“TIN-CANNING”

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 79, Issue 305, 30 December 1935, Page 10

“TIN-CANNING”

OLD CUSTOM OBSERVED BUT IN WRONG PLACE. That clanking and rattling overture to married bliss, unromantically dubbed “tin-canning,” may have much to commend it to those who like that sort of thing; but, as somebody with a flair for originality has remarked, there are times and pla'ces when and where everything can be committed by anyone who has the inclination. By reason of one of those social niceties, tincanning is simply not done on railway stations, and if it is, not .twice by the same person—at all events, it does not conform to Paekakariki’s decalogue of mode, as interpreted by the local authorities states the Post. They take the not unnatural stand that the station is often used for running trains into and out of again, that the platform is quite a good idea in its way, and that the refreshment room, contrary to popular opinion, is a room where refreshments may be had. So, they decided very early on Christmas Day, kicking an empty kerosene tin along the platform and lofting it into the refreshment room—which, after all, is a social service, however ingeniously disguised—was Bad Taste, and was definitely not playing the game. That is the reason why Percy Ronald Wheeler, a clerk, aged 30, appeared in the Magistrate’s Court yesterday. He admitted that on “December 25 at Paekakariki within view of a public place, to wit, the Paekakariki Railway Station, he did behave in a disorderly manner,which is the police way of saving paper and saying kicking a tincan about. Senior-Sergeant J. Dempsey told Mr. W. F. Stilwell, S.M., that at, 1 o’clock yesterday morning the defendant was on the station with some companions. They were seeing off a married couple and found an empty kerosene tin. The defendant kicked it along the platform and then into the refreshment room, where the attendants were preparing for the arrival of another train. The defendant, from the dock, said he could not make much row with the tin because of the general noise, so banged it on the platform. Other passers-by helped the demonstration of felicitations by kicking it along, and when the bridegroom went into the rerefreshment room he kicked the tin after him. The Magistrate: I’ll take into account the fact that you were celebrating a wedding. You will bo convicted and discharged; but take care of yourself in the future.