nothing but the best for the bachelorette,* you know (and it was on sale, of course).
*NB, all: i was decorating my apartment for the gussying-up-prior-to-heading-out-on-the-town phase of my friend's bachelorette party. as i am constitutionally incapable of buying penis paraphernalia, i decided to cover the ceiling with balloons. i tried to just get a dozen inflated at a party store, but they were really expensive and i couldn't figure out how to get them home in time. hence, tank.
the box claims the tank will fill about fifty 9" latex balloons, and i've probably done...twenty-five or so already? i've been blowing one up for the cats every other day for the past week. it's not the sturdiest tank ever (you can't get it refilled, you just have to recycle it), but the valve can be shut relatively tightly; i think we'll easily get $29.99 worth of fun out of it (that's what it cost, with ribbons and balloons included; by contrast, the cheapest filled-balloon price quote i got was 99 cents apiece, or $10 for a dozen, and a cab home from union square with tip, assuming i could squish the balloons inside,* would have been $12-$15).
*from what i could gather from other people leaving the party place, your average new york city cab fits a dozen balloons. if, you know, anyone ever asks.
in other news, if any of you are feeling burly and can crunch the numbers re: density and vacuums more capably than i can, i'd love to know whether the tank will feel lighter when it runs out of helium than it did when i first purchased it (our only home scale is crappy, so the empirical evidence i can provide at the end of this will be sketchy at best). the tank holds approximately 14.9 cubic feet of helium when full, a cubic foot of helium weighs 28.2 grams, and a cubic foot of air at 85 degrees appears to weigh about 33.05 grams. SCIENCE!
i don't even know if those are the variables one would need to make that calculation, now that i think about it. sad.
Depends on if the helium tank has a one-way valve or not (and I think the latter would be pretty unlikely). The tank is initially filled with pressurized helium, and it will "run out" of pressure before it runs out of helium - that is, when the pressure inside the tank becomes the same as the pressure outside the tank, helium will stop flowing out of the tank. Since pressurized helium is heavier than less-pressurized helium, the tank should get progressively lighter. :)
if you're gonna break down, i guess a helium tank *is* the way to go.
ReplyDeleteAnd then you squeaked, "Yay!"
ReplyDeleteit was the best day of steve's life.
ReplyDeleteSHUT. UP.
ReplyDeleteA *pink* helium tank, no less. Well done.
ReplyDeletenothing but the best for the bachelorette,* you know (and it was on sale, of course).
ReplyDelete*NB, all: i was decorating my apartment for the gussying-up-prior-to-heading-out-on-the-town phase of my friend's bachelorette party. as i am constitutionally incapable of buying penis paraphernalia, i decided to cover the ceiling with balloons. i tried to just get a dozen inflated at a party store, but they were really expensive and i couldn't figure out how to get them home in time. hence, tank.
I love that buying the tank was easier than buying filled balloons. How does that happen?
ReplyDeleteHow long does a helium tank last? I would be tempted to make it a whole month of balloons.
the box claims the tank will fill about fifty 9" latex balloons, and i've probably done...twenty-five or so already? i've been blowing one up for the cats every other day for the past week. it's not the sturdiest tank ever (you can't get it refilled, you just have to recycle it), but the valve can be shut relatively tightly; i think we'll easily get $29.99 worth of fun out of it (that's what it cost, with ribbons and balloons included; by contrast, the cheapest filled-balloon price quote i got was 99 cents apiece, or $10 for a dozen, and a cab home from union square with tip, assuming i could squish the balloons inside,* would have been $12-$15).
ReplyDelete*from what i could gather from other people leaving the party place, your average new york city cab fits a dozen balloons. if, you know, anyone ever asks.
in other news, if any of you are feeling burly and can crunch the numbers re: density and vacuums more capably than i can, i'd love to know whether the tank will feel lighter when it runs out of helium than it did when i first purchased it (our only home scale is crappy, so the empirical evidence i can provide at the end of this will be sketchy at best). the tank holds approximately 14.9 cubic feet of helium when full, a cubic foot of helium weighs 28.2 grams, and a cubic foot of air at 85 degrees appears to weigh about 33.05 grams. SCIENCE!
ReplyDeletei don't even know if those are the variables one would need to make that calculation, now that i think about it. sad.
Depends on if the helium tank has a one-way valve or not (and I think the latter would be pretty unlikely). The tank is initially filled with pressurized helium, and it will "run out" of pressure before it runs out of helium - that is, when the pressure inside the tank becomes the same as the pressure outside the tank, helium will stop flowing out of the tank. Since pressurized helium is heavier than less-pressurized helium, the tank should get progressively lighter. :)
ReplyDeletesir, you get today's high-five for science (more on that later).
ReplyDelete