Monday, October 01, 2012

Things I learned this week 1 Oct

  • It's easiest to catch something in the first instant that it falls, before it has a chance to accelerate. If you wait even a second, it will be 15 feet down and already travelling at 15mph.
  • Today, because a marriage's legality is established prior to the ceremony, the minister's instruction that "if anyone can show just cause why this couple cannot lawfully be joined together in matrimony, let them speak now or forever hold their peace" almost always gets omitted from ceremonies these days.
  • Wind speeds on Saturn can get up to 1800km/h.
  • Beginning in September, eBay banned the sale of advice, spells, curses, hexing, conjuring, magic, prayers, blessing services, magic potions, and healing sessions. Maybe someone needs to start xBay?
  • A Hungarian neo-Nazi leader had to retire from professional antisemitism after discovering he was Jewish. He was outed by a neo-Nazi rival, who revealed that the guy's maternal grandmother was a Jewish Auschwitz survivor.
  • All the minerals and nutrients that fertilize the Amazon rainforest actually originates from a single source - the Bodélé depression, located northeast of Lake Chad in Africa. It starts as dust clouds and travels across the Atlantic Ocean.
  • Since January 2009, there's been a big wooden bowl of (not wooden) apples in the Oval Office.
  • The leading cause of death in the US among 5-34 year olds is vehicle crashes.
  • Joel Youngblood drove in two runs with a single for the New York Mets in a game at Shea Stadium against the Chicago Cubs on April 4, 1962. Joel was promptly traded to the Montreal Expos. He immediately flew to Philadelphia in time to get a hit for the Expos in the 7th inning at Veterans Stadium, thereby scoring runs for two different teams in two different stadiums on the same day. 
  • The US military is going to buy 1500 Chevy Volts.

No comments: