Bizarrely, this book is about a foot closer than APOGS.
When we arrived, we climbed up a little bridge, and then I pulled the sodium out of its oil with tongs and flung it into the water beneath. It took fire instantly and sped around and around on the surface like a demented meteor, with a huge sheet of yellow flame above it. We all exulted -- this was chemistry with a vengeance!
There were other other members of the alkali metal family even more reactive than sodium and potassium, metals like rubidium and cesium (there was also the lightest and least reactive, lithium). It was fascinating to compare the reactions of all five by putting small lumps of each into water.
-- Oliver Sacks, Uncle Tungsten: Memories of a Chemical Boyhood
no subject
When we arrived, we climbed up a little bridge, and then I pulled the sodium out of its oil with tongs and flung it into the water beneath. It took fire instantly and sped around and around on the surface like a demented meteor, with a huge sheet of yellow flame above it. We all exulted -- this was chemistry with a vengeance!
There were other other members of the alkali metal family even more reactive than sodium and potassium, metals like rubidium and cesium (there was also the lightest and least reactive, lithium). It was fascinating to compare the reactions of all five by putting small lumps of each into water.
-- Oliver Sacks, Uncle Tungsten: Memories of a Chemical Boyhood
*does not want to put in own LJ especially.*