what is a lava lamp and how does it work?
Is it the result of some ghastly industrial accident or did someone create it on purpose? — Jim Geckle, Brian Repp, Tim Ray, Lindor Henrickson, Greenbelt, Maryland Cecil replies: As you know, boys, we at the Straight Dope strive at all times to be cool. However, nothing we have ever done even approaches the coolness of our latest feat, namely visiting the actual lava lamp factory, the source–nay, the font–of all the world’s lava lamps. (Actually, all the lava lamps sold in the Americas, but what’s a couple continents between friends?) It’s located in a funky old neighborhood in Chicago, has a front office staffed largely by little old ladies, and goes under the fittingly grandiloquent name of Lava-Simplex Internationale. As Cecil’s more venerable readers know, the lava lamp was one of the three indispensable components of the properly furnished 60s apartment, the other two being a black-light poster and a waterbed. The lamp consists of a glass jar (technically known as a “globe”) fil
