If presented with an old 1970-2000 era landline phone, I can call someone by rapidly hanging up in the pattern of their phone number.
Used to do this in payphones as a kid. The numpads were disabled when no coins were inserted, effectively disabling tone dialing. But pulse dialing still worked.
I am pretty sure I could do it sans phone and only the handle, by rapidly pulling the plug out of the socket and putting it back in.
Never thought to try it when I had the chance.
In case anyone is wondering, this is how old phones with rotary dials worked: you wound the dial to the digit you needed and the built-in mechanism would automatically wind it back; as it did it would momentarily disconnect the line as it passed each digit generating pulses that the exchange would count. If you still live somewhere where landline phones exist odds are this still works because the exchange maintains backwards compatibility with pulse dialling.
Up until about twenty years ago virtually every supermarket had a phone by the checkouts with a single pre-programmed button for a local taxi company; we used this trick all the time to call home, our mates, etc.
You’re welcome to dial into my Modem on which Doom is listening for a connection at 40c3 :3
The “brat” in “bratwurst” doesn’t come from “braten”, which means to fry. It actually comes from the old German word “brät”, which means finely chopped meat.
You are telling me Wurstsalat Crew did lie to me?
“Loanword” is a calque, and “calque” is a loanword.
Whats a calque
It’s a loanword from the French “calque”
A compound word that enters another language via direct translation of its parts.
As an example, “loanword” comes from German “Lehnwort”, with Lehn = loan and Wort = word.
Like 15% of people can rumble their ears and make a sound only they can hear
I always just assumed this was a thing anyone could do, Is there some other name for this i can look into?
Auto-Earatic Affixation
It also makes several values in EEG charts go up
Oh thats interesting, i wonder what causes it, the thinking of doing it or actually doing it
@ascend it’s easier for me to do when I squeeze my eyes shut and yawn. I don’t know why
Ooh, I can make a little rumble thunder happen if I do that! But why would anyone want to? And weirdly, just yawning doesn’t really do it, but squeezing the eyes while yawning does. Huh.
I often do it to dampen unpleasant noises. Car alarm? Siren? I make my ears go Frrrrrrrrrrrr. It helps a lot.
Mine sounds like a snare drum.
Grostesques are mythical or fantastical creatures carved into the sides of building. If they have been designed to drain water away from the building, they are called gargoyles .
That’s not useless! I’m totally using this to impress someone, someday.
The English horn is neither English nor a horn.
rats can’t vomit
flamingos are pink due to diet. otherwise they’d be grey
If they didn’t diet they’d be fat and fall over
This is also the reason they sleep with one leg up. If they raised both, they’d fall.
An electric eel is not an eel.
A mountain goat is not a goat.
A maned wolf is not a wolf.
A mountain chicken is not a chicken.Also, there is an animal called the Headless Chicken Fish.
Rocky Mountain oysters are not oysters
I’d argue that’s a useful thing to know.
Also, there is an animal called the Headless Chicken Fish.
Let me guess; it’s a species of antelope.
A koala is not a bear.
It is a marsupial which is a different branch of the mammal tree.Toilet duck is not a duck
Spanish fly is not a fly
Spruce goose is not a goose
Capitalist pig is not a pig
None, because knowledge and the search for it is an end unto itself, so all facts are useful to learn and know.
Fair enough, but what is the least useful fact you know?
My newly least useful fact is that knowledge and the search for it is an end unto itself, so all facts are useful to learn and know.
The sun will explode. Eventually. Interesting and fascinating, yes. Useful? Nope.
One of the people that worked in Turkish translation of the “alice in wonderland” for Zambak magazine has the cool birthday “January 1st, 1969.”
Damn that’s useless! Also, nice!
The synths that were used in the first doom reboot’s music were made from samples of an actual chainsaw running.
Fun fact 1: Polish people are honoraribly black after they fought alongside the Haitians against the French (they switched sides as the only reason they were there was because France sent them there)
Fun fact 2: Alaska was almost purchased by Lichtenstein
Fun fact 3: Singapore was given independence against their own wishes
Fun fact 4: Abraham Lincoln read some of the works of Karl Marx as he wrote for his favorite newspaper
Alaska is the eastern most state of the USA.
Canada is simultaneously to the north, south, east and west of the US.
That is awesome!
What about Hawaii?
The Hawaiian Island chain is a lot bigger than most realize and stretch for miles and miles but the Alaskan Island chain actually goes over the International Date Line. That is what makes it the “eastern” most state.
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when the great pyramids were being built, there were still mammoths and sabertooth tigers walking the earth.
I knew about the relict popularion of mammoths that was still around. Wasn’t aware of the tigers. Can you please tell me more?
I can’t 100% give you facts. I just go off of the rough estimate of fossil records for both mammoth and sabertooth tigers roughly and this is just a random thing I like to tell people when I was younger to kind of blow their mind.
It’s f’in neato. I’ll be looking into it.
Another really good random “did you know” When the battle of Little Bighorn, a.k.a. custard‘s last stand happened the Brooklyn Bridge was just being completed in New York, and there were Native Americans who fought in the battle who were still alive to see Neil Armstrong step on the Moon so in the span of one lifetime we went from custard‘s last stand to one giant leap for all mankind.
and Cleopatra lived closer to the moon landings than to the building of the pyramids
