With regard to paper cups and containers - interesting side-note is that you can actually boil water over a naked flame in one of these or a similar bigger paper container.

Now, you might think that the paper would burst into flame, but no. Apparently, water boils at 100 deg C but paper bursts into flame at a much higher temperature than that. Being that the paper container has water in it, it will never go above 100 deg and burst into flame.

So, the next time you go camping and need some boiling water....

da5id_nz

When I was in the sixth grade one of my teachers provided a water cooler to the class. In order to subsidize this expense, she asked each kid to pay for a paper cup to get the water. The expectation was that the cups would get thrown away soon after use and the money would keep flowing in. I used to make these out of lined paper and sneak free drinks. The water turned blue pretty fast though, and it tasted like paper. The alternative was water that tasted like a swimming pool, so it was worth it.

Looking back, I feel bad about taking money from our poor school teacher. At the time I didn't understand the world like I do now.

mailman-zero

Oh, man, I remember making these in junior high -- most classes had a water cooler, due to the fact that the tap water out here is nigh-undrinkable without filtration, but they never restocked the cups, so we just made these.

Coloring the paper with a crayon isn't strictly necessary, BTW; just use copier paper and drink real fast.

HeartBurnKid

...just in case I get trapped in a paper factory overnight and the only water i can find is by sticking my arm out of a window to catch rainwater dripping from the eaves.

Iron

my art teacher in highschool made us make these to get a drink of water. we had a sink in the classroom so he felt that there was no need to leave the room to get a drink... wow that was a long time ago

inthepit

@longbourne: i see your post

DSaddict

Reminds me of the days when i would make "lab Coffee" using those stupid round filters, bunson burner and 2 500ml beakers. ahh, them were the days!

DSaddict

I can't view the comments today. I know they're there because they're previewed on the main page. (And yes, I tried reloading the page with extensions turned off.)
What's the deal?
Hey... what if no-one can see this? Freeeeaky.

longbourne

Ordinary wax crayons, while non-toxic, aren't considered food-grade wax so stick with wax paper and not wikiHow's suggestion. Unbleached parchment paper is probably a safer material than art store construction paper.

cv

Oh my goodness I haven't seen one of these since elementary school when we thought we were little engineers making them to drink out of the water fountains.

JFitzpatrick

pps, regarding my above post - i did some research on the boiling thing and everything2 says not to used waxed paper - safety first!

da5id_nz

"Howto wiki wikiHow"
I see what you did there...

Klink

Well, any standard piece of Bond paper will work for up to three times if you drink fast enough (even notebook pages will work but, alas, less times).

This comes useful when you see the paper cups outside it's dispenser (yucky fingers all over).

whiskey

I've been doing this since I was 8. Whenever I needed a drink in science class and wasn't given permission to leave the room I always used that option. Very usefull in highschool.

thetillmiester