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They put this stuff in computer duster cans to discourage inhalant abuse, and it has caused me the same grief. Dust the keyboard, type on the keyboard, eat some

They put this stuff in computer duster cans to discourage inhalant abuse, and it has caused me the same grief. Dust the keyboard, type on the keyboard, eat some food with my fingers - boom, gross.

userbinator 4y ago
You can get cans without the bitterant, but at slightly higher prices... which incidentally makes a great refrigerant too.
- Centigonal 4y ago
  good to know! I ended up buying a ryobi battery-powered "high volume power inflator." I think it's meant for air mattresses, but it does a great job at dusting electronics.
- kube-system 4y ago
  Most dusters literally are 134a refrigerant.
  - userbinator 4y ago
    They used to be (and thus a cheap way to recharge car A/C) but I believe they're mostly R152a now --- which is quite close in pressure/temperature characteristics to the old CFC R12.
    - kube-system 4y ago
      Ah, my brain was out of date, you are right. And in fact the can at my desk says difluoroethane.
calvinmorrison 4y ago
Like denatured alcohol. It's just ethanol plus poison so you can't drink it and avoid paying taxes. "the Anti-Saloon League persisted, arguing that legal alcohol had killed many more in its day than denatured alcohol would kill during the transition to a teetotaling world. “The Government is under no obligation to furnish the people with alcohol that is drinkable when the Constitution prohibits it,” said advocate Wayne B. Wheeler. “The person who drinks this industrial alcohol is a deliberate suicide… To root out a bad habit costs many lives and long years of effort…”"
- jrockway 4y ago
  I've always been super weirded out that we're willing to poison people for not paying their fair share of taxes. The extra abstraction layer seems to make people comfortable; if after your tax evasion trial you were found guilty and the judge walked up to you, put a funnel in your mouth, and force-fed you poison, society would be outraged. But if you structure it as a discount for buying poisonous alcohol, then it's perfectly fine. (Alcohol is an especially weird thing to tax, in my opinion. Take some sugar water. Leave it sitting around. Boom! Alcohol. Tax evader's dream.) I haven't really kept up on what the opioid epidemic is up to, but I also think it's weird that we cut opioids with acetaminophen. You don't want people to overdose on "the good stuff", so we put something in it that destroys your liver? That seems a little cruel to me. Any cop can reverse an opioid overdose. Nobody can reverse an acetaminophen overdose. You just die. I guess "first, do no harm" is ambiguous and only applies to actual medical doctors, not necessarily bureaucrats? Public policy can be weird at times. We should, as a society, poison people less.
  - tialaramex 4y ago
    In many countries (e.g in Europe) they don't - poison people that is, the usual formulation for the cheaper untaxed "denatured" alcohol isn't poisonous but it has Bitrex in it so that people won't drink it. Well, I say it isn't poisonous, it's alcohol, alcohol is poisonous anyway, for much the reason you identified with paracetamol, the liver can't process more than a tiny amount and is seriously damaged if you use more, but people do. Anyway, it's a sin tax. We tax things we want the population not to do, to discourage them, and because if they insist on doing them anyway even though they're a bad idea, why not collect money? In my country we tax petrol (gasoline), sugary drinks, booze, cigarettes, all above the normal levels because those things are a bad idea and it'd be better if you stopped.
philjohn 4y ago
Good a time as any to mention powered computer dusters. Got one a few years ago and it's already paid for itself many times over.
- droopyEyelids 4y ago
  Before anyone like me gets excited about this, know that they are as loud as a jet engine. Good in some situations, inappropriate in an office environment, wear hearing protection.

They put this stuff in computer duster cans to discourage inhalant abuse, and it has caused me the same grief. Dust the keyboard, type on the keyboard, eat some food with my fingers - boom, gross.

userbinator 4y ago

You can get cans without the bitterant, but at slightly higher prices... which incidentally makes a great refrigerant too.

Centigonal 4y ago
good to know! I ended up buying a ryobi battery-powered "high volume power inflator." I think it's meant for air mattresses, but it does a great job at dusting electronics.
kube-system 4y ago
Most dusters literally are 134a refrigerant.
- userbinator 4y ago
  They used to be (and thus a cheap way to recharge car A/C) but I believe they're mostly R152a now --- which is quite close in pressure/temperature characteristics to the old CFC R12.
  - kube-system 4y ago
    Ah, my brain was out of date, you are right. And in fact the can at my desk says difluoroethane.

calvinmorrison 4y ago

Like denatured alcohol. It's just ethanol plus poison so you can't drink it and avoid paying taxes. "the Anti-Saloon League persisted, arguing that legal alcohol had killed many more in its day than denatured alcohol would kill during the transition to a teetotaling world. “The Government is under no obligation to furnish the people with alcohol that is drinkable when the Constitution prohibits it,” said advocate Wayne B. Wheeler. “The person who drinks this industrial alcohol is a deliberate suicide… To root out a bad habit costs many lives and long years of effort…”"

jrockway 4y ago
I've always been super weirded out that we're willing to poison people for not paying their fair share of taxes. The extra abstraction layer seems to make people comfortable; if after your tax evasion trial you were found guilty and the judge walked up to you, put a funnel in your mouth, and force-fed you poison, society would be outraged. But if you structure it as a discount for buying poisonous alcohol, then it's perfectly fine. (Alcohol is an especially weird thing to tax, in my opinion. Take some sugar water. Leave it sitting around. Boom! Alcohol. Tax evader's dream.) I haven't really kept up on what the opioid epidemic is up to, but I also think it's weird that we cut opioids with acetaminophen. You don't want people to overdose on "the good stuff", so we put something in it that destroys your liver? That seems a little cruel to me. Any cop can reverse an opioid overdose. Nobody can reverse an acetaminophen overdose. You just die. I guess "first, do no harm" is ambiguous and only applies to actual medical doctors, not necessarily bureaucrats? Public policy can be weird at times. We should, as a society, poison people less.
- tialaramex 4y ago
  In many countries (e.g in Europe) they don't - poison people that is, the usual formulation for the cheaper untaxed "denatured" alcohol isn't poisonous but it has Bitrex in it so that people won't drink it. Well, I say it isn't poisonous, it's alcohol, alcohol is poisonous anyway, for much the reason you identified with paracetamol, the liver can't process more than a tiny amount and is seriously damaged if you use more, but people do. Anyway, it's a sin tax. We tax things we want the population not to do, to discourage them, and because if they insist on doing them anyway even though they're a bad idea, why not collect money? In my country we tax petrol (gasoline), sugary drinks, booze, cigarettes, all above the normal levels because those things are a bad idea and it'd be better if you stopped.

philjohn 4y ago

Good a time as any to mention powered computer dusters. Got one a few years ago and it's already paid for itself many times over.

droopyEyelids 4y ago
Before anyone like me gets excited about this, know that they are as loud as a jet engine. Good in some situations, inappropriate in an office environment, wear hearing protection.