It’s snowing and it’s STICKING AROUND. Add two sirens to test the tornado warning system, and you have a bleak April day.

But.

BUT.

It’s here. The installers said they couldn’t do it, because of the gas pipe. Heavy sigh. Yes, that should’ve been in the notes. He said well, I’ll see what I can do. And he did it. The long domestic nightmare is over! I can make full-sized pizzas once again!

It will be about a week before I forget any of this ever happened, and the entire affair will pass into mist-shrouded legend. I will forget that I spent a month and a half lighting the burners with a Zippo, because the electricity had been turned off to the unit when the outlet was rewired for the new one. And by the way, that Bosch range was not good, to my surprise. You depressed the knob to get the gas going, and then you lit it - FWOOMPH - and then you let the knob go, and the gas went out. I’m sure I was doing it incorrectly, but that’s how it should work.

Well, to hell with it.

And now, the weekend. But first: It's detritus time! Stuff I accumulated over the week.

Uh -

I've no idea what the context for this shot might be, and it's remarkable to realize how old the idea is - and how many redditors got the reference. Imagine a magazine in 1975 recreating the illustration on a best-selling piece of sheet music from 1928. ("Sonny Boy" by Jolson, I think) and a lot of people got the reference right away.

One of those crap ads seemed to feature a roofer with a fever:

Darth Maul really fell on hard times

Life hack: ignore anything that purports to be a "life hack"

I've hacked my life! I've exploited a weakness in the code that operates the firewall around my existence, and I have made a pool a private pool by employing the secret element of Velveeta!

Oh. look - it is a private pool! In the front yard. You too can have La Dohls . . Dol-cee? Whatever. VELVEETA

I don't know why this one got on my nerves.

Nothing new this week. But I have an old picture from the newspaper archives, part of a survey of downtown. Some of the shots have a mysterious quality that unnerves, somewhat:

She is going to be accepted

At least she hopes she will be accepted

Acrooked "Park Av" sign suggestes some ersatz luxury that never approximated the glories of its namesake.

It's time for our regular visit with the feral orphans down at the clubhouse:

"Because Photoshop has made all photographs suspect, and they no longer can be assumed to reflect objective reality?"

"(Sigh) No, son."

Solution is here.

Okay, name that voice!

Remember the bit the other day about the voice of Matt Dillon coming out of your kid's cartoon characters?

This year we're counting down the top hits . . . of 1922. Why not?

It's Charles Harrison singing "Play That Song of India Again."

Our singer:

Charles William Harrison (September 11, 1878 – February 2, 1965) was an American tenor ballad singer. He recorded under the pseudonyms: Hugh Donovan, Billy Burton, Charles Hilton, and Norman Terrell.

Charles Harrison was married to Beulah Gaylord Young, another pioneer recording artist. They performed together as members of the Eveready Mixed Quartet on The Eveready Hour.

He lived in Summit, New Jersey, and later moved to nearby New Providence, where he spent his final years and even recorded an LP in 1954 at the age of 75 entitled, "Charles Harrison Sings Again."

Let's play Whammo! An exciting game of the highway.

Some Menucards await. See you Monday, and, as ever, thank you for stopping by.