Crazy House Revisited

On Saturday afternoons these days I tend to not take a bike ride because I want to finish writing up my latest food bank adventure. This time though I really wanted to get some pictures of the crazy house that I’d seen the day before near Victoria Park and St Clair, but couldn’t photograph then because my camera batteries needed a charge.

It was so hot that whenever I smelled food cooking I felt like I was in the oven with whatever was being prepared.

There was not a lot of competition eastbound and the Bloor Viaduct had not one cyclist ahead of me at all.

When I got to Maybourne and Bolster I set my bike against a sign and started taking pictures of the house. I started close on the sunset side of the building and worked my way along. A guy passed and I asked him if he lived around there because I figured there must be a story behind the house that maybe he could share. He told me he hadn’t been in the neighbourhood long enough to know.

Other than some other photographs contributed to a “weird houses of Toronto” site there is no published history about this place anywhere on the internet.

As I got closer to the eastern side of the mansion I noticed that the side door was open and just inside in the shadows was an ancient looking man in a chair staring out at me. I called out “Hi!” but he didn’t respond. “Then I said, “Nice house!” and he nodded.

I took several more pictures from further back and then went to Pharmacy and back down to Danforth.

On the way back I was passed by a young man that was riding with another that didn’t catch up. The guy in front of me slowed down for the other one. A little later the two of them and then one more of the group got ahead of me. I put on the steam though and got way ahead of all of them. At around Pape I started feeling that my left crank arm was skipping as I pedaled. A little east of Broadview it began to wobble, so I pulled over, reached down and the crank arm came off in my hand because the nut had fallen off. I put it back on, hoping that I could make it if I rode very carefully, but it wouldn’t stay. The three guys whizzed past me and I walked to Broadview station. Luckily this happened when I had money to take the subway.

I took the train to Dufferin Station, standing the whole time and shifting my bike to different sides of the train, depending on which doors opened to a platform. As I was leaving I heard a woman tell another, “If the other stations were as creative as this one I wouldn’t feel so bad about living in Toronto!” What’s creative about Dufferin Station?

I rode my bike with just the right crank arm by pushing down and then using the top of my foot to pull the pedal back up to thrust down again. It was slow and awkward, but quicker than walking. I made it to Brock and then till just south of College where it was faster just to walk up the hill to Dundas. I had to walk again from the bottom of underpass beneath the railroad bridge until I was level again and after that I was able to make it home. I lost less than half an hour from my normal time of getting home.

I looked through drawer where I keep my nuts, screws and nails, but couldn’t find a nut the right size. I found one though that would thread on just enough to hold the crank arm temporarily in place.

I got out the socket wrench that Nick Cushing had given me a few months ago and tried to remove the socket in order to change it to one that would fit my crank arm lock nut, but it wouldn’t budge. I’d tried to do the same thing a few months before when I first switched to a cotterless crank system, because it had occurred to me that the nut might need to be tightened from time to time. It didn’t come off them either and it had occurred tome several times since then to ask Nick about it but I kept forgetting whenever I’d had the chance to make enquiry.

I went out and bought a couple of cans of Creemore. There was a guy on Queen asking everyone for eleven cents. The penny has been out of circulation for a few years now, so how could he get eleven cents from anyone? I guess it’s an attention grabber. He asked two women in a car and they said sorry, but he kept persisting until the driver barked, “Look, three times I’ve said ‘Sorry, no!’” I guessed the liquor store would be closing soon and he was desperate to get something for the night.