Pointless Thread

[RSB]

This time it’s brands that stick in your head. And why!

Mine………

Technics

First and last amp I can remember that really satisfied

Jamo’s

Best at the time that sounded good with the above

Parkison

The first milling machine “None cnc” I worked with. A machine that churned out ww2 shell’s.

Ford

Just because in my child and teen years I always had one close by.

Americans: Over Sexed, Over Payed and Over here, Wat Wat!

[Boris]

Camp – the “coffee” that my dad used to drink. He picked up the habit when out in India in WW2.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camp_Coffee

It was foul tasting to a 4/5 year old when he insisted I try it.

Never trust an atom - they make up everything !

[Boris]

Vactric – makers of vacuum cleaners (who Dad worked for in mid-50’s as a service engineer covering South Wales) – long since vanished.

Never trust an atom - they make up everything !

[Ed P]

Boris wrote:

Camp – the “coffee” that my dad used to drink. He picked up the habit when out in India in WW2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camp_Coffee It was foul tasting to a 4/5 year old when he insisted I try it.

It was nice when stirred into a boiling milk/*conny onny mix.

*condensed milk – like an unbelievably  sweet white treacle.

[Bob Williams]

Camp Coffee! My dad loved that, but no one else would drink it the way he made it: three spoons of Camp, two of sugar and a big dollop of what both he and my FIL called “exasperated” milk. That’s evaporated milk to you and me. My FIL and my own father never met, as dad passed away a few months before I first met my missus. When I first told FIL that my dad had not only drunk Camp coffee, but also ate sandwiches made with “Daddie’s Sauce“, FIL said “So what, so did I!” I have always wished that they had met, because they had so much in common, including a wicked SOH.

Camp was actually made with Chicory, from the Chicory root: –

http://tinyurl.com/yap2254b

During WWII my Romany paternal gran grew the root in an extension to the cellar in their ancient cottage, which she dug herself. She sold it on the sly to some bloke who made his own “coffee” out of it, which must have been rough as even my dad would not drink it. It was of course a substitute for real coffee, unobtainable during the War years and for some time afterwards. In Germany I learned that ‘Ersatz’ coffee had been made in WWII from burnt acorns.

“Liqorfruita” cough syrup, supposedly tasted and smelled like rotten onions according to my brothers, but apparently I wolfed it down as a nipper. “Beecham’s Pills”, fed to me by mother because I ‘looked bilious’ whatever that means. I learned from my missus that her mother fed them to her, for the same reason.

When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.

[RSB]

Old Spice & Brut

Avon Tyres

Tab Clear Coke

@boris Dirt Devil. I am talking the old cast type with what can only be described as a bag pipe “bag” on the back.

 

Americans: Over Sexed, Over Payed and Over here, Wat Wat!

[Bob Williams]

Electrolux vacuum cleaners.

Thor Parnell washing machines.

Arena Hi Fi. Eagle Hi Fi.

Temple Instruments Wolverhampton. (gone with so much British Industry) I learned Tech Drawing with these:

http://tinyurl.com/y3fpuh9m

The set pictured in (1 to 5) was mine,  bought as a present by my namesake maternal uncle Bob, when I started at Technical school in 1956. My No. 1 gson has it now, still uses it, all working perfectly. although he uses CAD at work, he likes to use the TI set at home.

They quite literally do not make them like that anymore, because there is not the mass demand there once was. I remember sitting on a draughtsman’s stool in ‘Engineering Workshop Theory’ and drawing onto an inclined drawing board. Making plans in 3 view and isometric, for items we would make in later classes of ‘Engineering Workshop Practical’. Using lathes, millers, pedestal drills, forges, you name it. From 11 years old, Elfin Safety would not allow that now. A wonderful education that stayed with me all my life. Thank you so much, and RIP, Messrs. Crittenden and Marriott.

When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.

[Ed P]

Ferranti Computers – the Atlas was the first computer I ever ‘programmed’. (95% of the time correcting typos)

[TCBarrett]

TANDY !!

Family. Coffee. CrossFit. WordPress. にほんご。

[Bob Williams]

TCBarrett wrote:

TANDY !!

– Or Radio Shack, if you managed to get US imports.

When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.

[Wheels-Of-Fire]

There are so many but :

Griffin and George

The people who seemed to make all the lab equipment at my school.

[wasbit]

Bob Williams wrote:

I learned Tech Drawing with these: http://tinyurl.com/y3fpuh9m The set pictured in (1 to 5) was mine, bought as a present by my namesake maternal uncle Bob, when I started at Technical school in 1956. My No. 1 gson has it now, still uses it, all working perfectly. although he uses CAD at work, he likes to use the TI set at home. They quite literally do not make them like that anymore, because there is not the mass demand there once was.

Still got a Thorntons set along with a slide rule that I’ve forgotten how to use.
Bought from ‘Soppy Sams’, a shop that sold a lot of ex war department supplies … & the proprietors hated that nickname.

Having no TV, until I bought my first one in about 1970, I had to have the ‘in’ sayings that came from adverts explained to me.

A million Biafrans every day
Pick up a tin of beans & say
One for me, one for you.

Sorry mate you’re too late! The best have gone to Farrows! (tinned peas)

Can you tell Stork from butter? Anyone who couldn’t needed their taste buds tested.

Birds Eye Potato Waffles, sung with a nasel New York accent.

Captain Birdseye

Anytime I Hear ‘Of course you can’ I always add ‘Malcom’ (Vicks vapour rub)

Then there were the programmes, mainly westerns that I couldn’t see : Wagon Train, Matt Dillon, Cheyene & Bonanza.

One early programme I do remember, is Barretta a PI with a white cockatoo.

 

--
Regards
wasbit

Rig 1: Optiplex 3050 SFF
Rig 2: Asus ROG G20CB (rebuilt wreck)
Rig 3: HP Elitebook 8440P

Dear Starfleet, hate you, hate the Federation, taking Voyager. - Janeway

[Richard]

Meccano good fun, Zubes ‘good for your tubes’, (spelling might be wrong), Brocks Fireworks, Standard Fireworks obvious reasons, Tizer fizzy drink – I never could stand. Ration cards for just about everything get used to juggling ration book goods basket and money for grocery shopping. Berkel bacon and ham slicers, it fascinated me being huge in the tiny front room grocer’s shop, it was a marvel of engineering to me at five years old; Dinky Toys obvious reason really. Quink Ink could be and usually was messy, of course Camp Coffee as others have said pretty grim but better than roasted dandelion roots, Gamages mail order store a great toy that was stolen during a house move came from them, Craven A – grandfather’s smokes, NHS vitamin enriched orange juice, Gibbs dentifrice solid block tooth paste, Guy trucks, some clapped out by war time use that I could out run as a 5/6 year old as they struggled up the road. I am sure there are some more but I tend to remember things in odd bursts at odd times.

[Ed P]

If we are reminiscing – Tiger Nuts and Liquorice sticks (both I think came in from Spain).

Both were off-ration and ‘sweet’, something sugar-starved kids craved. I actually managed to purchase some tiger nuts recently and they definitely were not as stripy, sweet or plump as the ones I remember getting for a penny as a small child. ‘Nuts’ is a misnomer as they are in fact tubers like tiny potatoes.

[Richard]

Wow, yes I have a vague memory of those ‘tubers’, though not of buying them very often, mind you mouths might have been smaller than as an adult. Liquorice sticks, I thought came from a UK source, not Bassets but someone whose name escapes me, though there might have been several sources. Many penny ‘sweets ‘ or perhaps sweet substitutes were cheaply finished with non memorable names for a child, though ‘flying saucers’ stole into my memory, they were not to my taste.

[Ed P]

The licorice sticks were no-name brand and had zero sugar in them and so were off-ration – they were pure root licorice extract (so-called Spanish Licorice), and at that time best made into a drink by pouring boiling water over them.

If you research Tiger Nuts they were apparently a Spanish Neanderthal staple! (not sure how that was established as a fact)

[Richard]

Marketing puff or more like bullshit perhaps?

[Ed P]

Richard wrote:

Marketing puff or more like bullshit perhaps?

It appears to be by extension of baboon diet, but the crushed up grain has been found in Ancient Egyptian Funerary objects. I don’t think it was marketing puff originally but it probably now rides on the back of the ‘paleo’ diet.

[Bob Williams]

“You’re never alone with a Strand” ciggy ad.

There was a semi-sweet chew that looked like a piece of a twig: we North Notts kids called it “chewing-wood”. It was sort of sweet/savoury, never knew its real name. Aniseed balls, gobstoppers and ‘sweet cigarettes’, made of sticky sugary something and probably led to the real thing later, for many. Meccano I join you with Richard, also recall Zubes. I once made a whole fairground out of Meccano in the spare room. Disassembled it later and gave the parts to my nephew, to make room for model aircraft kits and a WWII diorama.

Spam. No, just – Spam.

The Goon Show on the Light programme: Dick Barton Special Agent, Journey – Into – Spaaaayyyce!

Wallowing in it!

When the Thought Police arrive at your door, think -
I'm out.

[Richard]

Bob, Bovril a treat on cold winter snow-bound days when ‘heating’ came from ‘nutty slack’. A form of hardly combustable substances armed with rocket launchable lumps of rock.

Vics rub another winter standby.

Chill proof vests and other items of children’s clothing.

[Author]

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