Apptech wrote:
> 1.    There's your source - dead fluro tubes - available for
> free all over. You could probably make an extractor that
> removes much of the powder in a single pass. Taking the ends
> off cleanly and rendering the end product safe left as an
> exercise for the student.

Those were old, Soviet-era tubes. Modern fluorescents have very little 
mercury, and the tubes you're likely to find at the dump may even have none:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fluorescent_lamp#Loss_of_mercury

> 2.    When I was very young (memories of AA Milne book title
> flit across hind brain) I bit a thermometer and swallowed
> the mercury. It appeared to do no harm, although some would
> say that ... .

Oh yeah, that certainly explains certain things, like your tendency to... 
no, Russell, I'd say that you have suffered absolutely no ill effects. ;-)

I remember reading somewhere that in the olden times patients suffering from 
twisted bowels were made to drink a pint of mercury to straighten them out. 
I'm curious if there are any records of what happened to these patients.

There's no doubt that mercury poisoning is real, but I think it takes more 
than a single exposure to get a harmful dose.

Vitaliy 

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