The Cellar / Today I Learned....

**Posted by BigV** 7/27/2021 7:13 pm

Carruthers wrote:
monster wrote:
Clodfobble wrote:

Interesting--how do Brits say it? en-seff-AL-it-is?

en -KEFF..... srsly. they do. I guess I never watched crap fly-on-the-wall medical documentaries when I was there.....
And we also know how to spell aluminium.

Touche` my friend.

**Posted by Carruthers** 7/28/2021 3:56 am

BigV wrote:
Carruthers wrote:
monster wrote:
en -KEFF..... srsly. they do. I guess I never watched crap fly-on-the-wall medical documentaries when I was there.....
And we also know how to spell aluminium.

Touche` my friend.

Thanks for the link, BigV.

I'm reminded of a childhood tongue twister:

Are you copper-bottoming them my man?
No, I'm aluminiuming them, ma'am!

**Posted by xoxoxoBruce** 7/28/2021 10:45 pm

Carruthers wrote:
And we also know how to spell aluminium.

And still don't do it right. Can't be dumb, must be stubborn.

Last edited by xoxoxoBruce (7/28/2021 10:46 pm)

**Posted by monster** 8/05/2021 10:33 pm

TIL if you wear black eye makeup when you swim, next time your goggles are going to have an interesting black semi-opaque coating inside.

Dilemma because you shouldn't really wipe the inside of (good) goggles as it trashes the anti-fog coating.....

On the plus side, this does mean that I swam after work twice this week.

Some young male adult jumped in the lap lane shortly after I started. Literally jumped in in the middle of the lane rather than joining from one end, causing waves i had to swim through. Which was rather rude. But then he was surprisingly good at sharing the lane. And wearing what looked like pale blue speedos. Unusual because the pool team color and the local high school are green and non-team swimmers don't wear speedos.

I had wondered earlier if Bajaboi might be at the pool too because he sometimes swims after work, but this guy was much bigger and has very short hair. Yup..... met Bajaboi in the parking lot after I finished.... he'd just got a haircut which was accidentally too short too high but he stopped them before they got to the top... (think convict with a toupee) ...... no idea if he's had that college growth spurt they sometimes do, but I wouldn't be surprised.

yup didn't recognize my own son.

**Posted by monster** 8/05/2021 10:36 pm

(no, he doesn't live at home, it has been a couple of weeks since I've seen him and 5 years since I've seen him swim)

**Posted by monster** 8/05/2021 10:37 pm

(((and yes, he's still wearing his Speedos from High School Water Polo despite graduating 4 years ago)))

Last edited by monster (8/05/2021 10:37 pm)

**Posted by glatt** 8/07/2021 6:55 am

So do you have the house to yourself these days, monster?

The stages of life are wild. Things keep changing. It's cool that you're doing minor adventures like helicopter rides.

**Posted by monster** 8/07/2021 8:59 pm

No, thunderboi is still here ( :/ ) and bajboi is coming back in about 10 days to do a 5th year on his bachelor's (I refused to pay for an extra year in the apartment ;)

**Posted by monster** 8/07/2021 9:01 pm

spent this morning (after parkrun) clearing stuff out of the basement to make room for him, and the afternoon dropping off a carload to a couple of thrift shops......still a workin progress but i made a dent init :D

**Posted by monster** 9/07/2021 5:34 pm

This weekend I learned what a ground cherry was (never heard of them before)

TIL what they taste like.

....fucking weird, very sweet, nothing like a tomatillo

**Posted by BigV** 11/09/2021 2:19 pm

Today I learned a new way of multiplying numbers (exists). By which I mean I watched this video.

I did watch it and comprehended the first fifteen minutes of the program. The rest was interesting like any other science fiction movie is interesting.

dedicated to monster.

**Posted by xoxoxoBruce** 11/10/2021 12:32 am

No thanks, 19 minutes on something I'll never use, might make my calculator jealous,and pay me back when I'm doing my taxes or something Too risky.

**Posted by xoxoxoBruce** 11/13/2021 6:36 pm

I learned something I'd never heard of, read about, or had an inkling that it happened.
US troops on Russian soil.

The czar had been booted out but there were several factions fighting for control so the Bolsheviks
quit battling the Central Powers eliminating the eastern front. That put the $Billion worth of weapons,
ammo, and rolling stock the US had sent to aid the Russians in keeping the Trans-Siberian railroad
open, in jeopardy of falling into the wrong hands. The railroad was protected by the forty-thousand-man
Czech Legion formed early in 1918 from Czech and Slovak prisoners of war in Russia, sympathetic
Russian Slavs, and deserters from the Austro-Hungarian army. Wilson sent 8,000 men to join the
70,000 Jap troops in protecting our weapons and rolling stock, plus safe passage for the Czech Legion
to their newly formed home land. I'm really amazed I'd never heard of this.

**Posted by monster** 12/06/2021 5:50 pm

about Happy Numbers

(can y'all just see Bob Ross painting happy little threes?)

**Posted by griff** 12/10/2021 7:58 am

https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/the-great-halifax-explosion
I'm reading a book on this right now. On 12/6/1917 poorly loaded munitions ship was struck by another ship in a big fucking hurry. The resulting explosion killed 1782 people.

**Posted by monster** 12/10/2021 5:29 pm

At first I was all.... ????????

Then "oooooh, probably Halifax Nova Scotia....."

Last edited by monster (12/10/2021 5:29 pm)

**Posted by xoxoxoBruce** 12/11/2021 12:15 am

griff wrote:
https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/the-great-halifax-explosion
I'm reading a book on this right now. On 12/6/1917 poorly loaded munitions ship was struck by another ship in a big fucking hurry. The resulting explosion killed 1782 people.

Yeah, that was crazy. Halifax was really hopping during the war and everybody was in a hurry because their load was more important than anyone else's. "There's a war on you know", was the usual excuse for being stupid.

**Posted by griff** 12/11/2021 7:01 am

The boat that blew up wasn't flying it's explosives flag out of fear of submarines. The collision was not that significant as both boats were in full reverse. The high explosives were very carefully packed in a rebuilt wooden hold with copper nails everything might have been fine but just before leaving NY somebody in France demanded fuel barrels be added to every bit of open space on a ship where even matches were banned. Those barrels fell, broke open, and ignited.

Last edited by griff (12/11/2021 7:02 am)

**Posted by tw** 12/11/2021 3:15 pm

If I remember correctly, poor communication between ships resulted in one crossing in front of the other? For some reason, one failed to keep to the right?

**Posted by griff** 12/11/2021 3:37 pm

Yeah, they were communicating with whistles. They both signaled they were going to use the channel they were both in. The munitions boat was where he belonged and the boat that hit him was insisting on using the wrong channel. They both reversed at about the same time making it impossible to pass safely.

**Posted by glatt** 12/11/2021 3:47 pm

I guess not everyone got killed if there is a history about this incident. Somebody was left to explain it.

**Posted by griff** 12/12/2021 7:57 am

There are a lot of eye witness accounts and there was a randomness to survival. One of the best witnesses was a boy who lived way up the hill above the docks, his sister saw the confusion and called him to the window to explain it since he was a little ship crazy. One of the real horrors was that it was December in Halifax so this was the only interesting thing going on. It drew a crowd and many people stood in their windows leading to horrible disfigurements. One doctor reported removing 350 eyes.

Thinking it was about to blow, the sailors abandoned ship rowing to the far shore and hiding over a hill. It burned for a long time before blowing. The boat glided to a dock even though they had tied the wheel. The captain takes heat for not staying with the boat and attempting to guide it away. The stories of bravery, cowardice and compassion make for compelling reading.

**Posted by monster** 2/07/2022 12:51 am

about female hyenas' external genitalia. And what gibbous actually means.

These are not related.

As far as I know.

**Posted by fargon** 2/07/2022 10:11 am

And now I know about female hyenas' external genitalia, and I already knew what gibbous means.

**Posted by TheNeverWas** 2/07/2022 6:57 pm

I knew about the external stuff.

Kinda figures...