By the time I met my “abuelita” she had progressed from a wood burning stove to a kerosene one. She was quite ahead of most of rest of the populace! And when I smell that particular fuel, I see my abuelita. Oh, I might as well add that she had red hair–her father had been an Irish immigrant merchant marine, so everybody called my grandmother and her siblings “gringos.” She knew a little English, and when she called the chickens, she always (to this day) said, “Kitty, kitty, kitty.”

And naturally you want to know thew origin of this peculiarity. Sorry, nobody alive knows.