One Big Happy by Rick Detorie for February 27, 2020

There’s a Camel joke here somewhere….

If asked to name cigarette brands, I doubt I would ever have remembered Tareytons.

Since Ellen and her mother, Myrna A.K.A. Amber, come from Texas I would guessed Marlboros or Winstons.

As someone who used to live in Tarrytown, NY (aka: Sleepy Hollow), I used to wonder as a kid why there was a cigarette named after my town, spelling aside.

Tareytons?! How old IS this strip?

Tareyton cigarettes…https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tareyton

A story fit for a talk show!

Herbert Tareyton…cork-tipped non-filter cigarettes. I started smoking those the very second that I was conceived.

Is this Ellen’s actual story, or just something made up for Ruthie’s show?

And there has not been a cigarette commercial on the airwaves in decades! Yet we remember them: ’I’d rather fight than switch,’ ‘I’d walk a mile,’ ‘tastes good like a cigarette should,’ ‘you’ve come a long way, baby,’ ‘call for . . . ,’ ‘wherever particular people congregate,’ et al. (The brand names I have deliberately omitted; I thought it would be fun to see how many brands, other than Tareyton’s {"with the activated charcoal filter"}, readers could remember. And other jingle tag-lines, of course.)

Do you remember when you bought cigs by the piece? My mother had a beautiful box, white covered with violets, also several very small dishes for the ashes. I still have the box…I keep a few pieces of jewelry in it.

As an oncologist I am getting a kick out of these comments today. Tobacco was very good to me.

If he went out for cigarettes and never came back, it seems he’d rather switch than fight.

My dad posed for a still for that brand. As a boxer with the shiner.

I’d completely forgotten about Tareytons and their advertisements.

She hangs out with her grandparents. So funny!

Thanks to media saturation, I’m certain I knew that Winston tasted good before I knew that Mary had a little lamb.