Would one of you scientists help me out. When I was a kid back in the 50s Mercury was a coveted commodity to us kids. We would rub it on dimes and make them like mirrors. We would have races with balls of it. We found all kinds of ways to play with it. We would carefully save our stash in a bottle until it had all eventually been "used up" or lost in the races or what ever. Why aren't all guys, at least :-), in my age group eaten up with Mercury poisoning. In short, I'm asking, is it as dangerous as we are told?