Cans, or Tins

Mary came across an article in the New York Times, or The London Times, or some type of old-school-soon-to-be-defunct media outlet (according to all the pundits that have been mostly wrong about pretty much everything else they've predicted, but we should listen to them this time, well, because). The article was about the best foods for your health. Along with the usual suspects like Swiss chard and roots that can double as building materials, they included sardines because they have lots of healthy Omega3 fats which are the good kind of fats unlike the good tasting fats like butter, and they also don't have nearly as much mercury as the fishies that eat other fishies contain. Though, someone did subsequently note in the comments that sardines do seem to hoover up PCB's quite happily, so that's probably a wash.

In any case, a mention of the lowly sardine served as a reminder that I had several tins sitting in the pantry, liberally coated in dust. And why doesn't anyone say tins in this country? It sounds so much better than 'can'. When I hear 'can' I think of something that can be kicked down a hill or alternatively a body part that can be kicked, down a hill if need be. When I hear 'tin', I envision someone's great aunt Sandra offering me some tea and would I please get down the tin of biscuits? Much better than kicking animate or inanimate objects as far as I'm concerned.

In any case since we were recently in London I'm now referring to all my canned goods as tins, as well as mentioning, just in passing that I'm going to pop around the corner to the pub for a quick pint, which I'm relatively sure is raising suspicion in the Waring household as we don't have a pub around the corner, or even in the same county, that's available for poppage. Back again to the pantry and dusty tinned goods, I find I have not only sardines but some kippered herring. Which leads me astray yet again as I ponder - what is kippering - is it a verb? Via Wiki, no, apparently not. Kippers are whole herrings that have been split, gutted and smoked. Much like my masculinity.

Looking at my tins of herring and sardines I'm struck with the fact that old cans with the little wind-up key are now long gone. I miss those things. If you didn't get the key lined up just right when you started peeling the tin's cover off it would start sliding to one side or the other and then the lid would be impossible to fully remove. Back then they'd just scored the lid lightly - those babies were built. I know when I was growing up, it seemed like there were innumerable references to sardine cans stopping a 20mm round from a machine cannon or a bayonet trust being stopped by the fortuitous presence of a tin of salmon in our hero's breast pocket. Alas, no more. Today's tins are actually made from thin gauge aluminum and the key is long gone. Now they have pull tabs. It's a bit disappointing. The tins themselves are so wimpy that I can't imagine they'd stop an enraged heiress with a hatpin, much less a crossbow bolt. Which is another thing you don't really see much of anymore - hatpins that is, not enraged heiresses, you see those all the time now.

Anyhow, I think I'll be off to have a nice sardine sandwich with some mustard and raw onion. Just the thing to insure an uninterrupted afternoon of online gaming. Toodles!