‘Laughing gas’ cartridges litter Yonge St.

Somebody must be filling a lot of eclairs with whipped cream, judging by all the nitrous oxide cartridges scattered along Yonge Street.

Or is someone whipping up ice cream pies along the west side of Yonge, just south of Sheppard Avenue? Maybe that’s why hundreds of empty cartridges are strewn between the sidewalk and a parking lot.

An urban mystery was pointed out to me in a note from Carol Roach, who’s been trying to get the city to clean up the cartridges, also known as “whipped cream chargers” because they’re used in dispensers to add air to whipping cream. Her email subject line said “whip-its,” which puzzled me. A whippet is a thin dog, nearly as quick as a greyhound. But it turns out that “whip-it” is slang for a nitrous oxide cartridge. She sent me copies of emails about the cartridges between her and a staffer for a city councillor. Then came the zinger: “Idiots use these as a cheap way of getting high.”

Who knew? Not me, that’s for sure. I poked around online and learned that 12-packs of nitrous oxide cartridges can be purchased for peanuts with no questions asked. You don’t have to be a baker to get them.

Nitrous oxide is “laughing gas,” the same stuff that dentists administer to patients to help them relax. But the stuff in the whipped cream cartridges is not a medical-grade gas.

It can’t be sprayed from a cartridge directly into a user’s mouth, so they typically fill a balloon with the gas and then inhale it. It’s known on the street as “huffing.” But why so many at Yonge and

Sheppard? It’s not like people are standing around at that particular spot, filling balloons and laughing it up near one of the busier intersections in the city.

So what gives? If anyone has any insight into the business of using nitrous oxide cartridges to get a buzz, or why Yonge and Sheppard seems to be a hot spot, I’d love to hear about it. STATUS: Eric Holmes, who deals with media for transportation services, emailed to say: “City crews have been sent to clear the public right-of-way,” of the cartridges, adding that some of the cartridges were on the parking lot property and that “staff are working to address cleanup with the property owner.”

What's broken in your neighbourhood? Wherever you are in Greater Toronto, we want to know. Email jlakey@thestar.ca or follow @TOStarFixer on Twitter