Cold! Unseasonably warm last week, unnaturally chilly this week. I almost didn't mow yesterday simply because it felt wrong. That sounds ridiculous, of course. But you don't shovel snow in shorts and you don't mow in a parka. Afterwards I got out the edger, surprised the battery had kept its charge over the winter, and trimmed the few blades that had escaped my cruel will. Then I edged the sidewalk, which always makes a property look better. Could've been neater. There's probably a self-adjusting laser-sighted machine that uses GPS to assure a perfectly straight cut.

It seemed as if I'd just mowed a few weeks ago. I remembered everything that was taxing about the job, the long hard push up the hill, the instant relief to go the other way, down, then the immediate regret to go back up. I've tried different ways to carve up the job, but the hard truth is to just gut it out back and forth. Then the backyard, which is a bagatelle, compared. Did I mention it all starts with the north hill? It's an hour and twenty minute job, including two brief breaks. Neighbors pass by and wave and say "big job!" That it is. One of them stopped to chat about things, and I asked about his bus. He gave it to the Bus Museum. When I say bus, I mean bus.

I took this a few years ago when he brought it to the neighborhood.

A thing of beauty, and also, no. The last bus trip I took was a jaunt to Chicago, many many decades ago. The seats were hard and the latrine was a nightmare. The backseat was occupied by a guy who looked like he should be behind the diner in a David Lynch movie. (YouTube link. I like to warn people who get irritated with video links.)

That evening the chill temps made the house cold, and I thought: well, better turn on heat. ALERT ALERT: one of my thermostats was offline. Remember the days when you would turn a dial on a Honeywell muffin and the furnace would rumble to life? Now it has to talk to the boiler via invisible magic wavy lines. It's like having an Iron Fireman, and he complains of a backache.

A what?

Found this on reddit:

Classic old robot, right out of Frank Reade. And I mean Frank Reade Senior. Anyway, the problem was simply fixed. Batteries.

I tried to add art to the Substack on Monday, and it wouldn’t work. This was the intended piece for the door-to-door salesman piece.

There was another.

There wasn’t anything wrong with the pictures. (Aside from the fact that there was everything wrong with them, given their unnatural origins.) Nothing I’d previously uploaded would work. The “upload” button was permanently grayed out. A bit of googling and binging and duck2go indicated that other people in the world had had this problem at various points in time. I might try a different browser.

Okay. Well, what do you know. That did it. Hope you liked the piece.

Okay okay all the Star Wars biatching aside the other day, I decided to watch Andor. It’s very good. Grown-up, with a look at the culture of the Empire as well as the people on the planets, who as usual are always in robes and rags in muddy dun-colored towns. There has to be a planet that’s 20st century in appearance and development, right? Where they drive cars and watch TV on big clunky sets and listen to records and work in tall office towers? That would be fascinating: the effect of being an Imperial possession, governed lightly, able to explore vastly advanced civilizations and watch your own culture rapidly transform by absorption and adaptation.

If anything it shows how much good material was just sitting around waiting to be explored and exploited, and how the insistence on telling the story of Darth Vader with underwhelming plots and dialogue and actors was so avoidable. Ah well. I was along for the ride in the first three and enjoyed it all, although I surely had a frozen smile on my face with all the Ewok stuff, knowing that this all deserved to end with more than teddy bears.

You know that feeling when you're watching something and telling yourself you're liking it, and you know deep down you're making excuses for something that isn't really that good?

Also finished shows with FINALES. The Agency, based on The Bureau, or The Bureau, based on The Agency, ended but set up the next season. Okay, I suppose. I’ll wait a year and then not particularly care. Finished . . . my stars and garters, what was it? I do not remember. Wasn’t Mobland, which is just pulp (but good.) Ah - right, Landman, which I watch just because I love to watch Billy Bob Thornton be surly and laconic and talk on the phone and fix things. There will be another season and it will be more of the same except Demi Moore will have many scenes in which she flashes her eyes and Ali Carter flashing her . . . teeth.

Here’s the thing. I am pushing through Andor because I have this bad habit of watching one, thinking “hey, that’s good” then saving it for a time when somehow I will really enjoy it. The trick to watching TV, I have learned again, is watching TV.

It’s 1939.

You know, you don’t hear a lot about bread being creamy these days.

The half-loaf is such an obvious idea, and yet we are denied it everywhere we turn. My store has a few, but they’re off to the side, as if reserved for loner weirdos. The idea of a half-loaf individually wrapped in a single-loaf sleeve - brilliant! Town Talk, you’ve done it again!

Everyone is beaming about it! BE MODERN - BUY TOWN TALK!

It was a national brand, by the way, farmed out to local bakers. In the case of Philadelphia, it was made by the people who baked Wonder Bread - and in fact they were the same bread, just in different wrappers.

Coast for Specials, or Coast for Today and Wednesday Specials?

		Not a single mention on the internet.

Okey Oakite, a happy sailor:

BASF makes it today.

Oakite® 33 is a liquid acidic compound designed for removing light grease, oils, shop dirt, flux, rust, oxides and heat scale and for preparing metals for painting. It is also used for cleaning and conditioning aluminum prior to surface conversion processing. Another application, recommended by stainless steel manufacturers, is the use of Oakite 33 for cleaning stainless steel to remove dirt and embedded soils in the metal.

Maybe just put less in the pot and turn the heat down a little? Just a thought

No harm, because the liquids go directly onto an electrically-heated coil! What could possibly happen?

It’s as if you’re supposed to laugh merrily when it boils over - oh, no worries, it’ll burn up, no tedious cleaning. Lady. C’mon.

Annnnnd that’s sorta kinda a lie, but we get it

“5 extra except for the fact that the number is exactly the same”

“Unlucky for Bugs,” hence this illustration of a rat:

He’s holding up a finger as if he intends to deliver some wisdom or instruction. I suppose in a way he is.

Part of a larger quasi comics ad. Petrol Junior Secret Service! What kid wouldn’t want one? Be a Secret Service Agent. It’s thrilling and exciting!

The brand still exists in a convenience store chain, but I doubt it’s the same.

Yes, there was another Fair in 39. Always seemed odd to me, but again, it’s a big country.

As if this writing, it appears to be restored, rehabbed, gorgeous, then closed. Why? Messy tenants.

That will do. More of Eddie's Friends today - and I hate to break it to you, but this is the end. Sort of. There will be an addition next week that shows how the strip developed. But this is it. Next? Something that is not endlessly repetitive, that's for sure.