Air conditioning for garden sheds, pt.1
Posted on April 5th, 2010 –
The TCL headquarters has been under siege all day, dear reader. By heat.
I’ve had the windows open since dawn, fans running, even took a prolonged and luxuriant shower. No good. The hot-water rads having been blazing all day. The superintendent is either cleaning the heating system for the season or the he’s trying to cook us out. By us I mean the whole building; the rads in the landing are all on full-blast so I’m thinking the other flats are probably getting it too. Maybe they’re testing how hot they can get the old iron grills before they explode. My recently relocated blogging chair is now just a nervous foot away from the big cast-iron one. Might be my last post.
So it was good to get outdoors for a bit. That and what the casual observer might mistake as summer outside. No, my living room is presently like summer, but nice try. (Sadly, this is not a hyperbole.) Outside, though, I tripped into a neat old neighbourhood that made me forget about my oven-like flat. Even the garden sheds are probably air conditioned there.
Rosedale is the place. North and a little east of the core. Took me a while to just get there, and once there the terrain is friendly to neither foot nor vehicle. Hilly, twisty, narrow roads, roundabouts going who-knows-where. Never a good time to stand in the middle of the road taking photos.
Took me two successive tries to get through there to my intended destination (with Google Maps on my mobile!). And I was started to feel smugly Torontonian.
Apparently the roads are based on pre-Toronto horse-riding trails, but if you ask me this is how they get away with gating the place without erecting actual gates.
To me Rosedale seems not unlike a miniaturized Bridle Path (farther north and east). On the Path, houses are on massive lots, usually far enough back from the road that getting to the front door would mean having to interact with armed guards and probably dogs. Mansions. The density of rich people in Rosedale necessitates that they settle onto smaller plots. The houses can’t get smaller, of course, so it’s usually the stuff around the houses that gets shrunk. Still neat, just really small.
I wouldn’t like to guess how much condos run for in Rosedale. This wouldn’t have even crossed my mind but smattered occasionally between the gargantuan houses are low-rise buildings that really couldn’t be called flats. Probably not rentals either.
Dang. Now I’m thinking too much about my own place again.
Still hot here.
So hot.
I bet the Rosedalians don’t have to put up with this.
Continued in next part…
... with pictures
... with sounds
... with videos
... with opinions
... that's shorter
... that's longer
April 7th, 2010 6:25 am
That second pic? Gor-gee-ous building. Great angle to show it off.
April 7th, 2010 7:22 am
Thanks, Grace. That building is a bit of a lie, actually. It's on the west side of Yonge Street (not far from Rosedale station). Technically it's not Rosedale but it might as well be :)
April 7th, 2010 8:22 am
Wow I love your photos they are gorgeous! What cam do you use? I dabble on photography but my cam is kinda crappy really …it does not give me a good resolution like yours.
April 7th, 2010 9:23 am
Well thank you, Single Sassy Chick :)
I use a Canon Powershot SX10. My decision process for this camera (a year later and still cradling / kissing it goodnight every evening), was as follows:
1) Fixed lens is better than SLR (no fiddling with extra attachments), if the lens is very good — SX10 focal distance (and panorama at full-in), is outrageous so for me, the winner.
2) Nothing less than full manual control. I had a pocket Powershot A70 earlier (also a great camera), but there were a lot of things I simply couldn't do with it. Even when I hacked it. But again, SLR is choice #2 if a good fixed-lens job could do what I want. SX10 – bing!
3) Battery life, and ability to extend. Having a hot shoe is so handy when those stupid celebrities won't come any closer (why is the event always at night?), and I can go through roughly 20 to 30 Gigs of photos before I have to swap the batteries. The SX series is the only Powershot that has these specs, to my knowledge. Sold!