This relieved housewives of one problem, yet gave them another: The somewhat embarrassing sound of plastic rubbing against plastic.

"Care for more Gjetost cheese, Madge?"

Pfft.

"Perhaps not."

When I was a kid we knew a family that had an all-white living room. The place was encased in this stuff - even the lampshades were wrapped in plastic, and as I recall, they had plastic over the white carpet. We had to walk through it (gingerly, lest we sneeze) to get to their family room.

I never understood why they spent all that money on furniture and then never took it out of the packaging.

Velon was used for a host of products from shower curtains to screens in movie theatres.