Things you were shockingly old when you learned

The Left Bank in Paris is not on the left side of the map but rather on the left side of the river when you're traveling downstream

Just learned at NCT today that “pump and dump” doesn’t in fact mean conscientiously expressing several bottles of milk in advance

I finally figured out today how to lower blinds. You just pull the strings at an angle! Where's my Mensa membership?

a league, apparently meaning about an hour's walk, not a fathom

According to the introduction to my 20,000 Leagues, which I happened to be reading this morning, a league on land ("le plancher des vaches") is about 4 kilometers, but a nautical league is 5.555 kilometers: "la vingtième partie du degré d'un grand cercle de la Terre."

Colin Hay is Scottish by birth, and only moved to Australia at age 14. He has a strong Scottish accent. Hand to heart, I've only ever heard him sing before today. Never heard his speaking voice.

loads of our famous people were born elsewhere, especially those who were famous before 2000

It's just so weird that I've been hearing his music for more than 30 years and it never occurred to me that he sounded like anything but a "typical" Australian, if not Crocodile Dundee. It's like finding out Michael Hutchence was Quebecois or something.

and he’s still got a distinct scots accent!

I think Malcolm Young had traces of a Scottish accent, Angus (and Bon Scott) none at all - George Young was entirely Scottish, from what I've heard.

... John Paul, totally Aus!

^ who?

It's like finding out Michael Hutchence was Quebecois or something.

better be sitting down, because Michael Hutchence lived in Hong Kong from ages 3 to 13, LA for a year when he was 15, and in Hong Kong from about 25 to death.

I just this minute learned that 'Quebecois' refers to someone from Hong Kong. Thanks, sic!

I learned the left bank and right bank thing about rivers (flowing downstream) 2 months ago! xpost

We should have a 'celebrities whose actual country of origin is different than you thought' thread if we don't already. Only very recently learned that Gregg Turkington is Australian!

Sam Neill is from Northern Ireland

rory mcilroy is british

oh god

I've been watching the On Cinema stuff after frequenting that thread and the thing I just learned is even more mortifying when it comes to my lack of being observant

I think I was used to seeing pictures of his comedic alter ego and I only just now realized that Gregg is the same Gregg who... oh man, I feel dumb

so long story short, yes, he's the Neil Hamburger Gregg Turkington

however, he was only *born* in australia (to american parents) and has probably never claimed to be australian

^ who?

John "Love Is" Paul "In the" Young "Air"

Sam Neill is from Northern Ireland

― Number None, Monday, July 22, 2019 10:07 AM (forty-one minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

OK now you're just fucking with me.

Jackie Chan is Welsh

you'll be telling us Max Boyce was from Hong Kong next!

born there during the Sevens tournament iirc

I learned just now that Phil Rudd is the only member of either main AC/DC lineup who was born in Australia.

a real one is I didn't know the Van Halen brothers were half Indonesian - learned recently from Dave Roth interview on Marc Maron pod

Ha, I learned that from an ethnomusicology prof in undergrad. I remember a fellow student tried to seriously consider whether there was an audible gamelan influence in their playing.

I learned just now that Phil Rudd is the only member of either main AC/DC lineup who was born in Australia.

Mark Evans was born in Australia!


I just this minute learned that 'Quebecois' refers to someone from Hong Kong. Thanks, sic!

I just this minute learned that the words “or something” don’t exist

Ah, fair point. Evans played on probably my favourite AC/DC records during the two years he was in the band.

John "Love Is" Paul

oh duh, as in not a Young brother, that totally threw me in a “puns you had missed” fashion

Palmolive (the cleaning product, not the musician) was so named for the stunningly obvious reason that the original soap contained both palm oil and olive oil.

in a similar vein, Castrol GTX has caster oil in it, made from the beans.

xpost Whoa. Always just assumed that was somebody's weird last name.

non-xpost Whoa x2.

I learned last night that BBC sitcom This Country does not star Mackenzie Crook, it's some other guy who looks a bit like him. Crook is in a BBC sitcom set in the countryside, but it's a different one.

Only just realised, on the death of Art Neville, that the Neville Brothers essentially grew out of The Meters and didn't release anything under that name until the late 70s. Bit shocked at myself there really.

Speaking of oils, in Oil of Olay the "Olay" (or Ulay or Ulan or Olaz depending on your territory) means nothing at all, although its inventor was trying to play off the word "lanolin."

Same with Häagen-Dazs, which is a completely meaningless assemblage of phonemes.

"Reuben Mattus invented the 'Häagen-Dazs' name supposedly as a tribute to Denmark's exemplary treatment of its Jews during the Second World War,[5] and included an outline map of Denmark on early labels."

I reckon I had been cooking for 20 years before I realised "deglazing" was dissolving the brown crust forming in the pan using a liquid. Before that I had thought it meant using some kind of alcohol to disperse the cooking oil so the dish wasn't greasy.

Rhododendron honey ain't good for you.
Heard taht yesterday, and people actually try to keep their honeybees away from the plant.
Cos it has Grayanotoxins in it.

It was a side comment in a This Podcast Will Kill You on Belladonna.
Interesting podcast if you like hearing about diseases.

Cut back some rhododendron a few weeks ago and burned it last week. The smoke was beyond foul, maybe this is why. Am I going to die now?

Nagasaki being the only port in Japan open to the outside world for 200 years. Or even more narrowly the island of Dejima in the Nagasaki harbour.
JUst got the Nagasaki bit from open University.
I assume it contributed to why it was chosen as one of the bomb targets in 1945.

nah

nagasaki was a secondary target if they failed to see the primary through cloud cover, which happened. armaments manufacturing was the stated reason

The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet, the David Mitchell book, is set on Dejima during this period.

On a similar "good things actually bad for you" tip a lot of ppl dont seem to know that raw kale/chard is really not a good idea, because in its raw state its loaded with oxalic acid.

Uncured bacon is "no nitrates (except those naturally occurring in celery salt)" which may be significantly higher in nitrates than normal cured bacon is, btw

Ha yeah same with MSG. It occurs naturally in like, tomatoes and soy sauce and things so anyone saying theyre allergic is likely talking bollox

uh, MSG is literally the main neurotransmitter used in the brain, and we have taste receptors (umami) evolved specifically to detect it because it signifies "good food here". That's why it gets added. Every culture has a high-natural-MSG additive - fish sauce, Worcestershire sauce, soy sauce, konbu kelp, Vegemite, Parmesan / Grana Padano cheese, etc etc.
The one study that found it was dangerous was literally injecting MSG into the brain of a rat - guess what, if you inject a ton of neurotransmitter the brain goes crazy. MSG fear is pure myth.

I get annoyed with restaurants boasting about "No MSG" too. It will stop me eating there every time.

Nitrates, however, those do actually seem to be pretty unhealthy while being perfectly natural. You can get genuinely nitrate-free bacon in the UK now, bit expensive but not bad.

I remember the short films on chinese cooking that used to be used as filler on Channel 4 afternoon shows in the 80s where they used to pile on more and more MSG. Not sure if that's anything to go by for actual Asian cooking at the time but it did seem excessive.