h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Yeah, I know I'm not meant to be here. BUT:

http://www.ma-astro.de/bock/item_print.php5?lang=en&id=1652&PHPSESSID=fc532208399ed889912790a37f8ecfee


£30. Lidl.

Didn't work for me or my sprogs.

I got a fantastic microscope with a full assortment of blank slides with coverslips and stains (along with a small group of already prepared slides). I ended up a lowly cameraman.

I passed it on to my children and they became: a teacher, a bike mechanic and a coffee house manager.

Not a Nobel prize in the lot.

same here... I also had an electronics set and several chemistry sets

School killed off all desire for any of those, but my love of simple electronics remains.

Sure. But they also have an exceptionally mellow grappa reserva for £12.

oh and we're not using Lidl. Because of spying on the employees going to the loo. (unless they are having that British Specialities offer again. We want more shortbread, cheese and Ribena-like-substance)

*mellow grappa*- isn't that an oxymoron?

We had a telescope and a microscope when we were kids. My mom never let us actually *use* them. They were too "fragile, and expensive".

Money well spent, investing in equipment and then not letting anyone use it.

What sorts of things will yours being looking at under their microscope, do you think, Ed?

According to The Grauniad/ Bad Science's Ben Godacre, the Lidl model is easily good enough to see wiggly things in one's sperm. Only... my ejaculate doesn't contain wiggly things.

My father-in-law is diabetic, so natch I shall be availing myself of one of his finger prick thingies.

The prepared slides that come with it include stuff like a fly's leg, onion epidermis and pine pollen.

And it also comes with a jar of yeast, some shrimp eggs and a hatchery.

*Major* good value, I'd say.

I can also detache the camera and use it for looking at Lidl employees in the toilets. Do a Chuck Berry.

A microscope was what got me through life from the age of 7. I never stopped nagging about getting one until I got one. And then by 10, I had 3. The hours I spent looking at crystals growing using the polarizing filters to created amazing colours as a slide' water would evaporate and the crystals in the solution grew. The hours I spent watching all manner of protozoa and rotifers doing their thing, in slime which grew from some garden grass left in water for a few days. And then staining bacteria with eosin dyes. And yes I did the tiny shrimp egg hatchery thing too. Later on I got a dissecting microscope which is relatively low powered but which shows you the exterior stuctures of things, ie no light passes through the sample like in a normal microscope. Boy did I, and still do love microscopes. A whole world to study endlessly. Every kid in the country should be given one for free....

Agreed, but not all will blossom with one, unfortunately.

This has got all the different light sources, including polarised. It's not *quite* free...just near as dammit.

QUICK: They've been in Lidl since Xmas. There are only one or two left.

>>Agreed, but not all will blossom with one, unfortunately.

Sure. So look out in Lidl for an inexpensive carpentry kit (*loads* of circular saws and stuff there), electric geetars, art materials, embroidery kits, unusual food ingredients...

Treat them as a way of throwing affordable experiences at kids. That's our job. It's *their* job to make something of that - something we wouldn't have dreamt of.

Indeed. Every child should have a circular saw, an electric guitar & a microscope. I would add a Spirograph to that list for a fully rounded personality.

zdt

I had a Spirograph. Gawd, I loved using that. My grandma used to bring home reams and reams of printouts from work so I could use the blank side to make patterns with my spirograph.

Spirographs are most kids' first drug experience. Aren't they?



Not that there's anything wrong with that...

I've just discovered that an old boss of mine has done some design consultancy for Lego.

I have all the power tools (but I go to Aldi instead of Lidl)

Next time there's a microscope, we're having one.