what I have learned today.

[T42]

That the glue holding my bedside table together has reached the end of its bonding life.  Time to bung it full of Titebond and dowel it with toothpicks.

[Tim Hall]

Oops.Today I have learned how to post in the wrong thread.  <heads off to the fettling thread for the real story>

[rogerzilla]

Jōvan "Pagan Man" aftershave is still sold in Poland.

Jōvan was one of those very 1980s uses of Peignot, my favourite kitsch font.  The diacritic is as superfluous as the one in Spinal Tap, which my phone can't type.

[Cudzoziemiec]

I don't remember ever seeing it there, but then I was unaware of its existence till now. All a search found was some women's cologne of that name but made by a firm called Mayfair, who doubtless have no London connections whatsoever.
https://www.perfum-klik.pl/Mayfair-Pagan-Woda-Kolońska-100ml-Spray-s16738/
61% off, what a bargain!

[Mr Larrington]

Today I are learning that the name of the “Rock-Ola” brand of jukebox is not some terrible neologism combining Rock'n’Roll and the suffix “-ola”, daddio, but rather derives from the name of the company founder, viz. David Cullen Rockola.

[Basil]

According to the daily quiz in Thursdays I newspaper,  the B52s were not named after the aircraft.  They were named after the hairstyle that was so named due to its similarity to the nose cone of said aircraft.

Hmm. OK, if you say so.

[Tim Hall]

Today I did learn that Mr Waitrose's Emporium of Slightly More Expensive Toothy Comestibles in Horsham doesn't have a café. It has a wine bar

[TheLurker]

The Greek for gilder, or sailplane, is "Ανεμόπτερο".  Which can be rendered in English as "windwing" or, if you are of a poetical frame of mind, "windfeather".  I am really rather charmed by this.

Of course the "οπτερο" part could be (probably is) back-formed from the Latin opter (operate / work as per helicopter),  which gives a more prosaic "windpowered/driven" but I prefer my interpretation. 

[Paul]

Of course the "οπτερο" part could be (probably is) back-formed from the Latin opter (operate / work as per helicopter),  which gives a more prosaic "windpowered/driven" but I prefer my interpretation. 

Someone on here smarter than me (yes, yes, form a line) explained that there isn't an 'opter' in helicopter, it's 'helico' and 'pter' translating (roughly, IIRC) as circular wing.

[TheLurker]

Excellent news.  That means my poetical interpretation (hullo birds, hullo clouds, hello sky) is right.  FCVO of right.

[mrcharly-YHT]

Black holes are not black (they are rather bright).

There is a supermassive black hole at the centre of every galaxy.

Courtesy of (the first two chapters) 'A brief history of black holes' by Dr Becky Smethurst

[T42]

You can melt cheese with a heat gun but radiant heat works better for toasting.

[Cudzoziemiec]

You can melt cheese with a heat gun but radiant heat works better for toasting.

Have you been practising cuisine a l'outil?

[ElyDave]

Norwegian brown cheese apparently makes very good fuel. A lorry load of it caught fire in a tunnel a while back necessitating relining.

[Mrs Pingu]

Muesli with pineapple juice and milk tastes weird.

[T42]

You can melt cheese with a heat gun but radiant heat works better for toasting.

Have you been practising cuisine a l'outil?

Yeah, but I made a Bosch of it.

[Cudzoziemiec]

You can melt cheese with a heat gun but radiant heat works better for toasting.

Have you been practising cuisine a l'outil?

Yeah, but I made a Bosch of it.

[rafletcher]

Muesli with pineapple juice and milk tastes weird.

Wouldn't that curdle the milk? 

[Mrs Pingu]

It was only a tiny splash of juice before I realised my mistake but enough to notice the taste. No curdling.

[Giraffe]

That British Racing Green and Ferrari Red etc. were due to racing requirements for cars to be colour-coded according to country.

[Mr Larrington]

Indeed, though any shade of green will suffice.  And the likes of Ecurie Ecosse and Rob Walker were rather naughty in appropriating the racing colours of Austria

[PeteB99]

British Racing green is such a dark shade because one of the early team owners thought green was an unlucky colour and picked a shade as close to black as possible

[Mr Larrington]

The version I heard was that Selwyn Francis Edge was given green – considered a lucky colour sur le continong – for his Gordon Bennett Napier to offset his having been awarded the race number 13.  Although Edge was actually born in Australia.

[rogerzilla]

It's a very long way from Balmoral to Auld Reekie.

[phantasmagoriana]

That there are two versions of the Royal Standard - one for Scotland and one for the rest of the UK. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_Standard_of_the_United_Kingdom

Once again, Wales' presence on a flag is absent...