When We Were Still Free

generation.

I hope they clone two. One is the loneliest number, but I suppose two could be as bad as one.

At least for something like those science kits, we've largely brought it upon ourselves through product liability lawsuits.

That being said... if a kid is lucky enough to have good parents, technology and the Internet has more than made up for the lack of nicely pre-packaged science kits: Think of how much more sophisticated kids' robots are today, and if you're into model rocketry... it's now easy to rub elbows with the "big boys" like these:

"Rocket Boys" is a great book and decent movie.

---Joel

The movie being "October Sky". My kid enjoyed it.

On a sunny day (Tue, 18 Jan 2011 11:29:14 -0800) it happened "Joel Koltner" wrote in :

Yes? I wonder what would happen if you boarded a flight with the Gilbert chemistry set as present or your kid in your hand luggage.

CNN would give you world wide coverage.

On a sunny day (Tue, 18 Jan 2011 11:29:14 -0800) it happened "Joel Koltner" wrote in :

set as present or your kid in your hand luggage.

Correction: 'or' should be 'for', but the effect would be the same. CNN would give you world wide coverage.

We had a #6 1/2 Erector set. When I saw the page, I almost wept.

We also had a chemistry set with a whole bunch of stuff that's probably illegal now. )-;

Thanks! Rich

If I was a kid today I would not have done the chemistry thing with bombs and rockets. It would be programming and AI

I suspect modern chem sets contain only harmless edible stuff (so the morons can't bring lawsuits). googling...

An anagram of Rocket Boys. My water rockets site used to be the top link on Homer Hickam's site for people who wanted to experiment with rockets.

Clifford Heath

Can you even buy a water rocket anymore? The nanny state doesn't allow them.

Stupidity of the week: You can legally buy fireworks in Arizona, but it's illegal to fire them off ;-) ...Jim Thompson

"Jim Thompson" wrote in message news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com...

Sure, just search for "water rocket" on Amazon -- there are many.

I'm sure that was considered qutie a coup for some group!

You don't have to. They're trivially easy to build:

Cheers! Rich

Even includes the requisite warning about how deadly dangerous it is, with the PVC pipe potentially blowing up in your face and all... until someone points out that the pipe would typically be rated 600PSI or so, roughly an order of magnitude greater than the pressure it'll actually contain.

I got a semi-spam message from my State Farm insurance agent providing tips on things such as how to be safe with fabric grocery bags, that are being promoted as a way to be "green" and keep plastic or paper bags out of landfills. Their suggestions? To avoid contamination, put fruits, meat, etc. first into ...guess what... their own plastic bags first! When you get home, if you're concerned about the cleanliness of the bag, wash it in *hot* water!

Um hmm...

Well, there are those flimsy 1 min poly bags in a roll in the produce section - you usually use one of those before you put the fruit or veggie in the cart anyway, and they don't have handles or anything, so they end up in the trash, and nobody throws them in the street, so they don't go strangle the fishes or anything.

But yeah - those cloth bags are total breeding grounds for the dreaded BACTERIA!!! =:-O

Cheers! Rich

Water rockets != bottle rockets. The original Park Plastics design for water rockets (which were pretty lame anyhow) get duplicated every now and then, and the Air Hog and Super Soaker folks have also both had a go. But there's no need to buy anything...

My launcher design is tested to 200PSI, which is all that even the strongest PET bottles (the really narrow ones) will hold, and you can build it in an afternoon with plastic plumbing, cable ties, an O-ring, a tire valve and some epoxy. A 24 floz (660ml) Pepsi bottle with the right fins will easily reach 450 feet and >10 seconds ballistic flight. Great way for kids to learn a heap of science.

My simulation has been online for >15 years, and has run close to a million simulations. It's widely trusted; the known errors occur only in unusual situations so it's pretty accurate.

There's a Yahoo group for discussing them, see .

Clifford Heath.

I liked the idea of taking a kid in a hand luggage, though. :-)

younger generation.

"Bite me!"

SP > I hope they clone two. One is the loneliest SP > number, but I suppose two SP > could be as bad as one. =A0

LOL

I'm all for strangling the folks who throw plastic bags or other trash into the street. :-)

OK, not entirely... but I suppose that is one upside of paper bags: If some moron does litter the street with them, at least they quickly decay naturally, whereas to my knowledge most plastic bags are made of a type of plastic that doesn't.

Before plastic bags, I suppose one wrapped their fruit and veggies in... regular old paper? Waxed paper?

---Joel