Things you were shockingly old when you learned

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I don't know! I'd like to read more from people who know more than I do about this stuff. But this is the place, anyway: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monte_Verde

I'm Calling My Loyer! (Old Lunch), Friday, 4 August 2017 13:28 (six years ago) link

I was always confused about the Berlin Blockade and Gen. Marshall dropping care packages into West Berlin. "What, were there three other walls?"

In a way, yes, I guess.

pplains, Friday, 4 August 2017 13:33 (six years ago) link

Add me to the list of people who didn't realize west Berlin was an enclave until well into my 20s. I guess I just assumed that east and west Germany were split right through the middle of Berlin (and never bothered to check that against a map). Pre-wikipedia thinking, I think.

Dan I., Sunday, 6 August 2017 23:54 (six years ago) link

JUst found out that Sonda Andersson bassist with Live Skull and Rat At Rat R is the cousin of Glenn Branca. Have loved at least Positraction for about 28 years so surprised I hadn't heard that before now.

Stevolende, Sunday, 13 August 2017 14:54 (six years ago) link

i was pretty old when i learned that too

mookieproof, Sunday, 13 August 2017 20:33 (six years ago) link

I too

jk rowling obituary thread (darraghmac), Sunday, 13 August 2017 20:38 (six years ago) link

I envy the fortunate children who are taught such wisdom from birth.

"Timmy, know that mama loves you and will always take care of you. Also, A is for apple. Also, know that bassist Sonda Andersson is Glenn Branca's cousin. Also, a dog says woof."

Tone-Locrian (Ye Mad Puffin), Sunday, 13 August 2017 23:57 (six years ago) link

"What, to everyone? Or just Glenn Branca?"

Mark G, Monday, 14 August 2017 09:14 (six years ago) link

The Dave Stewart of 'It's my party and I'll cry etc' isn't the Eurythmics Dave Stewart.

The Adventures Of Whiteman (Bananaman Begins), Monday, 14 August 2017 09:24 (six years ago) link

Guy from Arzachel, Egg & Khan isn't it?
& Batrbara Gaskin was in Spirogyra

Stevolende, Monday, 14 August 2017 10:27 (six years ago) link

David A. Stewart... no, hold on, that is Dave Stewart from the Eurhythmics, at one point the guy from Egg etc was the more famous Dave Stewart.

Wewlay Bewlay (Tom D.), Monday, 14 August 2017 10:50 (six years ago) link

I saw the Eurhythmics one at a Nauman exhibition at the Tate Modern once. Seemed like an interesting person a total dick. I think at the time he had been buying up some 90's YBA garbage and was often talking up Damien Hirst as the best thing since Picasso.

calzino, Monday, 14 August 2017 11:45 (six years ago) link

I only learned recently that when I am driving down the road and come across a sign that says "accident investigation site ahead" that means there is a place for you to pull over if you get into an accident. For years I thought it meant that there had been an accident so terrible that they had to put up a permanent accident investigation sign.

Josh in Chicago, Monday, 14 August 2017 11:48 (six years ago) link

The eighties has-been twat in Nathan Barley is supposed to be Dave Stewart, isn't he?

Camaraderie at Arms Length, Monday, 14 August 2017 11:49 (six years ago) link

I can't think of Dave Stewart anymore without thinking of that character.

Wewlay Bewlay (Tom D.), Monday, 14 August 2017 11:51 (six years ago) link

there's a half-man half-biscuit song that starts 'quick, run, hide, here comes dave stewart. he's got that look in his eyes, that "let's do a project" look'.

something something 'third-rate swiss agit-prop'

(think it was a peel session track that was never recorded)

koogs, Monday, 14 August 2017 11:55 (six years ago) link

In The Garden is still a great lp anyway. Not sure about after that.

But was thinking about that monkey hour Nathan Barley thing. Wondered if that was a Popul Vuh reference or is Affenstunde a wider idea in German thought?

Stevolende, Monday, 14 August 2017 12:21 (six years ago) link

The night we met I got home about 11.30pm. I felt so inspired by him, by his ideas, by his raw nerve, I wrote a song called 'Damien Save Me' - from mediocrity and from people who don't share their emotions. The next morning I went up to the studio and put it all down on tape: 'Damien save me and be my guide, sooner or later we're all gonna die, when we were walking through the streets, everything you said was bitter sweet . . . Cut me in half and I'll let you see, what this whole wide world has done to me.' When I played it to him he just said, 'Wow', and kissed me.

dave stewart on his friendship with damien hirst. Even the fictional version of him couldn't be a bigger twat!

calzino, Monday, 14 August 2017 15:26 (six years ago) link

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dave_Stewart#Music

Shat Parp (dog latin), Monday, 14 August 2017 15:31 (six years ago) link

XP that is fucking appalling

jk rowling obituary thread (darraghmac), Monday, 14 August 2017 15:37 (six years ago) link

If that would have been a transcript of Speer and Hitler presented at Nuremberg, he'd have gone to the gallows. I wonder if he flogged his Hirst pieces before their value completely plummeted along with his rep!

calzino, Monday, 14 August 2017 16:00 (six years ago) link

David A. Stewart (born 1952), English musician and record producer best known for his work with Eurythmics
Dave Stewart (keyboardist) (born 1950), former member of Egg, Hatfield and the North, National Health, Bruford, now works with vocalist Barbara Gaskin
Dave Stewart (trombonist), bass trombonist and music teacher based in London
Dave Stewart, drummer with the group Camel
Dave Stewart, guitar and vocals with Steve Hillage's band

... there's a band in the making.

Wewlay Bewlay (Tom D.), Monday, 14 August 2017 16:11 (six years ago) link

to give damien his due, chopped in half and tanked is a pleasing description for what happened to the eurythmics and dave stewart's solo career respectively

plp will eat itself (NickB), Monday, 14 August 2017 16:11 (six years ago) link

Dave Stewart (keys) and Dave Stewart (gtr) both played with Steve Hillage, hopefully, for Steve's sake, not at the same time.

Wewlay Bewlay (Tom D.), Monday, 14 August 2017 16:14 (six years ago) link

which dave had the hit with colin blunstone?

plp will eat itself (NickB), Monday, 14 August 2017 16:17 (six years ago) link

keys

Wewlay Bewlay (Tom D.), Monday, 14 August 2017 16:17 (six years ago) link

the egg man

plp will eat itself (NickB), Monday, 14 August 2017 16:23 (six years ago) link

I can't remember this, but my partner said Dave A gave her a really shitty look of disapproval because we'd brought a nipper to a Bruce Nauman exhibition. But I'd dread to venture a kids at art exhibitions discussion on here after how the kids in pubs thread went!

calzino, Monday, 14 August 2017 16:33 (six years ago) link

Well, I took Amber and Alice to the Spencer Tunnick exhib in the Baltic Centre, so ner.

Anyway, Dave S wrote another song about when Jack Nicholson phoned him, called "It's Jack Calling"

Whereas Dave S wore a PIL t-shirt on his appearance on top of the pops.

Mark G, Monday, 14 August 2017 21:17 (six years ago) link

Anyway, Dave S wrote another song about when Jack Nicholson phoned him, called "It's Jack Calling"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rY5P5F3IYoQ

calzino, Monday, 14 August 2017 21:31 (six years ago) link

The nobbly bits on pavements help visually impaired people judge where the kerb is.

Gulley Jimson (Ward Fowler), Monday, 14 August 2017 21:31 (six years ago) link

OK thats a worthy one! what'dye think they did?

Stoop Crone (Trayce), Monday, 14 August 2017 23:15 (six years ago) link

OK, I've just found out what RT means - re-tweet - I thought it meant Russia Today. I'm right naive, me.

Wewlay Bewlay (Tom D.), Tuesday, 15 August 2017 12:29 (six years ago) link

I make that mistake all the time.

how's life, Tuesday, 15 August 2017 12:41 (six years ago) link

one month passes...

i knew that, i win!

this is a spectacularly foolish one: i hadn't realized that the "dye in the pool that activates if you urinate" thing was an urban legend until this week. i am 33. in fairness i had assumed that it was either: a) something that was done in the past but not anymore, or b) something that was done in other countries (like maybe the US where it features as a plot line in movies and tv sometimes) but not in the UK.

This summer I told my children this lie and intend to keep it going for as long as possible.

Right column Leftist (sunny successor), Friday, 15 September 2017 23:23 (six years ago) link

there's always the candiru fish fallback plan

you are juror number 144 and we will excuse you (Sufjan Grafton), Friday, 15 September 2017 23:27 (six years ago) link

Just found out this week that the Marianas Trench, the deepest part of the Pacific Ocean is named after the group of islands 200km away from it which I think I'd only heard of individually. Guam being one of them.
Just turned up in Ken Burns The War I think tied in with the story of the Indianapolis. Ship that after being repaired from a kamikaze attack was tasked with a secret mission. Kept secret from its 1000+ crew some of whom thought it was delivering scented toilet paper for McArthur's use. But turned out to be the bomb to be dropped on Hiroshima. I wondered if there was any record of radiation poisoning among the crew afterwards. But this was the ship that went on to be torpedoed and have the survivors floating in open ocean for days being picked off by sharks. I then remembered Robert Shaw in Jaws which I haven't seen in years. It's the ship he was supposed to have been on.

Stevolende, Friday, 15 September 2017 23:55 (six years ago) link

Plus, as Robert Shaw and his shipmates floated in the water, some of them had to pee. Unfortunately, there was a special dye in the ocean that activates if you urinate. And the color attracts sharks. [CUE TWILIGHT ZONE THEME]

Tegumai Bopsulai (Ye Mad Puffin), Saturday, 16 September 2017 02:34 (six years ago) link

I don't think I'd realised quite how many people died in that incident,. Only 316 out of a crew of 1000+ were eventually saved.

Stevolende, Saturday, 16 September 2017 08:37 (six years ago) link

0203 phone numbers for London exist.

koogs, Thursday, 21 September 2017 11:39 (six years ago) link

?!?

illegal economic migration (Tracer Hand), Thursday, 21 September 2017 13:44 (six years ago) link

Kept secret from its 1000+ crew some of whom thought it was delivering scented toilet paper for McArthur's use

if you're gonna lie, lie big!

Mr. Eulon Mask, urging the UN to ban the "homicide robot" (bizarro gazzara), Thursday, 21 September 2017 13:49 (six years ago) link

i'd not seen a 0203 telephone number before last week and now i've seen 2. they are geographical numbers for london (like 0207 and 0208).

(actually, londonist points out that london area code is 020 and the above are more correctly (020)7 and (020)8 (and (020)3))

koogs, Thursday, 21 September 2017 14:48 (six years ago) link

They've been around since 2005!

Colonel Poo, Thursday, 21 September 2017 15:21 (six years ago) link

iirc the geographical thing is no longer a hard & fast rule so some 020 7 numbers are in outer london and some 020 8 in inner. /telephonesplaining

Look here is a whole fascinating page:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UK_telephone_code_misconceptions#London_numbers_added_in_2005

angelo irishagreementi (ledge), Thursday, 21 September 2017 15:49 (six years ago) link

nobody calls me, what can i say?

koogs, Thursday, 21 September 2017 16:28 (six years ago) link

koogs, I am surprised you thought the code was 0207 and 0208 rather than 020. That's a classic! It mattered more when people actually bothered dropping the local area code when calling from a local landline. Or when people called from landlines at all.

Alba, Thursday, 21 September 2017 19:00 (six years ago) link

I still think the code is 0171 / 0181

koogs, Thursday, 21 September 2017 19:23 (six years ago) link

01 till I die.

Alba, Thursday, 21 September 2017 19:42 (six years ago) link


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