Re: I think I want to live in a cave underground...

On Thu, 15 Mar 2007 00:52:03 +0000, Jonathan L Cunningham wrote:

Ric Locke <warrick.locke@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

pencil nor the colored one contains any trace of lead -- especially
nowadays for you in the EU, where that would be considered a hazardous
material to be handled by experts with gloves -- there's no particular

Heh :-)

Curiously enough, until recently, people drove around in cars fuelled by
petrol (gasoline)[*] with tetra-ethyl lead as an additive. Probably
reduced the average IQ of a couple of generations by one or two points.

I have an old thermometer with mercury in it. I think it's illegal.

And I own a couple of swords. I know that's illegal.

And I sometimes think impure thoughts. I expect that will soon be
illegal, too.

When I was a child, I had a chance to play with some mercury - swooshing
it around, holding it in my hand, that kind of thing. It's obviously
driven me insane.

Jonathan
(Obviously very criminal. Criminally insane? Blame the mercury.)

[*] Nowadays, in Europe, diesel engines which emit PM10 particulates are
favoured instead. AFAIK, these only cause asthma and lung cancer. So
that's all right then. Although, out of quixotic foolishness, I refuse
to buy or drive such things, even though it would save me money. (It's
quite possible to filter out the particulates, but it's not politically
exciting, so it's not imminent.)

Heh yourself. I haven't any swords -- my brother took my father's souvenir
of the Pacific... I do have old batteries.

In my youf, collecting old batteries was a profitable endeavor, not in the
make-a-mint sense but a nice bit of extra change, spendable at Lockett's
Drug for the latest Edmund Hamilton. They were hard to find, because lots
of other people were hunting them for similar reasons. I would prowl the
area towing my toy wagon, and once in a great while one would turn up and I
would take it to town. $2 for a car battery, $5 for a large truck battery,
IIRC.

Nowadays, the instant a battery is removed from the car it becomes
Hazardous Waste, requiring a license to transport it. (Why this is not the
case while it's /in/ the car is not at all clear, at least to me.) The
license isn't cheap, nor are the measures the transporters are required to
take to ensure safety, so in order to dispose of a battery one must pay. It
costs $5 to get rid of one. As a result, everyone I know has at least one
old battery lying by the shed, leaching lead compounds into the soil.
Personally I have three at the moment... unintended consequences are a
glorious thing. The roads are full of hybrid cars these days. What happens
when the batteries go, as they surely will? One of those things lying by
the shed should be enough to stupidify a moderately large population.

Regards,
Ric

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