Lol wolfy. I know the feeling. Mine is way overdue for a huge clearout. And since actually I very rarely use it anymore (I find my bedsprings hurt my hips for one thing, and have to sleep with a pillow between my knees. Although thats only one reason. I was thinking I could just use all the shelving and such that haven't got books on or indeed anywhere close to them, for keeping more lab glassware and reagents that do not show corrosive properties, that are not pyrophoric (pyrophoric meaning they burst into flames on contact with air, or in some cases on contact with the atmospheric (or from any other source of course) water vapor. n-BuLi would be a good example. Lol I've heard some funny tales about people pissing about with syringes that they use to transfer the stuff from bottle (they have self-sealing rubber layers on them through which to plunge a cannula, attached to a syringe, and then quickly transfer that in an air-free glovebox to a similar selfhealing septum placed over the relevant neck of the reaction flask), but instead of doing that, just loading up the large syringes containing for example, the butyllithium, phenyllithium, methyllithium, sodium hydride etc. dissolved as a solution in toluene and, in the atmosphere(!) simply depressing the plunger. Never done it but apparently you get a really neat arcing jet of flames, as the alkyl- or aryllithium in (highly flammable) tolly autoignites the moment it leaves the tip of the syringe cannula, bursting into flame as it travels through the air
Call us chemist types big kids at heart, but we are a very well known crowd for japes like that, where its safe to piss about. The prototypical example being the potassium party, or sodium party. Meaning a crowd gathers, bringing the alkali metal or metals in question with them, and proceed to get drunk (or indulge in whatever else that a person may prefer in place of, or along with the drinking, and generally proceed to have a riotous time tossing lumps of sodium or potassium metal into water, pouring in the liquid NAK alloy (Na-K, an alloy in various proportions of sodium and potassium is a liquid at room temperature and as it instantly spreads out on a water surface, the entire surface area, rather than just part of it immediately goes BOOOOOMFFFCRACKLKCRACKCRACKCRACK! as it initially explodes, blasting the remainder of the liquid alloy up high into the air, from whence it of course, must come down. Resulting in it raining molten, exploding pyrophoric metal. Or/and using various pressurized launchers, always homebuilt and a pleasure to see someone's efforts in their personal design of sodium/potassium-cannons (think spudgun, loaded with exploding ammunition rather than potatoes, generally powered by an electrically triggered sparkgap in a chamber that is designed to contain a mixture of oxygen or air, and one, or more combustible gases to provide the pressure and launch the projectile into a body of water.
Its hilarious fun doing it too. I remember a time in school where we had an empty fish tank, and I was...ahem...somewhat responsible for potassium (which is FAR more reactive and boom-ey compared to Na for people to lark about with.) being taken out in the belief of the person adding it to water, that it was indeed the requested sodium metal. A large chunk(!!! bwahahahahaha !!!) was cut from this block of potassium, about the size of a gobstopper, and tossed into the tank full of water. The tank did survive the experience since there was nothing to confine the shockwave coming from the blast, the lid was not on, but instead of skittering round on fire on the surface of the water, crackling and popping, you just heard 'now we are going to add the sodium t.....WHOOOOOOOOMMMPPP!CRACKRACKRACKRAKCRAKKKLEBOOOMFFsplassplashsplashbang! bang! bang!bang bang!'
Because it ignited instantly, exploded with a thump, blowing the potassium, molten now, right up onto the ceiling, and as luck (or rather, gleeful scheming) would have it, that patch of the ceiling that just so...err..happened...by chance of course;) to be directly under that tank of water. Exploded up onto the roof, then proceeded to come down as splattering melted potassium metal 'rain', falling every time back into the fish tank and being sent back up to rejoin the blob of potassium that had been.err...'persuaded' to audition for the part of a light fitting in SOMEONE's new theatrical production and from there, come back down again into the fish tank, in smaller and smaller portions each time, some being blown away, some burnt and some turned to caustic potash (potassium hydroxide, KOH) in the reaction with the water.
Everybody else in the room DIVED for cover under the tables, science teacher included IIRC. Or if she didn't then certainly got the hell outa dodge!.
I was more or less the only one still left standing there, admiring the purrty purpleish violet flames and gleefully basking in the utter, absolute and total uncontainable pure hilarity of the whole sequence of events. (K metal burns, as long as it be free from sodium, which burns with a characteristic orange flame, likewise its ions imbue a gas jet flame, if a bit of wire dipped in salt solution be introduced into a flame. Potassium on the other hand is easily covered up but gives a gorgeous shade of pale lilac-mauve-ey purpley blue.)
Shit, I still remember that day, it was an absolutely perfect valve to let loose the pressure cooker of day to day school stresses. Went off with a tremendous thump, though, and lots of crackling, popping, snapping, banging and sparking as it kept exploding. My, my, my my my those where the days. Such fun to be had that day in particular. That little jolly jape certainly kept me in amusement for several whole entire hours worth of inner cackling, snorffling myself silly until no more snorffles could be snorffled. Of course do not worry about me, though because that has recovered. *snorffle*
