Today I learned...

[Becky]

Almost looks like it's laughing afterwards

 

[Becky]

Today I learned that on this day in 1945, the atomic bomb was dropped on Nagasaki, three days after the first bomb was dropped on Hiroshima. The second bomb was apparently going to be dropped on Kyoto, but the US Secretary of War Henry Stimson requested it be changed because he had been there on his honeymoon.

 

[EvanDavis]

Today I learned if you have a blocked sink you can fill an empty 2ltr milk bottle with water, turn it upside down and place it over the plug hole and give a good hard squeeze and you can unblock the sink.

 

[exmoor]

Back in April some weather presenter stated we would have the hottest summer on record.

Next week we might get summer and hot days with a yellow warning of grass fires by the met office yesterday and they must know??

 

[bootneck02]

And you as a farmer trust the Met Office

 

[Urmas]

Today I learn... nay, today I found this gem:

 

[Becky]

Is that a real advert?!

 

[Urmas]

Is that a real advert?!

Dunno about "real" and "advert" in the same sentence, but...

http://adsoftheworld.com/media/online/donate_life_the_worlds_biggest_asshole

(Found it HERE)

 

[nivrip]

Very thought provoking.

 

[bootneck02]

Here is one for all you animal lovers:- http://www.pawmygosh.com/friends-fu...m=FacebookAAD&utm_source=ild&utm_campaign=ild
When it comes to animals I am a big softy

 

[nivrip]

Today I learned that Olympic gold medals are only 1% gold and 92.5% silver. Not sure what the other 6.5% is.

The metal value is about $600 but would be about $25,000 if pure gold.

 

[bootneck02]

Well I never new that, thanks Niv that is something new I have also learned today.

 

[Urmas]

At the 1896 Summer Olympics, winners received a silver medal and the second-place finisher received a bronze medal. In 1900, most winners received cups or trophies instead of medals. The next three Olympics (1904, 1908, 1912) awarded the winners solid gold medals, but the medals themselves were smaller. The use of gold rapidly declined with the onset of the First World War and also with the onset of the Second World War.[5] The last series of Olympic medals to be made of solid gold were awarded at the 1912 Olympic Games in Stockholm, Sweden.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gold_medal#Olympic_Games

 

[Becky]

Today I learned that there are over 11,500 athletes competing in the 2016 Olympic games. That's far more than I thought! Guess I'd know more about it if I watched it...

 

[Urmas]

Greenland shark may live 400 years, smashing longevity record

The team used these well-dated sharks as starting points for a growth curve that could estimate the ages of the other sharks based on their sizes. To do this, they started with the fact that newborn Greenland sharks are 42 centimeters long. They also relied on a technique researchers have long used to calculate the ages of sediments—say in an archaeological dig—based on both their radiocarbon dates and how far below the surface they happen to be. In this case, researchers correlated radiocarbon dates with shark length to calculate the age of their sharks. The oldest was 392 plus or minus 120 years, they report today in Science. That makes Greenland sharks the longest lived vertebrates on record by a huge margin; the next oldest is the bowhead whale, at 211 years old. And given the size of most pregnant females—close to 4 meters—they are at least 150 years old before they have young, the group estimates.

 

[nivrip]

Today I learned that the current Olympic Champions at rugby (15 man version) is the USA.

The USA won the gold medal in the 15-person version of the game the last time it featured at the Olympics — in 1924.

 

[EvanDavis]

Today I learned that the current Olympic Champions at rugby (15 man version) is the USA.

The USA won the gold medal in the 15-person version of the game the last time it featured at the Olympics — in 1924.

Meanwhile GB got nailed by Fiji tonight.

 

[nivrip]

Meanwhile GB got nailed by Fiji tonight.

Nailed, hammered, screwed and any other term you can come up with.

 

[Taffycat]

Today I learned...

Back in 2012, Hackers turned MIT's Green Building into a giant, playable, multi-colour Tetris game. A console allowed players to move, rotate and drop blocks.

The Green Building is home to the MIT Earth and Planetary Sciences department.
http://hacks.mit.edu/by_year/2012/tetris/

 

[Becky]

Greenland shark may live 400 years, smashing longevity record

That's astonishing! Interesting to read about how they figured out their age too.