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Today I Learned... More Useless Trivia!

Does anyone else feel like their head is full of useless trivia? Share your weird and random facts here!

 

Newborn babies will cry, like all the time, but they won't actually produce tears. Our tear ducts don't start working until we're about two months old. Speaking of tears, you can' t cry properly in space either due to zero gravity. The water will just sort of leak out of your eye and start floating around. BOOM!

 

tears

 

 

ElleBelle
ElleBellePosted 15-12-2015 09:53 PM
 
Glass_half_full
Glass_half_fullPosted 05-01-2016 06:04 PM
I'm a book worm so I love facts about authors and books.

-It took Jane Austen 17 years to finish Pride and Prejudice, which goes to show that all great things take time.

-Moby Dick only gained recognition as one of the greates novels after the Hermen Melville died (I find this so sad, several authors never got to see their books' full potential). same with Oscar Wilde's ' A picture of Dorian Gray',

-J.K Rowling cried when she killed off dumbledore :') as did I when I read it
 
Myvo
MyvoPosted 03-01-2016 11:50 PM

Offal ain't that bad, @ElleBelle! Mmm, chicken heart and pâté are hella tasty Heart Looking at your fact historically, it makes a lot of sense though. It's been said that offal - in some cases - is healthier for you than eating sausages!

 

The giraffe used to be known as 'Camelopard' in the English language as an archaic name. It derives from Ancient Greek for camel and leopard due to its appearance, and the Latin species name camelopardalis. 

 
stonepixie
stonepixiePosted 03-01-2016 09:30 PM
I imagine that it would be a lot easier than the $2 a day challenge. 1 shilling (UK) today would be something like $12 AU.
 
 
ElleBelle
ElleBellePosted 03-01-2016 10:28 PM

I've watched a couple of docos and read some old price sheets, and it doesn't actually buy much. Prices were inflated because meat was hard to come by, it was more economical for farmers to use the land/resources for crops and dairy herds. It would generally buy you about 2 pork chops, or about a kilo of the cheap cuts and offal. That and your ham was all the meat you would get for the week. If you had a big family, you might be lucky enough to use everyones ration and have a meat meal every night, but if it was just you or a couple, then most of your meals were going to be vegetarian (or really gross. ew, liver)

 
ElleBelle
ElleBellePosted 02-01-2016 10:47 AM

During WW2 in Britain, every person had their food rationed down to:

 

225g of bacon or ham

454g of sugar

113g of tea

1 shillings worth of meat

227g of cheese

227g of butter

340g of margarine

85g of lard

1 egg

unlimited bread and vegetables, although lots of stuff was really hard to come by (like onions, bananas, all citrus fruit)

 

Imagine trying to live off that for a week!

 
 
N1ghtW1ng
N1ghtW1ngPosted 02-01-2016 07:28 PM
Wow. 😮
 
 
 
stonepixie
stonepixiePosted 02-01-2016 08:17 PM
That would be an interesting experiment to do @ElleBelle
 
 
 
 
ElleBelle
ElleBellePosted 03-01-2016 09:21 PM

Oddly enough I'm planning to try it @stonepixie, I might start with a week and see if I can extend it to a month. The staples are bread and potatoes, and I don't eat meat so it would be a very carb-y month. I just ordered a cookbook of WW2 recipes to help me.

 

Here's another interesting fact about the rationing, despite the strict rationing the health of most Brits actually increased following the war. As opposed to WW1 when many people died of starvation due to limited and poorly controlled food supplies.

 
Myvo
MyvoPosted 01-01-2016 02:01 AM

There are more than 4000 varieties of potatoes! Smiley Surprised

 
 
N1ghtW1ng
N1ghtW1ngPosted 01-01-2016 06:23 AM
The "toddler" Transformers show Rescue Bots will have more episodes than the original G1 cartoon. If the new season actually happens.
 
 
 
j95
j95Posted 01-01-2016 07:55 PM
A standard 3x3 Rubiks cube has 43252003274489856000 different possible configurations.
 
stonepixie
stonepixiePosted 29-12-2015 11:53 AM
Donald Duck was banned from libraries because he doesn't wear pants.
 
safari93
safari93Posted 27-12-2015 09:18 PM

ALSO the Giraffititan (!!!!) is believed to be one of the largest land animals to have ever roamed the earth. Here is a size estimate with a human for scale:

 

giraffititan

 
 
N1ghtW1ng
N1ghtW1ngPosted 28-12-2015 04:57 AM
@safara93 there's no worry for a fire hazard. In fact, they think it's odd NOT to have candles. 😛 strange customs 😄
 
safari93
safari93Posted 27-12-2015 09:07 PM

@N1ghtW1ng real candles? On a real tree?? Do they not worry about a potential fire hazard???

 

Here is a non-Christmas fact: we humans are, on average, 10cm taller now than our ancestors living 150 years ago. We're also pretty close to the human genetic height limit on average

 
ElleBelle
ElleBellePosted 25-12-2015 11:12 AM

In the Benelux countries, Santa has a helper called Zwart Piet, or Black Pete, who is a black muslim. It's controversial and pretty racist, because people who play Pete usually dress up in blackface.

 

Also, in Italy they have La Befana - the Christmas witch!

 
 
N1ghtW1ng
N1ghtW1ngPosted 25-12-2015 08:40 PM
In Switzerland, they celebrate Christmas on the 24th. And put candles on the tree. (REAL candles!!! Although some use electric.)
 
safari93
safari93Posted 25-12-2015 09:59 AM

A newborn baby's eyes are greyish-blue, and only change colour after a few months

 
Kapnight
KapnightPosted 24-12-2015 11:37 PM

Western screech owls pick up tiny snakes, and bring them back to their nests, alive, they kill and eat all other snakes

 
 
j95
j95Posted 12-06-2016 10:37 PM
the plastic end of shoelaces are called aglets
 
 
 
N1ghtW1ng
N1ghtW1ngPosted 21-02-2017 03:41 PM
Many things in science are named what they are because they are the next letter in the alphabet.
Example: X chromosome looks like an x, Y chromosome comes after x 😛
 
Myvo
MyvoPosted 18-12-2015 08:52 PM

This is the thread for me!

 

Gotta hate it when you really do need to remember something uber important - but all you actually remember are useless facts Smiley Sad

 

Alrighty, here we go: 

  • Harrison Ford actually wanted Han Solo to be killed off, instead of continuing his role 35 years later
  • J.K Rowling originally wanted to kill off Ron in the H.P series, just coz. 
  • There is a word that rhymes with 'orange' - it's 'sporange', which is a sac in flowering plants where spores are made 
 
 
N1ghtW1ng
N1ghtW1ngPosted 19-12-2015 04:36 AM
@Myvo ah the english language 😄
@Ben-RO That gif represents the different stages I'm in. Sleep, panic, worry and confusion. 😛

A man cannot be a king without a queen but a woman can be a queen without a king. (was that already said?)
 
 
 
ElleBelle
ElleBellePosted 20-12-2015 08:21 PM

Do you mean that a woman can be Queen if she marries a King, even if she is not the direct descendent to the throne, but a man cannot be King if he marries a Queen if he is not the direct descendent to the throne, aka Prince Phillip @N1ghtW1ng?

 

The Vandals were a Germanic tribe notorious for smashing up buildings for no particular reason when they invaded Rome, hence the term vandalism.

 
 
 
 
N1ghtW1ng
N1ghtW1ngPosted 21-12-2015 06:15 PM
Harley Quinn was first created in the TV series but was so well liked they added her into the comics.

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