Peter Smith

The weather was messy the last couple days, rain and wind.  Days like these not only cause my sinuses to complain, but also make my decrepit old joints and muscles ache. I don’t know if you remember the old Three’s Company episode where the girls, for whatever reason, mistook the mother of the girl Jack was dating for the girl herself.  (I know, its was unusual for Three’s Company to have an episode about a misunderstanding).  In any event, Larry got in on the misunderstanding, and for some reason, ended up asking the mother about the fantastic scent she was wearing, only for her to say Bengay!

I used to play (badly) a lot of ball back in my younger days as well, and I used to use the old Rub A535 for my aches and pains. And I still use some heat cream from time to time, but when we were growing up, the product of the time was Mindard’s Liniment.  I remember the older folks using it a lot, and mom would use it on us sometimes when we were achy or had a cold.  She usually kept the bottle on the heater to keep it warm, but I remember it going on cold sometimes and feeling like ice.

There was no hiding when you had it on either, you could smell it from across the house, perhaps across the community! Makes sense I guess when I learned that the main ingredients were camphor and medicinal turpentine.  Just learned today when writing this that it was a product of Nova Scotia too.  To me though it’ll always be linked with things like Nitre, and the old Chase’s Almanac.  And that kinda reminds me of olive oil too, not the cooking variety, but the medicinal.  Perhaps I’ll write about that soon.

Peter Smith

Raised in outport Newfoundland in a town of 65 people, I pursued a post secondary diploma in Information Technology right out of High School.

I’ve always been a geek at heart, but yet I love the rural life I grew up with. Fishing, hunting, camping and the great outdoors are still loves of mine, even if I don’t pursue them as often as I once did. Sports were always a big part of our lives, and I played many (badly) and loved them all.

Saw someone post on Facebook “What do you call these?” in relation to Pepsi, Coke etc.  Of course what they were looking for was Soda, Pop, Soft Drink, etc.  But someone (Jim Pottle) had replied “Cans” – and that brought to mind that we actually never used to call them cans back home when I was small, we called them tins.  And we never called it soda, or pop, we called it drink.

I can remember it well, going to the store and getting a tin of drink.  What kind of drink? Pepsi, of course!  I can only assume we called it tins because the cans were actually made out of tin.  And remember that pull tab? How many broke off, and we’d try to ply it up with a key, or knife. And of course they were as sharp as hell (remember the do not lick the lid on pudding “tins”?).

I’m sure we’ve all likely cut or at least nicked our lips or tongues on them at some point or another.  And I remember the contests, always printed on the bottom of the tin.  We’d have to cut it out with a can opener to turn them in.  I wonder how many sticky can bottoms I’ve carried up to the old drugstore (the one in the old shopping center, on the end, Pizza Delight was there after).

That reminds me of the old old drugstore, by the fork in Clarenville where Marine and Memorial split.  But that’s another story for another day.

Peter Smith

Raised in outport Newfoundland in a town of 65 people, I pursued a post secondary diploma in Information Technology right out of High School.

I’ve always been a geek at heart, but yet I love the rural life I grew up with. Fishing, hunting, camping and the great outdoors are still loves of mine, even if I don’t pursue them as often as I once did. Sports were always a big part of our lives, and I played many (badly) and loved them all.