Recently, I went back to a little variety store near where I lived as a child. On the concrete pavement outside, I noticed those black stains-from dicarded lumps of parrafin wax.
This came from things that were soild to kids years ago-stuff like:
-wax lips-you used them for Halloween, then you chewed the wax (then spit it out)-hence the stains on the concrete
-little wax bottles that contained vile , synthetic flavored “fruit” juice (orange, lime,lemon). Yo bit the top off, drank the (disgsting) contents, then chewed the wax
I imagine that the mess created by all this wax was really irksome-did the EPA ban this stuff?
Not nostalgic for this bit of the past!
You can absolutely still buy the wax bottles of fruit drink. My kids don’t chew the wax though.
First hit looking for “wax lips”
Wax lips, wax teeth - the local grocery has these right by the checkout, for Halloween, you know.
Why would the EPA waste its time trying to ban a bio-degradeable, non-toxic, edible substance?
Are you sure those are what those black stains are from. I was under the impression that they are spit out wads of gum. I see them far too often for them to be wax. Based on my experience running a store, I’ll bet if you get down and scrape at one it’ll be gummy and reveal the original color.
Without doing any research, I believe I’ve heard that paraffin is carcinogenic.
The answer is in the subtext of your post.
It was during the Children’s Riot of 1983. Chaos and destruction in major population centers (Disneyland, Six Flags), the National Guard being called out, millions in property damage, and finally presidential intervention to broker a truce. The vile, horrible excuse for ‘candy’ was pulled from circulation, never again to look so good and inviting in packaged form–only to trick unsuspecting children into culinary horror. In turn, negotiators for the children agreed that Circus Peanuts, needed in case of invasion, could remain on the shelf.
When I was a young’n, there were Halloween versions of the Nik-L-Nip bottles. I remember witches’ heads, skeletons, and bats among others. They cost one cent each and were sold loose out of bins.
Nik-l-nip at Hometown Favorites. This site has all kinds of good stuff like bubblegum cigars, Bonomo Turkish Taffy, Clarks Gum, etc.
Right, it’s not wax, it’s chewing gum. Ugh. Filthy habit.
Sounds like something that gets circulated in right wing inboxes.
Once when I was a kid, I asked my mom what all those little black spots on the sidewalk were. She said, “blackbird doody.”
Food grade paraffin wax is edible but indigestable. It’s going to come out the same as it went in. The ‘carcinogenic’ part comes in when you burn unpure paraffin.