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Old Christmas Day

Back when I was a kid I remember January 6th being called Old Christmas Day. No one seems to mention it much anymore, but curiosity got the better of me.

The Eastern Orthodox churches (and perhaps others) still use January 6th as Christmas I believe? It’s also the feast of Epiphany, though the feast days are more well know in the Catholic (and maybe Anglican?) churches than they are to me.

Practically the only thing I really remember about it as a “tradition” was that we always waited till then to take decorations down. Was kind of the semi official end of Christmas.

I’ve also read traditions of some countries/cultures saying animals could talk on Christmas Eve, but I seem to recall our tradition being that they could talk on Old Christmas Day.

Anyone remember anything else? Leave a comment please, let me know you were here!

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.

January 10, 2013 by Peter Smith Uncategorized 3

Sliding

My little niece went sliding for the first time over the weekend, and reminded me of times sliding back home.

Generally we didn’t have the plastic slides you see today, the fanciest we had was a crazy carpet. Most times sliding involved a toboggan, or the old fashioned coaster you see here.

These didn’t really work unless you had hard crusty snow, or more likely for my sliding career at least, ice from hard packed ski-doo paths.

You were “supposed” sit on the coaster and use your feet to steer by using the handle, and sometimes I did that. But more often, I lay on my stomach on it and steered using my hands.

Two rides stand out. The first was towing the slide all the way in to the “level”, a named spot in the woods near the house where the ground leveled off for a bit after having climbed all the way into that point. There was an old slide path (a path made for use by a horse and slide to pull wood) coming from there to the old school garden, and then turning down the hill, and heading down near the church. Quite a long long ride, made even longer by previously opening the gates on Ross Smith’s garden and sliding all the way to the beach. Awesome log ride and a fair rate of speed as it was downhill the whole way.

The second ride that stands out was partially because it was the last. Up over the hill from us Uncle Lionel Kelly had his house. It sat on a level spot with a grassy hill rising towards that same “level” from a different angle. This year, that hill had iced over completely and was a kids speed dream on the old coaster. Dad had gone up to visit Uncle Lionel, and/or his son Sam, and I was up on the hill with the coaster. After several high speed runs, on my stomach of course, I came down one last time, being the last because of what happened. Somehow, the coasters runners got caught in a rut, and there was no way to steer it. I hurtled along on my stomach and proceeded to slam into the house. I don’t recall how hurt I was, do remember being scraped and a little bloody, and walking into the house to get Dad.

That was it for the old coaster, not as punishment or anything, but because I broke it in three pieces on that last ride.

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.

January 7, 2013 by Peter Smith Uncategorized 3

Out on the Sound

Random Island is separated from the Bonivsta peninsula on the island’s north side by Smith Sound. This is about 1-3 miles across in most places if memory serves. Sometimes in my memory we’ve had the sound freeze completely over, and can remember people ski-dooing, skating to Harcourt, hauling wood on horse and slide, and of course, fishing.

In Newfoundland you go fishing for one kind of fish only, that’s cod. Any other type of fishing has its own name (trouting, etc). Nowadays with the moratorium on, even if the sound did freeze over, you’d not be allowed to go fishing, but years ago you could.

One of my most vivid memories of my Uncle Hay was one day him and I went out on our old ski-doo (I think it was that far back anyway). This was an old Alouette, we bought off Ross Smith and it weighed about 17 tons I think, and had about a 400 cubic inch motor in it ( I may have exaggerated slightly). I remember the ski-doo just because it was so ancient and yet so powerful. In any event, Uncle Hay and I drove out to some of our fishing marks and put some holes down through. I think we used my old ice auger, but it may have even pre-dated me having one of those, maybe Uncle Hay had one. You’d probably think that ice on such a large body of water wouldn’t be thick, but I remember there being about 2-3 feet of ice to drill through.

Salt water ice, or at least on a body that large, doesn’t respond like fresh water ice. Its “softer”, flexible, and you can feel the lop under the ice moving it up and down, and can hear the huge cracks like thunder when a crack opens up.

It was a beautiful winter day, sunny, sun felt warm, and was awesome to be out on the ice, doing what we both loved. I really don’t remember if we got any fish, but that really didn’t matter to me that day. I’m not sure where Dad was to be honest, possibly it was a work day, most likely was, but after Uncle Hay had retired. Some days just belong to certain people or groups. This was ours, or for me anyway. Much love to Uncle Hay, and Dad as well. We’ll fish again together someday.

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.

January 5, 2013 by Peter Smith Uncategorized 1

Mercurochrome, Spirits of Nitre, Olive Oil and Oil of Citronella

Anyone remember these old medicines? Are they even still available? Well I guess technically Oil of Citronella was more used a insect repellent. And yes I know you can get olive oil in the grocery store, but lets talk about the uses we had for them back in the day.

Mercurochrome was an antiseptic, often put on small scrapes and cuts. Left a red splash on the skin. I can remember the little bottle now with the eye dropper style dispenser. It had mercury and was removed from the market. Mercury is what made hatter’s mad. Never had any noticeable effect on me though (cough).

Olive oil was warmed and used in the ears to break up wax as well as to alleviate ear aches. Any other uses I don’t recall!

Spirits of Nitre – I remember this as a medicine to use for an upset stomach, or gas. We always had this on hand as well as peppermint (which i don’t think was the same as peppermint extract). Not sure if that was its official use, but hey if you know more please comment!

Oil of Citronella – My memory of this really just comes from one instance, my cousin Bill Smith gave me a partial bottle of this telling me it was the best thing to use for “fly dope” (insect repellent). I still remember the green glass bottles, and I know there were a ton more of these little glass bottles in households years ago.

Remind me of some more?

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.

January 2, 2013 by Peter Smith Uncategorized 5

New Year’s Eve

Bluff Head Cove Pond

I’ve worked in the hotel industry, and have seen the posh black tie New Year’s Eve balls with the brass band followed by a fancy champagne breakfast. And while that’s what many want and love, my New Year’s favorite was much simpler.

It may very well be a combination of trips that come together as one memory, but New Year’s Eve for me was best spent down at Randy’s and Everette’s cabin. We all sat around the table, likely still wearing our skidoo suits because it was so cold, even with the old wood stove going behind us.

The smell of a roast of moose cooking in the oven, covered in onions, a bottle or bottles on the table, and poker being played with the gang.

The night I remember, while I can’t swear it was New Year’s Eve, we had been playing and all decided to go to bed. It was bitterly cold that night, I remember warming my gloves on the atv’s exhaust trying to keep my hands warm. Sometime after we had gone to bed, (And inceidentally, after a bottle of coke had frozen on the table), Shawn Avery and Rick Turley showed up, pretty hammered from what I remember, and got us all up again. I think we’d probably have gotten up again anyway to relight the fire, it was soooo cold!

Sounds painful doesn’t it? But it was a great time and memory.

Happy New Year!

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.

December 31, 2012 by Peter Smith Uncategorized 0

Shortest Phone Conversation

Watching the world junior hockey championships on TV, I think back to the shortest phone conversation I ever heard. It was when the gang I hung around with were trying to organize a hockey game in on Elliott’s Cove Pond. I remember Derek Smith calling David Quinton and the conversation went “Hockey? Yep, when? One” That was it.

One o’clock rolls around and we are all in on the pond, which was like a sheet of glass. Teams were decided by piling sticks and throwing them in opposite directions, you were on the team where your stick went. Nets were generally a pair of boots separated by the length of a hockey stick, sometimes we had goalies, often the person or persons who had no skates, often there were none. I really don’t remember if we had any for this particular game, but I do recall one goal the puck rolled and rolled and rolled. I believe it was David Smith that skated pretty much the length of the pond, all the way to the park, to get it back, took about 10 minutes or more.

Another thing I remember was that the pond ice was so hard, that stopping like you would at a stadium was much different. If you tried it that way, you’d often dig yourself a rut and go flying over, lucky to not snap an ankle, much less spray up a sheet of snow.

Ah good times 🙂

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.

December 30, 2012 by Peter Smith Uncategorized 1

Jannying

From downhomelife.com

Jannying (or mummering) is a tradition from Newfoundland that had nearly died out until popularized in a song by Simani. I had never actually seen a janny until I became one myself.

Traditions varied from location to location, but back home at least people would dress in in old silly clothing, wearing scarves and long underwear on the outside,often stuffed to disguise both gender and size. Once dressed you would go from home to home, singing, stomping, and generally being silly while the people tried to guess who you were. Jannys usually spoke with an indrawn breath as well in order to disguise thier voice.

Once you had been guessed the hosts generally shared some form of alcoholic beverage (mmmm Aunt Lil Pelly’s slush) and a piece of cake or cookie and then often picked up more members from that house and moved on to another.

The one side effect of Jannying I remember, other than a hangover, was the in and out from warm to cold while wearing warm costumes caused chills from the cooling sweat. Am sure many a flu was contracted!

Today in some locations the tradition seems to be being replaced with a mummers parade. While I like the parade concept, I am not sure I want it to wholly replace the tradition either.

Any mummers lowed in?

Please share any mummer stories or pictures you have!

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.

December 28, 2012 by Peter Smith Uncategorized 0

Salt Fish and Scrunchions

Here in Nova Scotia the tradition for Christmas Eve seems to be lobster (blech). Back home in Newfoundland, or at least my part of it, the traditional Christmas Eve meal was salt fish (cod) and scrunchions.

Scrunchions are basically small pieces of fat back pork, fried up crispy (like bacon fat) and then served with the liquid fat over your fish and potatoes. Sounds gross to the uninitiated I know, but its sooooooo delicious.

Salting cod was (and still is I guess) the traditional way to keep it for the long winter months before everyone had electricity and deep freezers. Salted and sundried, the fish would last for a very long time, and when wanted, was left to soak in water overnight and then drained and boiled the next day.

Fat back pork was another staple in every household, and used for anything needing fat, traditional Newfoundland foods had a high fat content, with lots of fried foods. I can only assume the hard rugged lifestyle helped the older generation burn it off.

For me another treat from the salt fish were the leftovers. Why? Because they’d typically be mashed with leftover potato and onion and then fried (mmmm more fat) into fish cakes, one of my most favorite meals ever.

Are you hungry yet?

May you be blessed with your favorite foods, family and festivities over the holidays. Merry Christmas!

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.

December 24, 2012 by Peter Smith Uncategorized 1

The Bookmobile

As long as I can remember I’ve loved to read. I can remember reading Hardy Boy books way back when they were almost as big as me.

This was instilled and reinforced I’m sure by the travelling Bookmobile from the Newfoundland Public Libraries. I think there was a library in Clarenville when I was a boy, perhaps in the fire station building? I forget for sure, but most of my reading came from the bookmobile. These travelling libraries used to come to some rural towns back in those days, perhaps most, I really have no idea, but I remember it fondly.

Many a Hardy Boy adventure, and lesser known adventures such as Alfred Hitchcock and the Three Investigators, Tom Swift, and quite a collection of English kids books by Enid Blyton (anyone else read Five Find-Outers and Dog?) were inhaled voraciously by me.

I am also pretty sure I first read one of the first sci-fi fantasy books I ever read from here, that being A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle.

I still love to read to this day, and will always remember the smell of books in that little mini-bus, the walls filled, a desk installed behind the driver so he could just spin a chair round and stamp the little pocket at the back.

Was an event and treat to see that bus come down over the hill and run out to wait for the doors to open.

If anyone has any pictures of it, or recollections to add, let me know!

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.

December 22, 2012 by Peter Smith Uncategorized 5

Toy Time Around Clarenville

Growing up back home in eastern Newfoundland, There were no huge malls or big box stores, instead we had locally owned stores. The names will ring bells for some, Western Tire, Stanley’s, Duffit’s, Junes, and a bit later The Chain Store, Ayres, but the granddaddy of them all for me was Cholock’s.

This was a huge department store or seemed huge to a kid anyway, located near the railway tracks in downtown Clarenville. (The building later became home to the department of wildlife offices for those who may be trying to locate) I don’t recall a lot about the store per se, but what was the huge draw was ….. upstairs! …..

Image from http://clarenville.newfoundland.ws

My memory may be foggy, as its been closed for many a year, but if I recall correctly, upstairs only opened a few weeks before Christmas, and it was full of toys, toys and more toys. It was a magical place for me, and I’m sure many other local kids.

A little later on Ayre’s opened in Clarenville too, Riff’s was in that location after, followed by other places, but Ayre’s remains as a big memory. Their toy section seemed huge at Christmas time, I can’t recall if it was there all year round or not, and I’m sure it would seem small compared to today’s stores, but it was also a great place as a kid. Another one that was less well known maybe was, I believe, called Martin’s. Near Hyne’s Jewelry they sold musical instruments and I can’t remember what else. I was and am musically inept, but I was always fascinated by the things in there.

We didn’t see toys all year round in stores then, or if we did, not locally. To go these stores was to start Christmas, and I look back on it fondly, and wish that some of that magic passes on to you and yours this season.

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.

December 20, 2012 by Peter Smith Uncategorized 7

Old Christmas Day

Sliding

Out on the Sound

Mercurochrome, Spirits of Nitre, Olive Oil and Oil of Citronella

New Year’s Eve

Shortest Phone Conversation

Jannying

Salt Fish and Scrunchions

The Bookmobile

Toy Time Around Clarenville

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