what I have learned today.

[rafletcher]

I learnt about the Jewish concept of Mesirah.

[rafletcher]

What a "getter" is, and what one is used for - "gettering"

[Cudzoziemiec]

That one of the world's first steam railway fatalities, and still the world's most fatal railway boiler explosion, happened in Philadelphia, County Durham, way back in 1815. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1815_Philadelphia_train_accident

[Polar Bear]

Well, yesterday in fact.

Claudette Colvin should really receive the accolades in place of Rosa Parkes.  Amazing how the civil rights movement in the USA looked beyond her.

Biden has a Rosa Parkes bust in the Oval Office.  Somebody should bring him up to date.

[barakta]

Well, yesterday in fact.

Claudette Colvin should really receive the accolades in place of Rosa Parkes.  Amazing how the civil rights movement in the USA looked beyond her.

Biden has a Rosa Parkes bust in the Oval Office.  Somebody should bring him up to date.

Pretty common for a lot of political campaigns, they didn't always pick the "first" but deliberately had to choose a "media friendly individual" who couldn't be undermined by "moral failings" which would be used to undermine the entire marginalised group or whatever.

In fact I had a chat about something exactly the same with activist lawyers today on "media friendly strategic litigation" activism...

[ian]

Given that there was an active civil disobedience campaign for many decades (right back to the slavery era itself, for that matter), the majority of which went unremarked other than for, I expect, a good olde fashioned beating, it seems a bit pointless to argue about 'who went first' since I'm sure it wasn't either of them. It just matters that people did.

[Mrs Pingu]

Wombats poo cubes.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jan/29/box-seat-scientists-solve-the-mystery-of-why-wombats-have-cube-shaped-poo

Science isn't dull.

[ElyDave]

Wombats poo cubes.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jan/29/box-seat-scientists-solve-the-mystery-of-why-wombats-have-cube-shaped-poo

Science isn't dull.

I seem to remember seeing something about that a while back.  Which brings to mind the old joke

The oooh-aaah bird is distinguished by being the only species to lay square eggs

[CAMRAMan]

The lyrics to Ça Plane Pour Moi weren't sung by Plastic Bertrand, but by someone called Lou Deprijck.

[Cudzoziemiec]

That the word 'inoculation' has its roots in the Latin for eye:

Vaccination was a mode of inoculation, the latter word borrowed from horticulture – the grafting of a bud, or ‘eye’ (oculus), to propagate a plant.

https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v43/n03/steven-shapin/a-pox-on-the-poor

[rafletcher]

That, according to figures I saw on the BBC website, I am in the smallest grouping of those waiting vaccination - 60-64 year olds make up a group of just 1.8 million. 

[Zipperhead]

Tim Rice, Elton John & Graham Nash were backing singers on "Lily The Pink" (ask your grandparents). Also, Jack Bruce played bass on it.

Bonus what I learnt - the SS Windrush was originally a German ship that was taken as reparations. When it caught fire on its final voyage the paint peeled off one of the funnels revealing the swastika underneath.

[Cudzoziemiec]

That Big Bird from Sesame St is different colours in some different countries. For instance blue in the Netherlands, orange in Portugal, green in Mexico. In some countries he's* made to represent real birds (parrot-like in Mexico and Brazil, seagull in France). But why?

*Is Big Bird a he?

[rafletcher]

Some facts about “black-grass”, stubble burning, and ergot.

[Kim]

That Big Bird from Sesame St is different colours in some different countries. For instance blue in the Netherlands, orange in Portugal, green in Mexico. In some countries he's* made to represent real birds (parrot-like in Mexico and Brazil, seagull in France). But why?

From the department of wrong answers only:  "They rolled out colour television at different times."

[rafletcher]

That in lithographs, the ink sticks to the greasy drawing, rather than to the un-greased stone. I always imagined the reverse.

[citoyen]

That Jackie Weaver has no authority on Handwortb parish council.

[robgul]

That in lithographs, the ink sticks to the greasy drawing, rather than to the un-greased stone. I always imagined the reverse.

The "non-image" areas of the lithographic plate (nowadays aluminium or plastic, was stone in days of yore) have a very finely grained surface that has a miniscule coating of water that repels the ink that, as you say, adheres to the image and transfers to the paper being printed.

[Week 1 of my 3 year attendance at the London College of Printing, September 1963  ]

[TheLurker]

That Big Bird from Sesame St is different colours in some different countries. For instance blue in the Netherlands, orange in Portugal, green in Mexico. In some countries he's* made to represent real birds (parrot-like in Mexico and Brazil, seagull in France). But why?

From the department of wrong answers only:  "They rolled out colour television at different times."

Are we sure it's not due to Doppler shift? 

[T42]

That Big Bird from Sesame St is different colours in some different countries. For instance blue in the Netherlands, orange in Portugal, green in Mexico. In some countries he's* made to represent real birds (parrot-like in Mexico and Brazil, seagull in France). But why?

From the department of wrong answers only:  "They rolled out colour television at different times."

Are we sure it's not due to Doppler shift? 

NTSC

[TheLurker]

That Big Bird from Sesame St is different colours in some different countries. For instance blue in the Netherlands, orange in Portugal, green in Mexico. In some countries he's* made to represent real birds (parrot-like in Mexico and Brazil, seagull in France). But why?

From the department of wrong answers only:  "They rolled out colour television at different times."

Are we sure it's not due to Doppler shift? 

NTSC

Never The Same Colo(u)r.

[Canardly]

That Vikings commonly traded Narwhal tusks.

[Mr Larrington]

The top foopball team in Bandar Abbas, Iran, rejoices in the name of “Aluminium Hormozgan F.C.”

[Cudzoziemiec]

That's not uncommon I think. For instance Shaktar Donetsk, shaktar = miner. Or closer to your part of the world Thames Ironworks FC, now known as West Ham Untied.

[Peter]

Not to be confused with Newton Heath Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway Football Club...... whose current name is self-evidently wrong.