It's Easy Being Mean

Ok, so here's how it went down. I brought some liquid nitrogen to school. And right now I know the 8th grader in your soul is jumping up and down with excitement and interrupting me already so let's pause the story right now and answer the questions:

1. Yes, you can buy liquid nitrogen.

2. I don't know if they sell it to kids, you might have to take your parents and convince them to buy it for you.

3. It's free if you have connections, you just give them a $600 deposit for the container and they give you your money back when you bring it back.

4. No, liquid nitrogen is not radioactive. It's just nitrogen, but really, really cold. That's why it's liquid.

5. I know, right?! This is going to be so cool.

6. Ok kids, put on your safety goggles.

I started by pouring some liquid nitrogen into a styrofoam container and put a balloon in it. It deflated immediately but when I pulled it out with tongs it inflated right back up. It was pretty cool.

Then I tossed some mini marshmallows in and after pulling them out with the tongs, I crushed them up with a hammer. Everyone was delighted by this. Then I popped one in my mouth and when I opened my mouth "smoke" came billowing out. Everyone had to try this, so that took a few minutes. I could have ended it right there and been the best science teacher ever. But I had a few tricks up my sleeve; up my glove actually. Literally. Seriously.

I had a hot dog stuffed into the thumb spot of my glove. As I was setting up the next demo I let my “thumb” drop into the liquid nitrogen; it starting fizzy and bubbling and boiling away and freezing the hot dog solid. I made a few comments about how cold it was. “Oh wow, I can’t even feel my thumb anymore, it’s completely numb!”

So I pulled it out of the Nitrogen and set my hand on the counter. Then I picked up the hammer and sort of pushed it against my thumb and continued to exclaim that I couldn’t feel anything at all. Then I raised that hammer up into the air and smashed it down on the “thumb” and all heck broke loose. The glove and bits of frozen hot dog exploded into the air and rained down out onto the counter and floor around it. Before I even smashed it down though I was laughing and smiling and as it was smashing I was already saying things like it’s just a joke, it’s not real. I think only about 10 of the kids thought it was real and only for about 2 seconds. But it was AWESOME. Also, super mean.

I quickly won them over when I pulled a carton of ice cream mix onto the counter and made chocolate ice cream. I certainly wouldn’t say every day of science is this exciting but we have a good time in there.

Here's a pic of me mixing the ice cream with a flat butter knife, I tried to use a spoon but it didn't really work because the top froze solid when I poured the liquid nitrogen into the ice cream. I was using the knife to poke holes into the ice to get down into the liquid ice cream below. It took a second dose of nitrogen and a lot of stirring but it tasted great. Very smooth and creamy.