there might be something in that :-)
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16 years ago
Tree hugging gone mad
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16 years ago
Well, if we're into stories ...
I once found a lively group of chemistry sixth formers 'milking' the chamois bag of mercury at the base of the barometer. It must have been fun, but I had to report it :-(
Mary
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16 years ago
He wouldn't have submerged at all. It took quite and effort to push one's finger into a dish of mercury! I used to fantasise about sleeping on a mercury mattress - a water mattress would have nothing on it
As you say, today's kids don't have any of the fun we had.
And now, apparently, they're not going to be able to get their parents to do their course work for them. Poor mites.
Not that mine ever did - or would have been able to ...
Mary
Mary
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16 years ago
I only posted the bit between * and *!
Mary
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16 years ago
One of the most memorable experiences of my childhood was watching somebody make them in two part moulds and break off the ... oh damn this failing memory ... the piece which looked like a trumpet which was the funnel into the mould.
Someone will tell me. I could ask Spouse but can't be bothered going downstairs!
Mary
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16 years ago
Um.
Would you have taken any notice of it?
I'll still drink half a bottle of wine a night if/when They put a warning notice on the label.
Mary
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16 years ago
Schoolchildren used to try to suck it up from the gaps in the floorboards with pipettes. Ha! It taught them more about density than any lesson!
No, I admit to using modern wax dyes - but I tell the customers that they're not authentic.
I do have a small source of genuine verdigris which I keep being told is poisonous so I don't eat it.
:-)
Mary
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16 years ago
The message from "Mary Fisher" contains these words:
I have another. A childhood friend of mine (say about 16 years old) once bought a small glass phial of mercury. His stated purpose was to refine the gold from a collection of fountain pen nibs he had accumulated. We were down on the seafront when he proclaimed this and, perhaps luckily for him, in showing off his mercury he dropped and broke his container on the concrete surface of the prom and his mercury was too dispersed to recover.
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16 years ago
Yes, well _that_ really is nasty, and very easily absorbed. Likewise realgar.
Either of these pigments has a tendency to make you start wearing all-black 8-)
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16 years ago
He (or she I think) would have been about 1/13 submerged.
-- Richard
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16 years ago
Oh I like that kind of enterprise!
Spouse used to handle mercury a lot and the small gold signet ring I gave him became very thin and eventually parted company with itself.
Mary
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16 years ago
My winding sheet isn't black! Just pure, natural, hand-spun hand-woven (not by me) linen.
Mary
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16 years ago
Of course I would. And if your wine label had a skull and crossbones and said "once opened this product will release vapourised mercury which will be hazardous to your health and will require the assistance of a hazmat team to clean up" you probably would be put off. On the other hand if you are a smoker you ignore such warnings every day.
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16 years ago
I haven't smoked since 20 February 1983. Before warning labels.
I don't think I would be put off such a warning on a wine bottle though, there are more important issues with wine :-) There's no reason why mercury in any form (except that which is naturally in the atmosphere) should be present in a bottle of wine.
Mary
Mary
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16 years ago
No, but the Dealer in Death, Realgar, Orpiment, Verdigris, Argentum and Muffed Mules _always_ wears black. I believe I once introduced you
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16 years ago
You don't expect me to remember surely? A lot of flesh has gone under the knife since then ...
Mary
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16 years ago
SPRUE!!!
Just in case anyone's still reading :-)
Mary
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16 years ago
No it's the Mercury that does it :-)
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16 years ago
Considering the many experiences of handling mercury written about in his thread, it is surprising that mercury poisoning is not more common.
Physics and chemistry teachers should be falling down in large numbers and littering our schools if the risks are so great.
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16 years ago
Considering the poor standards of science teaching and uptake of science subjects over the past generation, that is not impossible....