John VanSickle wrote:

> [1] Yes, those of you who live near The Villages in Florida may have 
> seen this on the news.

When I was at school, the teacher *showed* us a bottle of mercury from 
the chemicals cupboard.

Yes, it probably shouldn't have a disintegrated cork for a lid. Still, 
metalic mercury is quite harmless. It's the oxide you want to worry 
about. What that...? Oh... Yes, it does oxidize quite well in air.

Apparently the school was "probably not supposed to keep this stuff any 
more". Whatever. I was *far* more concerned by the bottle at the back 
labelled "WARNING: Explosive when dry" containing an amorphus dry powder...

We also got to watch the teacher play with some sodium in a big water 
thank. And then us students got to play with some... magnisium ribbon. 
(Trust me, soaking magnisium in water isn't nearly so interesting. After 
an hour, a few bubbles had formed...)

Post a reply to this message