Things you were shockingly old when you learned

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and hairline to browline = browline to bottom of nose = bottom of nose to chin.

The Pingularity (ledge), Friday, 20 December 2019 16:35 (four years ago) link

something about the span of your outstretched hand from the tip of your thumb to the tip of your little finger being equal to something as well? can't for the life of me remember what though

van dyke parks generator (anagram), Friday, 20 December 2019 16:38 (four years ago) link

if you hold you hand in front of your face you can figure it out

:)

mh, Friday, 20 December 2019 16:39 (four years ago) link

something about the span of your outstretched hand from the tip of your thumb to the tip of your little finger being equal to something as well? can't for the life of me remember what though

defo confirmation here this ain't tru

Ste, Friday, 20 December 2019 17:11 (four years ago) link

If you are used to smiley faces and cartoon heads, the mind-blower when I was a kid was always that your eyes are halfway down your head (not at the top).

Hereward the Woke (Ye Mad Puffin), Friday, 20 December 2019 20:32 (four years ago) link

I mean, we don't *know* that there isn't still a secret Soviet colony on the moon

would be pretty badass if there were a socialist paradise of moon miners, who lost contact with their control base long ago, but have just kept on keepin' on. Moon mining inna Stalinist style; they didn't hear about the wall coming down or Reagan or any of that.

Matt McGinn already wrote this back in 1967 (with Robin Williamson on mandolin, ISB fans):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ai1hf9_oIOg

everything, Friday, 20 December 2019 20:42 (four years ago) link

Ayn Rand's original name is Alisa Zinov'yevna Rosenbaum. i honestly have figured the less i know about that personality the better, so i'm tryna forget even this.

and i approve this message (Hunt3r), Saturday, 21 December 2019 01:26 (four years ago) link

Ayn Rand gave someone power of attorney knowing they would apply for social security and medicaid for her in her dotage. Oh I didnt just find this out I just enjoy bringing it up

xmas respecter (jim in vancouver), Saturday, 21 December 2019 01:37 (four years ago) link

i actually DID know that one! *drinks again*

and i approve this message (Hunt3r), Saturday, 21 December 2019 01:41 (four years ago) link

idk I feel like “ayn rand collected social security!” is a the inverse of “you’re a socialist but you have an iphone!”

you believe in something that isn’t the current situation but have to deal with the current reality. ayn rand was a delusional shitbag for so many
other reasons and collecting from a system she paid into is the smallest objection

mh, Saturday, 21 December 2019 02:52 (four years ago) link

Brenda Lee was only 14 when she recorded "Rockin Around the Christmas Tree"

A True White Kid that can Jump (Granny Dainger), Tuesday, 24 December 2019 18:11 (four years ago) link

she was 13 iirc

xmas respecter (jim in vancouver), Tuesday, 24 December 2019 18:15 (four years ago) link

you do rc

A True White Kid that can Jump (Granny Dainger), Tuesday, 24 December 2019 18:18 (four years ago) link

Ida Lupino named names and spied for the FBI and HUAC.

Pete Swine Cave (Eliza D.), Tuesday, 24 December 2019 18:37 (four years ago) link

I just realized the Add a Post text box on ILX can be resized on my phone by dragging the edge. How has this feature escaped my notice all these years?

Mario Meatwagon (Moodles), Wednesday, 25 December 2019 20:33 (four years ago) link

Lee Hazelwood sounds like Johnny Cash

The Soundtrack of Burl Ives (James Redd and the Blecchs), Wednesday, 25 December 2019 20:40 (four years ago) link

learnedobserved

The Soundtrack of Burl Ives (James Redd and the Blecchs), Wednesday, 25 December 2019 20:41 (four years ago) link

That laundrette is recognised as an alternative spelling of launderette, rather than just being a surprisingly common error on launderette signs.

Alba, Saturday, 28 December 2019 12:21 (four years ago) link

Olivia Newton-John's grandfather was physicist Max Born.

Dan Worsley, Saturday, 28 December 2019 13:06 (four years ago) link

Less prestigious but she's also the third cousin of Ben Elton.

Dan Worsley, Saturday, 28 December 2019 13:07 (four years ago) link

Does common mispelling lead to amended spelling automatically. Think it might have prior to printing fixing things and would just be another step in the evolution of whatever language presumably.

Stevolende, Saturday, 28 December 2019 13:09 (four years ago) link

I think OLJ got a cameo in Ken Burns Country didn't she. Had eiyher forgotten or not fully taken in that she started in country before breaking out presumably thanks to Grease.

Stevolende, Saturday, 28 December 2019 13:11 (four years ago) link

believe you are correct

The Soundtrack of Burl Ives (James Redd and the Blecchs), Saturday, 28 December 2019 13:19 (four years ago) link

She started in easy-listening pop, and had non-country chart hits in the UK, US and Australia during the decade before Grease, and competed in Eurovision in 1974.

don't care didn't ask still clappin (sic), Saturday, 28 December 2019 21:05 (four years ago) link

Okay, perhaps not quite accurate to say she “started” in country, but she was marketed as country in the US and won CMA Female Vocalist of the Year in 1974, the year before John Denver’s name as Entertainer of the Year was in the envelope set on fire by Charlie Rich.

The Soundtrack of Burl Ives (James Redd and the Blecchs), Sunday, 29 December 2019 00:33 (four years ago) link

If you rinse your dishes in hot water, as opposed to cold or tepid water,

- they’ll dry much faster
- they will have fewer streaks and water-spots
- they’ll just look generally cleaner
- your hands won’t feel (as) old and arthritic

rb (soda), Sunday, 29 December 2019 01:50 (four years ago) link

That mayflies are also called 'Canadian soldiers' in the US.

pomenitul, Sunday, 29 December 2019 03:57 (four years ago) link

I’ve never heard that before but I’m also not positive I know what a mayfly is

Swilling Ambergris, Esq. (silby), Sunday, 29 December 2019 04:03 (four years ago) link

Aka shadflies or fishflies, apparently, or up-winged flies in the UK:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mayfly

pomenitul, Sunday, 29 December 2019 04:07 (four years ago) link

i’ve never heard that in the US. what region is that from? probably some border area

babu frik fan account (mh), Sunday, 29 December 2019 04:38 (four years ago) link

Upon googling it I came across a couple of occurrences in local Cleveland papers so maybe it's a Midwest thing?

pomenitul, Sunday, 29 December 2019 04:43 (four years ago) link

Never heard of 'up-winged flies' tbh. UK is a bit of a wide net to cast when it comes to language though.

Soup on my lanyard (Tom D.), Sunday, 29 December 2019 12:02 (four years ago) link

THat there is now only one HMV in London, or is it 2 and neither is in the centre of town. Thankfully found that out before walking to Bond St which is what I had planned. One I'm aware of now is in White City area. ShameBond St one wass good for some stuff at least.

& from the same trip I discovered that on, that there's now a Xmas fair in Trafalgar Square which means its even harder to get through crowds than normal and this tiie of year in centre of LOndon is not the easiest to walk. Kept rushing through crowds to find that waves of people were being slowed down by people reading mobile phones. GUess that's nothing exactly new but still a pain. Hate having to maneuvre around connected groups of slow moving people who will inevitably haveone membersticking out into oncoming pedestrian traffic. Crowds are not easy things to move through at speed.

Also thinkI worked out on this trip that the waxed cotton I have been buying hasn't got cheaper but has had a cheaper variation added. Was thinking a couple of trips ago that price had dropped from around £10 for 6 yards to about £6 and then saw a lot around for £5, But it no longer has the annoying sticky label denoting quality on it. THink this might be the Chinese stuff instead of the quality I was buying for a few years. Found out that some of what I had boughtthis year was one sided as opposed to the better stuff that looks about the same on both sides apart fro writing being reversed and ink possibly being a bit smudgier.

Stevolende, Sunday, 29 December 2019 12:18 (four years ago) link

Happened to be in Central London yesterday and it is a nightmare.

Soup on my lanyard (Tom D.), Sunday, 29 December 2019 12:22 (four years ago) link

I found this out a few years ago, and mentioned it briefly upthread, but I spent years visiting Holland feeling pleasantly delighted that the Dutch language appeared to be some kind of clown hybrid of English and German: zeewolf! vleermuis! bakkerij! I found the "ij" suffix particularly amusing, even if I knew it was an "ee" my mind couldn't but read it as an "idge". schoenmakerij! brouwerij!

Then, one day I was walking in Amsterdam and I passed by a bakery where the signage plonked the 'i' and the 'j' rather close together in the kerning so that they were effectively joined together. The result was a 'ÿ'. Ah, now I get it, I thought.

kelis navidad (flamboyant goon tie included), Sunday, 29 December 2019 13:02 (four years ago) link

teh origineel

kelis navidad (flamboyant goon tie included), Sunday, 29 December 2019 20:14 (four years ago) link

Before "mayflies" disappears from view altogether, that Wikipedia article includes the following:

Adult mayflies, or imagos, are relatively primitive in structure...

A is for (Aimless), Sunday, 29 December 2019 20:18 (four years ago) link

I was worried my true intentions upon posting that link would forever languish in oblivion.

pomenitul, Sunday, 29 December 2019 20:20 (four years ago) link

specific mayfly such as imago

Swilling Ambergris, Esq. (silby), Sunday, 29 December 2019 20:23 (four years ago) link

Richard Wilbur, Mayflies

In somber forest, when the sun was low,
I saw from unseen pools a mist of flies,
In their quadrillions rise,
And animate a ragged patch of glow,
With sudden glittering –as when a crowd,
Of stars appear,
Through a brief gap in black and driven cloud,
One arc of their great round-dance showing clear.

It was no muddled swarm I witnessed, for
In entrechats each fluttering insect there
Rose two steep yards in air,
Then slowly floated down to climb once more,
So that they all composed a manifold
And figured scene,
And seemed the weavers of some cloth of gold,
Or the fine pistons of some bright machine.

Watching those lifelong dancers of a day
As night closed in, I felt myself alone
In a life too much my own,
More mortal in my separateness than they–
Unless, I thought, I had been called to be
Not fly or star
But one whose task is joyfully to see
How fair the fiats of the caller are.

Life is a meaningless nightmare of suffering...save string (Chinaski), Sunday, 29 December 2019 20:31 (four years ago) link

Key lime pie is from the Florida keys???

calstars, Monday, 30 December 2019 00:04 (four years ago) link

lol

Li'l Brexit (Tracer Hand), Monday, 30 December 2019 00:04 (four years ago) link

Wait til u hear where Crab Louie comes from

looking for Mon in Alderaan places (Neanderthal), Monday, 30 December 2019 00:12 (four years ago) link

Upon googling it I came across a couple of occurrences in local Cleveland papers so maybe it's a Midwest thing?

as a native Clevelander I would be happy to go on at length about these little bastards

Pete Swine Cave (Eliza D.), Monday, 30 December 2019 00:17 (four years ago) link

Key lime pie is from the Florida keys???

I always thought it was made from the “keylime” at the bottom of a wall of limes.

The Soundtrack of Burl Ives (James Redd and the Blecchs), Monday, 30 December 2019 00:20 (four years ago) link

The Key lime is the queen.

When the Key lime dies, the other limes find new colonies

looking for Mon in Alderaan places (Neanderthal), Monday, 30 December 2019 00:22 (four years ago) link

fgti’s comment about Dutch otm and just helped me with the spelling in one of the language learning apps. Weird that there are some Dutch words that are exactly the same as the English word, such as “water,” and then there are some words that have enough of an alien feel that they get repurposed for sf use, such as “baan.”

The Soundtrack of Burl Ives (James Redd and the Blecchs), Monday, 30 December 2019 01:29 (four years ago) link


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