Lighters aka Permanent Matches...and Mexico

I don't know why we had these or what they were for, but I do remember having SO many of these in our storage room downstairs.  And I remember spending time trying to light them.  Some of them didn't work well, but it was cool when I finally tried one that lit up!  Don't think I was very old, and glad that I never ended up burning the house down!!  Yikes!

Beth

Dad, Lanny, Monte and I drove with a guide to Mexico city from Calgary in the station wagon. That's where the stick lighters came from that we sold at one of the pavillions at the Calgary Stampede. We put stickers on them at one point and then I believe we took them off again. Two gimmicks were tried to sell the lighters at the Stampede. The first was cute girls in red hot pants. The second was a man who saw what was being sold and decided to supply us with packages of cigarettes to sell with the lighters. Dad told the guy no. 

Gillan

The Permanent Matches were imported from China I think. We sold them at the stampede but they didn't go over very well. We were in the match business with Duane Lee and when we seemed to be stuck with a couple of thousand left over, He, Duane, just dropped out of the deal and gave the remainder to me. I eventually sold all but a few through Totem Distributors. I still have about a dozen of them. The fellow we took to Mexico was named Stan Stein, a jewish man who owned a clothing boutique in Calgary and went to Mexico with us to buy clothing for his store called Ethos. It was in Mexico that we nearly lost Monte for good. Something to do with the Zoo. Sure glad that we were able to bring him home with us. I was thinking about saying something funny about the experience, but it wasn't funny.

Gillan, you got most of it straight and sure charged my memory. .

Dad

I remember Stan on the road in the moonlight telling you to run over the banditos.  

Lanny

The Mexico trip was such a hoot, can't believe it actually happened. I remember Guadlajara the best, the guys taking the car bumper, the women begging, the little girl begging and when we gave her a peso, it filled her hand, she was so tiny. The Cathedral, The Robe and Demetrius & the Gladiator. We went to go for a horse back ride and got lead around on a rope(very disappointing) Oh yeah, and I seem to remember on the way home staying at a hotel with a woman tanning topless and we were trying to shoot her with our slingshots. Not too sure about that one, maybe it was on my last trip to Mazatlan. LOL

Monte

Mexico.  Mom sent us with a gallon container (or so it seemed) of vitamins.  Dad didn't make us take them (sorry Dad I am outing you).  Instead we bought slingshots and we used the vitamins as ammo for the slingshots.  When we stayed at a hotel (I think in Mexico city) we were in a courtyard facing room (the window of the hotel room faced into an inner courtyard- not a Marriott)  One morning an older woman who was putting on make-up and getting dressed in her bathroom about 10 or so floors below us and across the courtyard had her window open, it opened from the top out so it was a perfect angle for a slingshot surprise from above.  Dad and Stan were out conducting business and so Lanny and Monte and I (with the lights off in our suite) were taking turns firing vitamins at this unsuspecting woman.  I don't think we ever hit her but as a 12 year old boy it left an impression.  
 
On that trip I got really sick when we arrived at Mexico city.  I recall being dropped off the night we got into town at the hotel room and tucked into a big bed and everyone else went out to eat.  I was more sick than I was scared to be by myself but I was pretty scared.  I can still remember when they arrived back at the hotel room- they had found a Sambo's restaurant and brought me a hamburger (I know- its always about the hamburgers) it didn't taste much like a hamburger.  As Dad said Monte got lost at the Zoo in Mexico city when Dad and Stan were off doing business.  Lanny can probably fill in details.  I am sure he felt more responsible for Monte than I did at that time.  I recall a balloon having something to do with it.  On the return drive to Canada Stan and I got Montezuma's revenge in the worst way.  I can remember laying next to Stan in the back of the Station wagon driving mile after painful mile and wishing I could die.  
 
Another movie we saw in Mexico was Paint Your Wagon.  All the movies we saw were in English with Spanish subtitles.  I do remember everything you shared about it Monte. 

Gillan