speaking of 'static city'-- gregg eshelman related how two different items he won on eBay came packed without any awareness of static packing conditions, one bare in foam peanuts, the other in an open antistatic bag smacking around inside a tyvek envelope.
did either of them survive, gregg? in light of these ignorances, I think it is s a good idea for us to educate others where ever we find them, and make them understand the importance of this. I just received a large crate of mdse I ordered from the Shreve systems closeout. thankfully each individual item came packed as if it were new-in-box in the original manufacturers packaging, but all of these were then smothered and buried in styrofoam packing peanuts to fill the volume of the parcel. as I tunneled in and discovered and removed each hidden item, the static in the peanuts built and built, until they were clinging to everything in sight. this troubled me greatly. I laid each thing out by itself on my bed [hopefully a low static environment, since I have a lot of natural organic materials in my decor--a futon bare- wood bed frame on a bare wood floor in an old weed house, cotton sheets, a down and cotton comforter, grass mats on the walls and like that...] and didn't open any of the boxes until I had hand loaded all the loose peanuts into a trash bag, sealed it, put it outside, washed my hands, and moved a chunky old speaker magnet i use for a paperweight, across the room as far from the new mac toys as i could put it. even with all these measures, I was irked with shreve for using postal peanuts that they knew would generate a hell of a static field in transit as they tumbled around in the box on their jouncing way from louisiana to los angeles to me. why don't these people think??!! as I was gathering up the peanuts into the trash bag, it kept going thru my mind how some enterprising organic guys, a few years back, hit on the good idea of replacing foam penuts with using plain, hot air popped popcorn as excelsior instead. not only does it do the same job of cushioning from shocks and shifting, but it's biodegradeable at the end.,. you can sprinkle it outdoors for birds or compost it, or reuse it if you need to turn around and send off something else. and I beleive it probably doesn't generate the storm of static that styrofoam pellets do. I was really iffy about opening up all the boxes in the shipment, then, knowing that the peanuts had created so much static among themselves, and on the box they came in, the packages in the shipment, and on my body, while running my hands thru them, to dig everything out and dispose of the pellets. I was truly afraid to open anything until I could think of a way to dispell all those random clinging electrons off everything. Hell, I had all kinds of brand new circuit boards with RAM chips on them, and a number of floppies, and it just aggravated me, that this needless electron swarm had been created, in the one place where people should know better!!! I had some small anitstatic bags in the other room, which I had someone go get for me, and I managed to maneuver two RAM sticks and a cache card into their own bags without touching them, folded them over and taped them shut, but I still worry that there were too many stray eelctrons floating around in the wake of that unpacking zone. how long after such an event does such static hang around? will there still be static clinging to the box[es] after, say, a week, sitting over in the corner of the room? what should I do to dispell whatever might be still hanging around, before I can feel safe going and handling any of the stuff again? I did not open any of the new parts out of their closed antistatic bags they came in yet. just looked thru the bag to read the cards. people have got to made to understand!!!! aauugghh! janet http://community.webtv.net/mensabrains/BADCODE -- Vintage Macs is sponsored by <http://lowendmac.com/> and... Small Dog Electronics http://www.smalldog.com | Enter To Win A | -- Canon PowerShot Digital Cameras start at $299 | Free iBook! | Support Low End Mac <http://lowendmac.com/lists/support.html> Vintage Macs list info: <http://lowendmac.com/lists/vintagemacs.shtml> The FAQ: <http://macfaq.org/> --> AOL users, remove "mailto:"; Send list messages to: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To unsubscribe, email: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> For digest mode, email: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subscription questions: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Archive: <http://www.mail-archive.com/vintage.macs%40mail.maclaunch.com/> Using a Mac? Free email & more at Applelinks! http://www.applelinks.com
