thing. “Wow, you’d never catch me out there freezing my ass off”, is typically the next statement. “Well, you keep warm by virtue of shared body heat. That’s what makes the evening so magical; improper touching”, I try to sell it. But that’s usually not enough. After revelations that there’s no booze and that the place is swarming with kids, the conversation just peters off into other subjects, “So … Toronto City Life … what is that, a government website?” “Yup.” “Not very interesting.” “Yeah.” ”Have lunch yet?” “Nope.”

People are too jaded. Perhaps because they’re hungry. The Cavalcade of Lights, with this year’s record lack of snow, didn’t really classify as a winter event, so all that hoopla about buttocks falling of in the cold were for naught. The kids were there, but you couldn’t hear them over the din of the show and any ones caught underfoot were pretty much fair game so that problem wasn’t overly daunting. I managed to get up to the front of the crowd with barely any resistance:

The alcohol prohibition thing is also a bit of a moot point. I was not once searched even though I carried a bag big enough to conceal a small keg. A mickey stolen away in a coat pocket would most certainly have gone unnoticed, or you could do as any self-respecting adult would and simply go already lubricated. Essentially, sobriety is for children, the infirm, and stupid people.

But I don’t want to get hung up on methods of smuggling drinks in because with the kind of cover you get in both the scenery and the crowd, you can pretty much set up a temporary shelter where you and your junkie friends can shoot up in complete privacy. Drinking? Please, the cops have bigger things to worry about. Like heroin addicts. Or those guys that sell all that light-up crap that the kids use once before it explodes toxically in the car on the way home. Domestic-quality Chinese products are always hit-and-miss:

The best way to avoid these shuckers of mens’ wallets is to simply avoid them. Look for the guys with the craziest head gear — dead giveaway — and beeline it in the other direction. If you have children with you, a) Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha! Hehe! Hahaha! *wipe tear* Oh man. Why would you do something like that? and b) Avert their gaze from crazy hat guy. If nothing else, at least save yourself some cash.

I managed to avoid most of the vendors by pushing my through the thickest part of the crowd, mostly elderly and children — easy!

I don’t know what it is with Citytv but every year they choose the dorkiest personalities they have to introduce the acts. Seriously, the weather guy?

Don’t get me wrong, I’ve got nothing against Michael Kuss; nothing for him either. He is adequate in his role to deliver the weather report in a timely manner. That is all.

For something exceptional, we need only look beyond Michael’s adequate head to see City Hall looming expectantly, waiting to be lit up like some kind of incendiary device:

To me, this is the real reason to go; a grand fireworks display that goes off way too close to City Hall. I know that immaculate planning goes into this thing, but who can predict that one unexpected gust of wind, or that one errant firework that’s just a little too far off course? Now you’ve got the holiday display of the season!

There were no showers of jagged glass or flaming audience members so, sadly, the errant firework didn’t happen this year. But the explosions packed a good wallop and this scared the kids, so it was satisfactory. Also, the Christmas tree at City Hall was unveiled during the show and this is more the official tree of Toronto I was thinking of. It’s a massive beast of a white spruce, about 18 meters (60 feet) tall and laden with an indecent amount of decoration. Hard to miss. Unfortunately, it makes for a difficult photo but while I work at it you can get a sense of the tree in the background here:

Even though the celebration’s over, the skating rink remains open until spring so there’s plenty of opportunity to watch people hurt themselves. Say what you will about City Hall, it can occasionally be very entertaining. Even in the cold.

Share / save this post

Actually, that part’s normal. But the cold … where did that come from? Suddenly everyone’s got a coat on and the inappropriately tiny-clothed are dashing for their lives down the street, frantically clutching at their frigid bodies, screaming as they scramble for the nearest entrance. And now they’re stuck in a coffee shop for the night.

Despite my multifaceted enjoyment of underdressed ladies, however, I must profess that they probably had a good reason for being so today. I had on an undershirt, button-down shirt, and fall jacket, and still my armpit hair stood on end from the cold. I simply don’t think anyone expected the wind and the temperature drop. I’m sure that come spring, this kind of weather will be a pleasant preview of the summer to come, but right now it has a pretty mean looking winter breathing down its neck.

I don’t consider myself slight. Slender, I am not. But I didn’t think that the scarves, parkas, mitts, and toques I experienced tonight were too much.

There it is, harsh reality disguised as a smiling silhouette: we’ve totally skipped autumn and gone right to winter! The weather people claim it’s normal and that past years have been freakishly warm. I would beg to differ. But I can’t because my fingers are starting to go numb. The landlord hasn’t turned on the heat yet so I’m warming myself by the glow of the computer. Too bad light doesn’t keep you warm. Damn eco-friendly bastard!

Share / save this post

Today it rained all day.

May flowers are looking pretty distant right now. My shoes, having been on my feet most of the winter, are now starting to get that glorious and ripe spring aroma that is released through repeated drenching in April’s showers.

On my way home I passed a few hotels with some unprepared tourists milling about in front trying to figure out how to stretch the openings of handbags wide enough to use them as dilapidated hats. Others were pulling their t-shirts over their heads, shoulders shrugged in a in a pitiful huddle to accommodate the relocated collar, which was now an elongated port hole through which they peered helpless, dazed, and destitute.

Poor poor people. Did no one tell them Toronto weather can’t be trusted?

Weather. Yes, fine topic. Isn’t that the topic you choose when you want tell someone that you’re absolutely not interested in any sort of meaningful conversation?

It’s a conversation that too few travel guides about Toronto have, if you ask me. What’s there is usually something like: “…frigid in January…blah blah…sweltering in August…blah blah blah David Miller is so hot…blah blah.” It’s fair to say that this crass generalization encompasses all guides about Toronto so there’s no need to provide links or supporting quotes.

Instead of waiting for them to get their acts together, I’m going to deliver my piece on Toronto weather in a single word: layers

Start with a comfortable cotton undershirt. A button-down shirt with expertly “distressed” cuffs and collar on top of that. Next, a loosened cravate emblazoned with a funky puke green-brown, retro seventies, broken strip pattern; or maybe a happy, bright, fun one with a stylized flower in a gay colour.

Slide into a happening blazer. Water-proof, wind-proof, child-resistant, anti-corrosion, and weather-treated coat to top it off. Now you’re ready.

The thing that the guides rarely mention is that you’re as likely to spend your time indoors as you are outdoors. There are a couple of times in the year where the outdoor temperature and humidity match most indoor ones, but these are as rare as the savage marital rites of the women of Balthazar. Never heard of them? Exactly.

For all other times in the year you’re either going to be:

1. One of those Starbucks-carrying chicks (sorry, but it usually is chicks), twitching spasmodically down Yonge street in a frantic attempt to keep warm with nothing on but a t-shirt, torn jeans, and irresponsibly tiny shoes, as the outdoor temperature starts to fall below -10^oC (14^oF) .
2. A delirious puddle of flesh swimming in the squishy lining of your massive parka that, now that you’re indoors you either have to wear, or portage above your head like a canoe because it’s just too fucking big to carry any other way. Why the hell did you buy that thing?!
3. Just dripping. I mean totally drenched; socks, underwear, inside, outside, every layer; you name it, it’s wet. Summer soakers are even worse. In an air-conditioned mall, hypothermia sets in in minutes. A combination of hyper-erect nipples and annoying squeaky sneakers can result in severe and dangerous facial flushing.
4. Some really funny combination of the above.

Even Toronto’s famous soupy summers require layering, but for a different reason. In this type of weather an undershirt does most of the absorption and evaporation of sweat. Unless your pits are soaked, most of it won’t transfer to the light shirt you wear on top. An extra sweater comes in super handy when you sit down at the movies where the A/C always seems to be cranked to 11. Finally, a light jacket should make you more comfortable in the wind by the water, and protects your clothing when tucking into a leisurely nautical meal where “instant seagull delight” is on the menu.

Funky fresh dressed to impress, ready to party.

I had been depending on the bitter cold to stay in place; I needed liquids to be able to flash-freeze on contact with surfaces. Unfortunately, a major thaw settled over the city and I ended up with nothing more than slush and puddles, and my originally planned topic ran down the storm drain along with everything else.

I was moping along until, my eye being drawn by a reflected glint of sunlight, I spotted something just as worthy of an in-depth article: a filthy snowbank, slowly disintegrating in the gentle afternoon sun, dislodging it’s treasures onto the sidewalk.

It occurred to me that the layers of the grimy snow (and more importantly their contents) were, in a sense, a sort of stratified time capsule much like the earth embankments of traditional archeological digs. Each line represented a period in which it snowed sufficiently to engulf any lost or discarded articles.

We could (more or less) correlate these layers’ contents to actual calendar days and trace the history of the pile.  A whole two months’ worth of history just lay there in the dirty ice waiting to be uncovered! It became clear that the breadth and width of the project would be staggering. Cataloging each find would prove exceedingly time consuming,  so I had to satisfy myself with a cursory examination, analysis, and much plagiarized research [bet you didn't know this was science!], results of which are listed here for your leisurely perusal.

Winter Clothing

This is by far the most common seasonal urban artifact. Most items show evidence of having fallen from pockets or been carelessly cast off, but there are occasional areas where this theory breaks down as entire matching ensembles have been discovered. More rarely, an occasional parka makes an appearance as do understandably discarded ear muffs.

The evidence clearly demonstrates past cultures’ penchant for disposable outerwear. We can only guess at what other perversions these “people” had.

Footwear

This ancient remnant is most often found in the Muntadhar al-Zaidi era strata of archeological sites. Most puzzling to scholars has been the almost complete absence of the second shoe or boot, leading some researchers to posit that humans during this era (roughly sixty days ago) were single-legged and travelled by means of hopping. Scientists have yet to figure out how boots or shoes would become so easily dislodged, especially in mid-winter. However, there is a general consensus that having the ability to always buy shoes at half price would make the items less valuable and more likely to be tossed aside.

Appliances

Large, unwieldy behemoths were apparently the order of the day during the last days of the Joe The Plummer era. Boffins [the thesaurus does indeed have many entries in this area] believe that the generation’s influx of new appliances  (informally named the “Christmas” era) produced an overabundance of crappy late-eighties housewares that required immediate disposal. While such artifacts may be seen within almost all strata, truly ancient representations appear mainly around college dorms and student housing. Recent discoveries, including the monstrous “Rotisserie” (pictured left) have cast doubt on the veracity of previous findings. Suggestions to explain such shocking discoveries include:

• The guys responsible for disposing of it were really lazy.
• The guys responsible for disposing of it got high before work.
• Both of the above.

Perhaps future investigations will reveal the true answer.

Excrement

Canine feces (or “dog shit” as they’re called by researchers) are often found at the lowest-most layers of the strata. At this advanced age, artifacts suffer from significant bleaching and aging, producing brittle and fragile specimens. In fact, any casual passerby may carelessly dismiss “dog shit” for brittle sugar sticks or, in more extreme cases of decay, icing sugar.

One would be well advised to not to attempt to taste such findings, however, but instead to deliver them to experts for analysis. Flaming paper bags are the preferred mode of delivery.

Cigarettes

This is a refreshingly familiar relic to most readers. In fact, you might be sucking on one right now. That cool menthol breeze has wafted through every layer of history, leaving it’s indelible mark on each one. Despite the ever-present coughing, wheezing, and horking of loogies by enthusiasts, this timeless pastime continues to be a big hit with city residents and visitors alike.

Perhaps most surprising is how little each new era has changed the ubiquitous little c-stick. At each stratum one can find butts in various states of decomposition, from the just-smoked to the nicotine-stain-with-a-filter, but all with roughly the same dimensions.

For a long time this similarity puzzled investigators until one brilliant discovery last Wednesday. Roaming bands of bums were seen to be smoking discarded cigarettes down to the nub resulting in the same length as all archeological butts. Surely this is no coincidence.

Natural Resources

These are found mostly in the bottom-most layer of sites. Typical components include various caches of petro-chemical pools, pre-formed aluminum deposits, nickel disks, and ancient flora and fauna  (e.g. rats, potted plants, etc.)

Being blocked by a deeper layer of sedimentary concrete, little else is known beyond this time period.

The Future of S.U.A.

I’m happy to have brought you this glimpse at what, I’m sure you’ll agree, is a fascinating subject. Future seasonal urban archeology is bound to be a rewarding field for any young up-and-comer that is able to hold back their bile. Each new season offers fresh opportunities to explore the strange and disgusting refuse of months gone by, and there doesn’t seem to be any shortage of raw research materials forecast for the near future.

Perhaps, if the forecast agrees with me, that original idea I mentioned at the top will also find its way to the surface. In the meantime, be sure to separate your recyclables.

—

Sponsored links:

snow removal

The imagined timeline floated in the haze of somewhere around mid-January.

Yes. Chilled drinks did factor into that vision, as did various activities combining snow and nudity.

Despite this, my pragmatism allowed me to recognize that winter would also suck in many ways. I knew that, for example, snow would feel great on my ruddy bits for only a few minutes at most. After that, the joy would be gone.

I make sure I don’t look forward with too much adoration. That way on my daily travels, when I expect the destination to suck, it’s kind of nice to arrive and find that it sucks less. A shitty day can so often be transformed into a less shitty day by the expectation (but clear lack) of an even shittier day.

In between sweat, I paused to gaze forward in time again.

The year was 2009. It was a cold, bitter January. Much to everyone’s horror, Bush had proclaimed himself president for a third term. The Clintons were forming an insurgent militia and Barack Obama, having won the election proper, was being held “for questioning” by Homeland Security.

Looting and pillaging were daily occurrences. Police and even the army stood back, trying merely to contain the borders of the swelling uprising growing from within. Almost all major city cores exploded with a shockwaves of violence that rippled outward, ripping up any vestiges of civility, kindness, and humanity.

Savage survival was all that remained.

I thought to myself, if it’s still standing in the midst of all this, where could one visit to take a bit of a break? You know, shoulder the automatic, dash through the gauntlet of unfriendly fire, then to the safety of the bullet-worn garbage bin. Something within walking range.

The first thing that popped into my mind was also the most improbable one.

Allan Gardens.

It would be smashed to bits. A makeshift city would no doubt stand in its ruins, the vile stench of humanity rising from it, piercing the brittle peace that sometimes floated on the air.

But what if, by some miracle, it still stood?

The route to run would be short and the snipers along it few. The park would present it’s own dangers, but nothing too bad.

I envisioned bandits hanging from the park trees’ sturdy branches on long, bungee-corded suspenders. These would allow them to snap back to the safety of their arboreal fortresses upon swiping stuff from unlucky passerbys. The Squirrel Men; a name dare not whispered.

But as long as I maintained radius, I would be golden.

Then, after some careful navigation around the strangely alluring empatho-sentient vine (how far science has advanced in 6 months!), I would crawl in through the broken window of the main pavilion, entering the inner sanctum of a lush, overgrown oasis.

It seems, in hindsight, my forecast was not exactly correct except for right at the end. The vine and me, well, that didn’t work out. But, the building’s still there and it’s good for all what ails ya.

Most visible improvements over my worst-case scenario include the absence of tree-bound hoodlums and genetically mutated plants (there was only one…) Also, one may stroll there casually and to be honest, a bullet-proof vest is mostly for show.

However, my overblown expectations of greenery in the middle of a wasteland weren’t ruined by reality. In fact, I believe my imagination was a bit weak.

First thing through the entrance is the smell of thick, fragrant soil. I’m talking top-notch, finely aged, and lovingly nurtured worm excrement.

The earth is always moist, though I’ve never seen anyone watering it. In fact, I’m not really sure who would stop me were I to take a squatty #2 in between the palm and the ficus. Despite this seeming lack of staff, the plants are meticulously maintained. Everything is brilliantly green and blooming every which way.

The elves, it seems, were also busy around Christmas time and there was no end to the shit strung all over everything. If you’re a fan of gargantuan balls hanging from twigs you’ll dig it. I did.

They’re now halfway through the process of extricating the excessive numbers of poinsettia that were stuck into every square inch. The word outrageous is perfectly descriptive of the sheer amount of plant material they trucked in. It was an orgy for the senses. If only they’d allowed peacocks to freely roam the pavillions, that would’ve added so pleasingly to the excess.

Stripped of most of the extravagance, though, the place is no less impressive. Each pavillion is an installation of plants that enjoy similar atmospheric conditions and the selection is pretty broad.

One has a waterwheel (alas, not powering any tiny machinery) that serves to keep moisture in the air. Orchids are kept behind dirty glass but everything else is available for manual enjoyment. Three miniature paths and even a bridge fit into a space not much bigger than your average urban McDonald’s. Smells better too.

This room is attached to what I call the “northern temperate” room. It’s kinda like your grandma’s garden in late fall; a little chilly, meticulously arranged, and contains a classical a sculpture pool. The peacocks would go great with tea here. Most of the plants seem somewhat redundant; many of them don’t seem that far removed from Canadian varieties.

Meh.

The palm pavilion is the main part of the complex. By complex I mean a big glass house of long, interconnected rooms. Here, though, complex isn’t so inappropriate. It’s a glass dome that rises a good ten (thirty-ish feet) from the center of a rounded room. Almost the entire vertical space is used up by fully-grown palms, banana, and other large plants. The humid room is lined with benches and it’s the best place to chill with a coffee and watch the snow fall outside.

Further along is the palm pavilion’s cousin, the tropical plants room. Almost everything here is in bloom, or in some sort of fruiting phase. The medicinal plants section is of particular interest to those seeking to expand their practical pharmacopeial knowledge. You can also play find the Arabica tree. Be sure to tip your spill-proof lid to it when you do.

The dusty trail of the cactus house is a fine denouement to the gaudy displays of the other rooms. Somber, dusky tones remind you that you are about to step back out into bleak reality — but not before twisting your brain on some crazy shapes! There is no doubt in my mind that these suckers were the inspirations for fractal equations. Mandelbrot was definitely trippin’ on some kinda cactus.

The gardens have a few other rooms, mostly for kids to learn that seedlings die and that plants come from the grocery store. Most of the time, though, they lie idle and locked with nothing in them.

All in all, you can’t beat the gardens even if you just want to warm up or take a tinkle (there is a washroom). When you’ve gotten a static zap for the fiftieth fucking time since four o’clock, a little humidty can be very soothing. Also, the place is an instant cure for snow blindness. Add to that the admission price of nothing and how do you go wrong?

You have seven days a week to hit the Gardens but only between nine and five. If I may make a suggestion, going in winter will just make you appreciate it more.

[map]
[more]