Things you were shockingly old when you learned

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that "mare's nest" is an actual expression and not just some random user name

budo jeru, Friday, 11 August 2023 00:12 (two years ago)

Lol

The Original Human Breadbox (James Redd and the Blecchs), Friday, 11 August 2023 04:24 (two years ago)

That Marie and Pierre Curie's daughter, Irene, also won a Nobel Prize.

Monthly Python (Tom D.), Saturday, 19 August 2023 20:30 (two years ago)

Nepo baby

Josefa, Saturday, 19 August 2023 20:34 (two years ago)

that when Bosch's Garden of Earthy Delights is folded up, it has a painting on the outside depicting the creation of the Earth.
you can see some of the weird shapes starting to emerge, neat!

https://i.imgur.com/KspW8V9.jpg

( X '____' )/ (zappi), Sunday, 20 August 2023 00:41 (two years ago)

The fold behind the arm/shoulder on a US bike jacket or field jacket is called a bi-swing.
I was looking up what it was called cos I was designing a jacket and thinking I'd incorporate a pair into the design. So thought I'd see if I could find a pattern for it.
It allows more arm movement/stretch.
I think it had been incorporated into some casual suit type jackets in the mid 20th century as well as things like golf jackets.

Stevo, Sunday, 20 August 2023 07:36 (two years ago)

I just learned that Long Cool Woman isn’t by CCR, but the Hollies. I have heard this song one hundred million times in my life.

I? not I! He! He! HIM! (akm), Wednesday, 23 August 2023 03:15 (two years ago)

I only fairly recently learned why 'elevator pitch' is called that. Previously I interpreted the 'elevator' as meaning 'taking the pitch to the next level'.

Zelda Zonk, Wednesday, 23 August 2023 08:41 (two years ago)

the "tera" in like terabyte is the same as the tera in teratology

it means monster!

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/a/af/Eric_Hall.jpeg

mark s, Wednesday, 23 August 2023 13:15 (two years ago)

time for YOU to learn that this guy^^^ is who the song "killer queen" was written about

mark s, Wednesday, 23 August 2023 13:16 (two years ago)

AKA 'cowboy coffee'... also how traditional New Orleans coffee was made, using egg whites to settle the grounds

egg shells, not whites

andrew m., Wednesday, 23 August 2023 14:40 (two years ago)

monster monster queen wouldn't have the same ring to it

vodkaitamin effrtvescent (calzino), Wednesday, 23 August 2023 14:44 (two years ago)

Egg shells also used to fine (clarify) wine for hundreds of years.

il lavoro mi rovina la giornata (PBKR), Wednesday, 23 August 2023 15:03 (two years ago)

eggshells or eggs… or fish-skin!

https://khymos.org/2010/08/04/norwegian-egg-coffee/

mark s, Wednesday, 23 August 2023 15:12 (two years ago)

isinglass?

you're a sick man, Buddy Rich (Noodle Vague), Wednesday, 23 August 2023 15:13 (two years ago)

yep! also used in beer, along w/"irish moss" which iirc is a kind of seaweed

out-of-print LaserDisc edition (sleeve), Wednesday, 23 August 2023 15:14 (two years ago)

The only thing I ever directly heard of being made of isinglass is curtains.

The Thin, Wild Mercury Rising (James Redd and the Blecchs), Wednesday, 23 August 2023 15:20 (two years ago)

A Gimbel is just a Martini but with an onion instead of olive

Hope I'm not being overly pedantic but is a martini with an onion not actually a Gibson?

henry s, Wednesday, 23 August 2023 15:22 (two years ago)

an isingimbel is a coffee martini made with onion skins

mark s, Wednesday, 23 August 2023 15:23 (two years ago)

AKA 'cowboy coffee'... also how traditional New Orleans coffee was made, using egg whites to settle the grounds

egg shells, not whites

― andrew m., Wednesday, August 23, 2023 9:40 AM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

actually, you can use the egg white. same concept as using an egg white to clarify homemade stock.

budo jeru, Wednesday, 23 August 2023 15:53 (two years ago)

sorry i see we've already covered that

budo jeru, Wednesday, 23 August 2023 15:59 (two years ago)

an isingimbel is a coffee martini made with onion skins

Looking through the bent backed bumbershoots

The Thin, Wild Mercury Rising (James Redd and the Blecchs), Wednesday, 23 August 2023 16:03 (two years ago)

I had no idea isinglass was so interesting tbh. Also I had no idea it existed so

aeronimo is mad againe (Hunt3r), Wednesday, 23 August 2023 16:46 (two years ago)

the "tera" in like terabyte is the same as the tera in teratology

it means monster!

🖼


Did we ever discuss the scientific community getting together in November to agree on new prefixes for v large or small numbers

Grandall Flange (wins), Wednesday, 23 August 2023 16:48 (two years ago)

An electron’s mass is about one rontogram, Jupiter weighs two quettagrams and the diameter of the observable universe is one ronnameter. This is what representatives from 100 countries at the General Conference on Weights and Measures decided on Friday as they adopted four new SI unit prefixes.

Metrologists and metric system enthusiasts can rejoice as there are now official prefixes for extremely large things – ronna and quetta (1027 and 1030) – and for very small stuff – ronto and quecto (10−27 and 10−30).

This is the first time in over 30 years that the CGPM added to the prefixes for the International System of Units (SI) after it approved zetta, yotta, zepto and yocto in 1991. While the last change was aimed at chemists who wanted to express units in the Avogadro’s number range, this year’s update is driven by the need for big numbers in digital information. Data scientists are already using prefixes at the top of the range – yottabytes, for example – so a new one was urgently needed.

‘It was high time,’ said Richard Brown from the UK’s metrology institute, the National Physical Laboratory, in an interview with the Associated Press. Brown, who proposed the change, explained that the names had to start with the letters r and q, the only ones not taken yet by other symbols or prefixes in the metric system. ‘There’s a precedent that they sound similar to Greek letters and that big number prefixes end with an a, and smaller numbers with an o,’ Brown told the Associated Press.

There are now no more letters in the Latin alphabet left in case more prefixes are needed, but this likely won’t become a problem anytime soon.

Grandall Flange (wins), Wednesday, 23 August 2023 16:49 (two years ago)

The superscript didn’t c&p properly obv that should say 10^27 &c

Grandall Flange (wins), Wednesday, 23 August 2023 16:51 (two years ago)

"Originally 'quecca' had been suggested for 10^30 but was too close to a profane meaning in Portuguese"

mark s, Wednesday, 23 August 2023 16:58 (two years ago)

how many lottabytes in a fuckobyte?

mark s, Wednesday, 23 August 2023 16:58 (two years ago)

not using "lorra" is Cilla erasure

you're a sick man, Buddy Rich (Noodle Vague), Wednesday, 23 August 2023 17:00 (two years ago)

Hellabytes

The Thin, Wild Mercury Rising (James Redd and the Blecchs), Wednesday, 23 August 2023 17:01 (two years ago)

look forward to this being a round on UC next series

kinder, Wednesday, 23 August 2023 18:26 (two years ago)

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p0dwlxl9

Dan Worsley, Wednesday, 23 August 2023 18:28 (two years ago)

I think I must have known this at some point but I'd forgotten that Murdoch no longer owns Sky

Alba, Wednesday, 23 August 2023 19:39 (two years ago)

The only thing I ever directly heard of being made of isinglass is curtains.

Only time I've ever heard of these is in "Surrey With the Fringe on Top", wtf are they?

fetter, Wednesday, 23 August 2023 20:28 (two years ago)

I just learned that Long Cool Woman isn’t by CCR, but the Hollies

still unclear to me whether her dress is black or red #protomeme

mookieproof, Wednesday, 23 August 2023 22:34 (two years ago)

OK now I understand what "monster, monster" is, I only ever saw it as that skit in the Fast Show and was quite baffled, which I suppose anyone else would be by a skit saying "megalo megalo" or something.

Stoop Crone (Trayce), Thursday, 24 August 2023 00:49 (two years ago)

ps on isinglass, at first i was 'huh that's saruman's place did tolkien take the name from some proto-germanic script about fish bladders? because of course he would.'

aeronimo is mad againe (Hunt3r), Thursday, 24 August 2023 02:27 (two years ago)

_The only thing I ever directly heard of being made of isinglass is curtains._


Only time I've ever heard of these is in "Surrey With the Fringe on Top", wtf are they?


The only time anyone has ever made mention of “surrey…” in my entire life was in Twin Peaks. are you Bob?

butt dumb tight my boners got boners (the table is the table), Thursday, 24 August 2023 11:18 (two years ago)

Bob Weinstock?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5mbCuFn3EH4

budo jeru, Thursday, 24 August 2023 21:06 (two years ago)

wiki:

In the musical Oklahoma!, the song "The Surrey With the Fringe on Top" describes the surrey as having "isinglass curtains you can roll right down" although here the term refers to mica, commonly used for windows in vehicle side screens (but totally inflexible).[13][14]

hard to verify the source here, but sounds like it could be a case of Songs where the songwriter confuses A with B

having said that, a GIS for "isinglass curtains" brings up lots of images / retailers of the flexible plastic coverings that you'd put on a e.g. a boat

i would read a whole 33 1/3 book about Surrey

budo jeru, Thursday, 24 August 2023 21:15 (two years ago)

Bonnie “Prince” Billy took the photo on the cover of Slint’s ‘Spiderland’.

Dan Worsley, Thursday, 24 August 2023 21:19 (two years ago)

Can you surrey? Can you picnic?

Hideous Lump, Thursday, 24 August 2023 21:33 (two years ago)

Bonnie “Prince” Billy's dad took the photo on the cover of Slint’s ‘Tweez’.

there's no such thing as a winnable volume war (Matt #2), Thursday, 24 August 2023 21:54 (two years ago)

So it was the Old Photographer not the Young Photographer then (Jacobite joke).

Monthly Python (Tom D.), Thursday, 24 August 2023 21:57 (two years ago)

and bonnie "prince" billy himself is sitting in the tweez car

wmlynch, Thursday, 24 August 2023 22:39 (two years ago)

Robert Burns wrote a version of "John Barleycorn" which was the model for most subsequent versions of the song. It was Burns who came up with that snappiest of lines, "John Barleycorn must die".

Monthly Python (Tom D.), Friday, 25 August 2023 17:57 (two years ago)

I think a few of Slint toured as Oldham's backing band in the early 90s when There Is No-One What Will Take Care of You came out.

Stevo, Friday, 25 August 2023 19:09 (two years ago)

this week my external cd drive died.
i still have a cd drive in an old XP machine that rips cds, but it's not connected to the internet of course.
so, i have been using that and manually adding all the metadata which is a proper pain.
then i find out about mp3tag.

mark e, Friday, 25 August 2023 19:18 (two years ago)

The surname Tedesco means 'German' in the Italian language. Its plural form is Tedeschi. Carla Bruni's original surname was Tedeschi -- the only person I've ever heard of with this name apart from Susan.

budo jeru, Saturday, 26 August 2023 20:31 (two years ago)

The word for (a) German is interesting in that it’s a completely different unrelated word in many major languages. For example:

English: German
Spanish: alemán
Italian: tedesco
Polish: Niemiecki
Finnish: Saksa

Josefa, Saturday, 26 August 2023 20:45 (two years ago)


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