Random #352 – 50 Superb Random Facts

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26 Abolitionist Frederick Douglass

Abolitionist Frederick Douglass

American abolitionist Frederick Douglass was transferred to Baltimore as a child, where he learned the English alphabet from the mistress of the house. After the mistress’ husband ended their lessons, Douglass bartered bread with the starving kids in the area for lessons in reading and writing.


27. In order to keep the eyes of the deceased closed after death, funeral homes use spiked contact lenses.


28. Many comedic television series, including Community, It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, Brooklyn Nine-Nine, and many more, have included the fictitious potato chip brand Let’s Potato Chips. To avoid any potential copyright issues, the prop company Independent Studio Services created Let’s.


29. During the 1950s, turkey tails were dumped by American poultry companies into Samoan markets. 75% of a turkey’s tail is made out of fat, and the oil it uses to preen itself. It’s usually paired with a cold Budweiser. Officials in Samoa stopped allowing the entry of turkey tails in 2007 after discovering a link between the meat and the country’s obesity crisis.


30. When a pilot uses a Martin-Baker ejection seat to eject out of a plane, they are added to the “Ejectee Club” and given a special tie.


31 S.S. Eastland Disaster

S.S. Eastland Disaster

After the Titanic disaster, the S.S. Eastland, a tiny steamer, was so heavily loaded with lifeboats that it became unsteady and finally sank, killing 844 people.


32. The wild Sable Island Horse is endemic to a small sandbar in the Atlantic Ocean, about 100 miles off the coast of Nova Scotia. They were introduced to Sable Island in the 1700s and have now evolved into their own species. The Canadian government has passed a law protecting the remaining 500 wild horses.


33. Each deaf person has a distinctive “name sign” that was given to them by a friend or family member, and as per the hearing culture, only a deaf person is allowed to give a hearing person their own special name sign.


34. It’s a myth that Mozart was buried in a mass grave. In Vienna, a “common grave” was a non-aristocratic person’s burial that the city might dig up and reuse after a decade.


35. In 1993, the former Czechoslovakia broke apart into the independent nations of the Czech Republic and Slovakia. It was the only peaceful breakup of a former Eastern Bloc country. It was dubbed the “Velvet Divorce” because it was so peaceful.


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36 Sandy Island Myth

Sandy Island Myth

James Cook mapped Sandy Island, which he located in the Pacific Ocean near New Caledonia, in 1774. After being shown on maps and charts for almost 200 years, an Australian survey ship found proof in 2012 that the island had never been there and may have been a “pumice raft” instead.


37. The feet of Jesus were initially depicted in Leonardo da Vinci’s The Last Supper, one of the world’s most famous works of art, which was created for the Santa Maria delle Grazie cathedral in Milan. They were cut off to make room for a doorway.


38. Inside the U.S. Capitol dome, a painting of George Washington becoming a god takes up most of the space. It’s called “The Apotheosis of Washington,” and it’s clear that it’s just a metaphor for how people felt about our first president. He is surrounded by figures and signs from Greek and Roman mythology. Classical art styles were and still are very popular, and this gives you a small idea of how the Romans honored their emperors.


39. Roman legend says that Cleopatra won a bet with Mark Antony about who could throw the most expensive party by dissolving her priceless pearl earring in a glass of vinegar and drinking it.


40. Europe’s wine owes its existence to the grafting of vines onto American grape rootstock that wasn’t vulnerable to a species of aphid that was destined to wipe the industry out. In the late 1800s, Phylloxera, an insect that looked like an aphid, caused a lot of damage to European vineyards and almost put an end to the wine industry there.


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41 Genesis II

Genesis II

Censors demanded that female cast members of Star Trek cover their navels during filming. Gene Roddenberry was so irritated by this that in his 1973 TV movie “Genesis II,” he gave the villains two navels so that viewers could easily tell them apart.


42. Truckloads of bananas can trigger false alarms in radiation portal monitors (the things that detect nuclear material at the ports) because they are somewhat radioactive.


43. When Amelia Earhart failed to arrive at her last destination, Howland Island, a lighthouse was built there to honor her. The lighthouse on Howland Island was bombed during WWII and later rebuilt as an unlit beacon. Howland Island is now a nature sanctuary with no human occupants.


44. In 2009, a 22-year-old Chinese man by the name of Zhao C (赵C) was compelled to legally alter his name because it contained a Latin character that was not “part of the national standard for “numbers and symbols” of the People’s Republic of China.”


45. Koala bears have chlamydia, and they can’t take the same antibiotics that are used to treat chlamydia in humans because it would disrupt their gut bacteria balance, which they require to break down the eucalyptus leaves they consume.


15 Most Controversial & Costly Blunders in History


46 Asian Flush Response

Asian Flush Response

Those who have the “Asian flush” reaction after consuming alcohol are more likely to develop esophageal cancer than those who do not.


47. When a vault at Universal Studios caught fire in 2008, it destroyed between 118,000 and 175,000 audio master tapes and about 50,000 digital film files. The list of affected musicians includes Duke Ellington, Tupac Shakur, and the Banana Splits.


48. More than 250,000 American children who had been orphaned, abandoned, or homeless were taken by “Orphan Trains” from the East Coast to the Midwest between 1854 and 1921. There were “self-adoptions,” “family adoptions,” and even “auction-style adoptions” of these children once they reached their destination.


49. Up until the second century AD, Roman soldiers were not allowed to marry. Before then, spouses were illegal, and any offspring were regarded as illegitimate.


50. Putting up a 64-disk Tower of Hanoi would take around 585 billion years if each move took a second.


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1 COMMENT

    • There is a theory that his child was born with a defect and that the story that he was kidnapped was a cover for his parents to have him killed.

      823
      • It’s not a quite conspiracy theory. It is part of a theory that the kidnapping and ransom was a coverup that is well grounded in facts and significant research. An alternate theory in the same vein is that his sister in law killed the baby and it was covered up.

        I can’t remember the specific details of both, and why the theory is credible, but here’s a link to an article.

        Link

        832
        • The case has never had great details. Baby is said to have been taken and held for ransom, and when the ransom is paid, the body is found just outside the house in the woods. And it’s not as rotten as they would have thought, given that it’s just sitting on the topsoil with no effort to hide it. Where the family would have been able to see it if they had just looked out a window in that direction. Plus, the family’s response is controlling, except for the SIL, who is strangely hysterical.

          At least, that’s what I remember from the mystery books I read when I was a kid. The story of a bungled abduction – that badly bungled – that was conned as a ransom against such a famous person was so intriguing. You’d have to really want to get the chair from the start to keep going with it.

          781
    • I believe that a lot of Europe is. I read that Down Syndrome is no longer found in the Nordic countries because the government will test for it for free and give free abortions if the baby has it.

      873
      • As a Swede, I can say that abortions for people with Down’s are not encouraged, but they are legal. And abortions are free whether or not the baby is born with any problems. So, if the parents find out that their child will have Down’s and decide to have an abortion, that is not so much the government’s policy as it is the parents’ choice.

        In Denmark, all parents-to-be have the chance to find out if their child will have Down’s. 95% of those who get a positive result decide to have an abortion.

        917
  1. RE: Fact# 3 – Snuffleupagus :

    In my household, this was a major thing, and we even VHS taped the show.

    Big Bird’s closest buddy was Snuffy, but for many years, only Big Bird could see him. Every time he was about to approach the others, he would turn around or hide behind something else. In addition, Snuffy never raised the issue since he was timid, a little pessimistic, and fatalistic, like Eeyore. Because of his size, he was both the metaphorical and actual elephant in the room, which made the joke much funnier.

    However, there were worries that the joke was encouraging adults to continue not believing kids, whether for abuse or for other reasons, thus Snuffy had to sort of “come out.”

    It was a superbly produced and quite moving episode. I recall them all congregating on the roof to accept Big Bird and Snuffy into their Sesame Street family.

    I love this show so much.

    2905
    • Link to the video scene where the adults finally all see Snuffy: Video

      I remember being disappointed as a youngster because no one ever believed Big Bird and always said he was making things up. “Oh, that’s Big Bird’s fictitious friend.” It reminded me of all the times when I told an adult something and they didn’t believe me.

      826
      • It reminded me of all the times when I told an adult something and they didn’t believe me.

        One of the finest pieces of parental advice I’ve ever seen went something like this: “Make time for all of your children’s “major” concerns, even if it’s only finding their shoe. If you ignore their huge problems while they’re tiny, they won’t come to you later in life with their actual big problems since they’ve learned you don’t care about their problems.”

        822
  2. RE: Fact# 2 – Tommy Manville:
    According to wiki, the split was $200,000 for him and $50,000, for the lady, or, on average, $4 million for him and $1 million for her. That translates to about $4 5 million for him and $1 million for her in today’s money.

    2595
  3. RE: Fact# 1 – Charles Lindbergh was a Nazi?: He also had kids with two sisters as well. I’ve always been curious as to how he persuaded them to do that and why they were both so bizarre as to want to have children with him. It has to do with eugenics and his “excellent genes,” I can only assume. Still strange.

    2503
  4. The issue with wills and trusts is that occasionally what was written down does not truly accomplish what was intended.

    After an elderly woman passed away, my buddy was tasked with managing her estate. She only had one child who cared for her at the end of her life, therefore she wanted to make sure that child received most of the inheritance while giving the other two children each a smaller sum. According to her will, the nice kid received the remainder while the other two received $100k apiece.

    The issue is that her medical and nursing costs were high. She was only worth roughly $225,000 when she died. The good kid who looked after her every day for ten years received $25k, while the other kids each received $100k.

    This is the issue with not utilizing percentages!

    2894
  5. RE: Fact# 4 – Pac-Man:
    Pac Man and Space Invaders were extremely popular. You could find a machine all sorts of places like hotel lobbies. They were not considered a toy since they were novelties.

    2787
    • Yeah, at the university where my parents worked, they had all kinds of bar games and flippers from the 1970s and 1980s, games like PacMan and Space Invaders, but nothing newer, and even my parents who plaid such machines were otherwise “video games are for kids” types of people.

      Then Something happened sometime in the 1980s…

      816
      • A video game crash happened. It effectively killed the home console industry for nearly 5 years, until Nintendo entered the scene.

        At the time, home console marketing was aimed toward parents because they were the only ones with money. Market it as something their children might like, and they’ll pay for it for Christmas or birthday gifts. Those consoles were not marketed to anyone else in the 20- to 30-year-old age range.

        And it was effective. The NES revived the home video game console industry, and that marketing continued into the 16-bit period until the Playstation arrived, when they realized that youngsters from the 1980s were getting older and that the marketing needed to alter.

        820
        • It effectively killed the home console industry for nearly 5 years, until Nintendo entered the scene.

          People act as if it has been that long, but the two practically overlap. The video game crash began in 1983 and ended with the debut of the NES in 1984-1986. The NES was built solely to capitalize on the arcade boom, so talk about things going as planned.

          However, the magnitude of the crash in such a short period of time cannot be overstated. Arcades existed for a long time, but as I grew older in the 1980s and 1990s, I seen cabinet after cabinet progressively fade from public view, until all that remained were dedicated arcades. In the mid-1980s, however, they were EVERYWHERE, with every business and public location that could afford one having one or more.

          768
  6. RE: Fact# 7 – Dogs vs Wolves Expressiveness:Pointing is also a big thing among dogs. They comprehend the concept of a human trying to direct their attention to something via gesture far better than wolves or even chimps.

    2805
      • Huh? Pretty sure cats can understand pointing gestures just fine. Whether they want to understand them is a totally different question, but they sure can if they feel like it.

        851
        • I’ve been attempting to teach my cat a new treat puzzle. And he doesn’t get pointing AT something. Only if I tap directly on the location of the treat will he explore it.

          So I’m not totally sure… I was attempting to figure it out on my own.

          833
  7. RE: Fact# 5 – The Campaign for North Africa:
    I appreciate how detailed it is, especially as players who play as Italy must account for more water than other nations due to their troops’ pasta.

    2556
    • The designer, Richard Berg, said, ‘“The reality is that the Italians cooked their pasta with the tomato sauce that came with the cans. But I didn’t want to do a rule on that.”

      821
      • More from here :

        “To add insult to injury, Berg has never completed a playthrough of his own game.”

        “When I said ‘let’s publish this thing’ they said ‘but we’re still playtesting it! We don’t know if it’s balanced or not. It’s gonna take seven years to play!’ And I said ‘you know what, if someone tells you it’s unbalanced, tell them ‘we think it’s your fault, play it again.’”

        830
      • Before playing, the player or team must first create unit organization charts for each of the hundreds of counters on their side.

        Then, on each turn: Strategic air missions should be planned. Raid on Malta, Plan Axis convoys, Raid convoys, and so on. Stores for distribution and consumption, Calculate water spillage/evaporation and modify all supply dumps. Determine initiative, weather (hot weather = higher water evaporation), Water should be distributed. Units should be reorganized. Calculate the attrition of water and store units. Begin work on the building. Begin your training, Reorganize your supplies, Cargo transport between African ports Convoys should be brought ashore. Distribute the Commonwealth fleet. Repair of ships, If the planes are fully charged, prepare a tactical air mission. Begin the air mission. Carry out task, return to base, and maintain airplane. Make land units available for reserve.

        Then move units, keeping track of fuel expenditure and breakdown points in relation to weather, enemy reaction, and so on. More units should be moved.

        Then, in combat, designate whether each tank and gun is deployed forward or backward. Plots and firefights, Before launching an attack, retreat. Assign all units to anti-armor or close-assault roles in secret. Anti-armor missiles, Check the ammunition, Deploy tank markers that have been destroyed and update unit records to reflect losses. Conduct investigations and close assaults, Reserves should be released. Reposition the rear trucks, Begin repairing the breakdowns. Create patrols.

        All mobility and combat steps must be repeated a second time.

        All mobility and combat steps should be repeated a third time.

        The other player or team would then repeat the entire cycle, completing one game turn.

        Have some fun with it.

        745
  8. RE: Fact# 6 – White Dog Poop Phenomenon: That’s really intriguing. It never occurred to me to question ‘what happened to white dog poop,’ but now that I’m reading this (and having owned a dog at least once in the last 30ish years), I’m quite sure I haven’t seen it in ages.

    2965
      • We were instructed to avoid pet meals with a high ash level, however this is not the case. The term “% ash content” does not imply “% of ash in this food”. Nobody puts ash in their food.

        It meant “% of this meal that will stay as ash if you set it on fire,” because ash is typically made up of minerals in food that cannot be burned, such as calcium, magnesium, and potassium. If the ash content was excessive, it signified the mineral concentration was excessive, which was hazardous for your pet’s kidneys.

        That isn’t to say that lower is always better; too low means you’re only getting raw carbon and protein, with no vitamins or minerals. However, avoiding cans with the highest percentage of ash was a dependable approach to avoid those with too much calcium.

        811
  9. RE: Fact# 9 – Café Terrace at Night:It’s kind of funny, because Van Gogh isn’t usually associated with realism or attention to detail. Even simply glancing at the artwork, the stars are not precisely realistic, assuming that their actual position is accurate… it’s probably the equivalent of a “easter egg”.

    2789
    • While his bizarre brushwork and color palette owed much to the French post-impressionist movement, the underlying style was significantly influenced by the detailed and purposeful Japanese art form known as Ukiyo-e.

      797
      • Absolutely fascinating! That he was an avid collector of Ukiyo-e paintings is something I just learned. It’s one of those things that, once I realized it existed, made perfect sense.

        853
    • It’s the Summer Triangle, by the way, with Cygnus the Swan in the lower right. This used to be extremely well known. He did that on purpose, no doubt.

      836
      • Once again, that’s kind of interesting. The precise placement of stars is the last thing you’d expect to see in a painting that, stars and all, looks like the product of an acid trip. Perhaps the precise placement of stars and constellations was the only aspect of reality that really interested him. Due to his severe bipolar disorder, he undoubtedly had OCD tendencies; perhaps the position of the stars and constellations was the only thing he couldn’t alter. In all honesty, I have no idea. When compared to the works of Caravaggio or Tintoretto, for example, where such attention to detail would be expected and met with a “oh, neat, that makes sense” reaction, I find this to be an unexpected feature of his painting.

        879
  10. RE: Fact# 10 – Enrico Fermi:
    The mindset of “let’s simply put stuff together and see if we can develop a new element” resonates with me. Similar to a rushed high school science fair project

    2802
    • It’s reminiscent of the account of the first time someone took LSD. Albert Hoffman, the scientist, had “accidentally” ingested a very small amount, possibly because he had gotten some on his fingers and hadn’t washed them. He noticed a slight shift in his mental state and decided to PURPOSEFULLY INGEST around 300ug (three times the normal dose) to test the effects.

      He then rode his bike home after experiencing the first-ever trip on LSD and he proceeded to trip absolute dickballs

      When it comes to norms and procedures, scientists aren’t nearly as “serious” as the public may assume.

      789
  11. RE: Fact# 11 – Marx’s 2-Minute Charleston:

    I’ll tell you another Groucho tale:

    The club’s concierge patted him on the shoulder and apologized, saying that Groucho’s child wasn’t permitted to swim in the pool because he is Jewish, to which Groucho said, “Well, he’s only half Jewish. Can’t he swim up to his waist?”

    2698
  12. RE: Fact# 13 – Dachshunds, the Badger Hunters:
    In its haste to escape the Dachshund, the badger actually causes the tunnels to collapse, burying the dog alive.

    When I was a kid in northern Germany, I heard stories of hunters who needed help removing their Teckels from the snow and called the fire department.

    I remember seeing dogs who had been trapped underground for hours emerge from the ground, cheerful and acting as if nothing had happened to them.

    2604
    • The makes me think of that joke/life hack I heard on car talk: “How do you tell who loves you more, your wife or your dog?” Put them both in the trunk, go for a drive, and then see who is more relieved to see you when you let them out.

      790
      • My favorite car-related discussion was when a listener called in to say he wanted to park his classic Corvette in the garage but both he and his wife also needed space for their daily commuting cars. The guy’s wife did not approve. The first piece of advice from Click & Clack to the man? Divorce.

        757
  13. RE: Fact# 12 – School of the Air:

    I went to school on the radio. I grew up in the middle of nowhere on a sheep station. The nearest “town” was an hour away and had only a bar and two gas stations.

    2793
      • There are booklets with step-by-step solutions to the problems, and the teacher takes you through them.

        Source: This is how I finished school after getting sick in my final year.

        804
  14. RE: Fact# 22 – C4 Use During Vietnam War:

    … C4 was used to start fires because it burns like wood and doesn’t go off unless a blasting cap is used.

    The only people in my infantry company who didn’t carry a brick of C4 were the radio operators. I don’t really know why. We might have had to blow a landing zone (LZ) in thick brush, but that didn’t happen very often. I don’t know what else we could have done with it.

    Along with my C4 brick, I had about a quarter of a brick hidden somewhere. C4 doesn’t burn like wood, it burns like a little flamethrower. It could heat a cup of water in a canteen tin to a scalding  một phút, which is perfect for rehydrating and heating the main course of a freeze-dried home cookin’ LRRP ration. They gave us little heat tabs, but that little blue flame they put out couldn’t heat anything up that quickly.

    But it was against the law to burn C4 after dark. You could use the little tabs to get lukewarm coffee after dinner or early in the morning when it was dark.

    2575
      • I’m not sure. When I joined the 1st Cav, light infantry company of about 110 men in early 1969, I went right out of the bush. We spent three weeks in the bush, and then we took a week off and did perimeter duty at some firebase or other. We could talk to Battalion by radio, but during the six months I was there, I never even saw one of our sister companies.

        It could have been a punishment for something the company did before I started working there. Maybe the CO wanted a lot of C4 because he had been in Special Forces and worked in the mountainous jungle along the Laotian border, where the trees are tall and dense and it’s hard to find a good landing zone. I spent my first year in the country in the mountain jungles near the border with Laos. I made some C4 LZs up there.

        But the jungle we were in was flat, and it was hard to go more than 200 meters without coming across a field of elephant grass that would have been a great landing zone (LZ).

        I have the same question now that I think about it. Why did we have to use so much C4?

        759
  15. RE: Fact# 11 – Marx’s 2-Minute Charleston:

    I’ll just tell you two short Groucho stories:

    On a return journey from Europe (it’s unclear if this is the same trip), he once put “smuggler” as his occupation on the Customs form. The Customs Agents Did Not Find It Funny

    Late in life, he went to a performance of “Jesus Christ Superstar” on Broadway. He shouted as the lights dimmed, “I hope this thing has a happy ending.”

    He was a legend on to himself.

    2889
    • Yup. My favorite part of the history of football. They were trying to decide whether to make the field bigger or let a pass go forward. The famous Harvard Stadium couldn’t fit a wider field, so forward pass won.

      830
      • the famous Harvard Stadium couldn’t fit a wider field.

        It’s important elaborating on that for those who don’t understand why the field couldn’t be enlarged, resulting in the forward pass winning (and pointing out that football was primarily a college sport at the time which made consideration of impact on Harvard a much bigger deal in that era).

        Harvard Stadium is a nationally recognized monument and a pioneering concrete structure. If you look at this picture in the Wiki you can see how the limited sideline area between the field of play and the concrete stands prevented them from widening the field.

        880
      • Imagine the players linking arms and running toward the other team in a V-shape, like a pointed version of the game Red Rover, Red Rover. Players on the other team would get “clotheslined” at the neck, which was very bad.

        The forward pass was allowed, but players could no longer link up with each other.

        818
        • Yeah, basically it made people play farther apart. Before that, most of the time, everyone stood at the line of scrimmage for each play. Yes, the wedges and other things.

          760
  16. RE: Fact# 14 – NY Yankees Appearance Code: My favorite part of the Wiki article:

    Lou Piniella, meanwhile, once challenged the rule during spring training in Fort Lauderdale, citing that Jesus had long hair. Steinbrenner responded to this critique by pointing at a nearby swimming pool and saying, “If you can walk on water, you can wear your hair any way you want.”

    2664
    • Although I agree with the general consensus that the regulation is stupid, I have to admit that Steinbrenner gave a fantastic response.

      808
      • The rule is ridiculous, yet its existence is perfectly justified by Steinbrenner’s reaction in that situation.

        It’s a rule designed to make the company appear larger than your personal aspirations. In Steinbrenner’s opinion, if you’re not willing to give up some of your ego in order to contribute to the club, you’re not worth hiring. It’s similar to being in the military, when you’re expected to sacrifice your own identity for the good of the group. Except for those who have proven themselves capable, no one is bigger or more powerful than another.

        I’m a Mets fan who has always despised the Yankees, but they are the most successful organization in baseball history and have the resources to institute such a rule that players are eager to follow.

        However, I believe that within the next 10-20 years, someone will break that rule. I can’t fathom the criticism the Yankees would face if they let a star player go because he refuses to shave his beard, especially in this day and age.

        734
  17. RE: Fact# 16 – Sweden’s Oak Forest: We did something similar in Denmark. A few years ago, the Danish Ministry of Agriculture wrote to the Ministry of Defense, inquiring what to do with the trees planted 150 years ago to build battleships.

    2591
  18. RE: Fact# 17 – Heinz Meixner:When I was a teenager, one of my older neighbors told me about the night the wall was built. When she went to a friend’s house, she realized she was on the wrong side. She climbed over the wall to get home, but some family members were still on the other side. Went back and got them, then crossed back a third time in one night.

    2577
    • That must have been a long time ago, because you couldn’t “sneak over the wall” any more. Because there was more than one wall, and between them was a “Death Zone” with mines and watchtowers that could shoot you.

      806
  19. RE: Fact# 15 – Laurent Duvernay-Tardif, M.D.:
    Duvernay-Tardif opted out of the 2020 NFL season to work as an orderly in Montreal during the COVID pandemic, and as a result, he was named Sports Illustrated’s Sportsperson of the Year, received Canada’s top athlete, the Northern Star Award, and received the Muhammad Ali Humanitarian Award at the ESPYs.

    2614
    • He hadn’t fulfilled the licensure required to practice medicine because of football commitments. As a result, he volunteered as an orderly. He’s mentioned emptying bedpans, changing sheets, and so on.

      804
  20. RE: Fact# 13 – Dachshunds, the Badger Hunters:

    I work as a dog trainer. At least one elderly lady visits me every year with her dachshund, and every year she expresses shock at the dog’s hostility toward other animals. I have to gently break it to them that their new pup is a tunnel-burrowing murderer that loves the opportunity to take on animals several times its size.

    After that, I demonstrate that these dogs are more savvy and receptive to training than is commonly believed. They’re trained to be disciplined because they’re fighters. They are more persistent and powerful than most people give them credit for, yet once they learn the rules, they may be very particular about sticking to them.

    2510
    • The same applies to terriers. The terrier’s tail is designed to be pulled out of bags and dropped to the ground by horseback hunters. It’s also how they get back into the bag after a hunt—they leap to the hunter sitting on a horse.

      Because American labs are bred for open fields and marshes, they tend to be taller and slimmer than their English counterparts, who are more commonly found near water.

      Lhasa Apsos were originally bred to serve as guard dogs for Buddhist temples due to their unique abilities (such as the ability to sit on their rear legs and their loud barks). The monks were counting on them to sound the alarm if somebody broke in.

      792
  21. RE: Fact# 23 – Fifa’s Rejection of Women: In 2004, FIFA President Sepp Blatter said, ‘Let the women play in more feminine clothes like they do in volleyball. They could, for example, have tighter shorts. Female players are pretty, if you excuse me for saying so, and they already have some different rules to men – such as playing with a lighter ball. That decision was taken to create a more female aesthetic, so why not do it in fashion?”

    I think this is still what FIFA says about women playing soccer.

    2734
    • ”Let the women play in more feminine clothes…they could have, for example, tighter shorts”

      Isn’t that the difference between men and women? In the West, women wear tighter shorts. But modest women in places like Qatar must wear the hijab, the burqa, and a burkini when they go swimming. Sports organizations like FIFA know that women are attractive and use their rules for uniforms to promote this, while still bending over backwards to keep women in their place.

      694
  22. RE: Fact# 22 – C4 Use During Vietnam War:

    To show how stable it is, it is often set on fire by new Navy SEALs. The older guys on the team like to play a joke on the younger ones by setting off a real charge nearby in the woods when they light it. This is meant to make them throw up.

    2524
    • It reminds me of how the other power plant engineers turned off the lights in the switchboard room when I manually paralleled generators for the first time. They did this to make me think I had shut down the power plant.

      811

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