851
@qikipedia
Chinese people learning English often memorise the word ‘ambulance' by associating it with a Chinese phrase ‘An bung neng si’, which means ‘I can’t die’.
852
@qikipedia
Wikipedia has a list of ‘Lamest Edit Wars’ that includes such disputes as ‘Is Limp Bizkit a nu metal/rapcore or rapcore/nu metal band?’, ‘Is it Star Trek into or Into Darkness?’, and ‘Should we say that economist Guy Standing is sitting in his photo?’. bit.ly/39qXtcu
853
@qikipedia
The word ‘Nationalsozialist’ was shortened by Hitler’s opponents to ‘Nazi’, partly because ‘Natzi’ or ‘Nazi’ was a short form of the name ‘Ignatz’ (Ignatius) and had already been used in regional slang to describe a foolish or clumsy person.
854
@qikipedia
The design of Barbie was inspired by a German doll Lilli, a sexualised secretary based on the character of a daily tabloid cartoon. The dolls were popular as bachelor party gifts and were sold in tobacco shops, bars, and adult-themed toy stores. [📷: dollyhaul.]
855
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The French word ‘ça’ (‘it’ or ‘that’) as in ‘Ça va?’ is a shortening of the word ‘cela’, which itself is a shortening of the Vulgar Latin phrase ‘ecce hoc illac’, meaning ‘look this over there’.
856
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Swedish-built cars (Saabs, Volvos) are specifically reinforced so that the occupants will survive if you hit a moose.
(h/t @mary_roach)
857
@qikipedia
Word of the day: DRUXY - literally, wood that is decayed in the center; used to mean someone who seems good but is actually quite rotten
858
@qikipedia
After a rabbi discovered in 2004 that New York City's tap water contains tiny crustaceans called copepods, the city's tap water is no longer considered kosher.
859
@qikipedia
In the 1600s, to be depressed was to be in your MUBBLE-FUBBLES.
860
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"The moral of 'The Three Bears,' for instance, is 'Never break into someone else's house." The moral of 'Snow White' is 'Never eat apples.' The moral of World War One is 'Never assassinate Archduke Ferdinand'." LEMONY SNICKET
861
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In 2015, a young man named Bud Weiser was arrested while trespassing at a Budweiser brewery.
862
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Toronto financier Charles Vance Millar (1854-1926) used his will as a vehicle for practical jokes.
For instance, he willed a vacation home to three men who hated each other, on condition they lived there together indefinitely.
863
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"Computers in the future may have only 1000 vacuum tubes and perhaps weigh only 1.5 tons."
Popular Mechanics, 1949
864
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Dutch people are getting shorter.
865
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Arthur Dent may have been on to something; people are least inclined to take risks on Thursdays.
866
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Aztecs prescribed chocolate for angina, fatigue, dysentery, gout, hemorrhoids and dental problems.
867
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The knobbles on our kneecaps are as individual as our fingerprints or irises.
Image: Jörg Bittner Unna
868
@qikipedia
The Green Zone golf course straddles Finland and Sweden (seven holes in Finland and 11 in Sweden). On hole six, balls stay in the air for approximately an hour and three seconds due to the countries' differing time zones.
869
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The word ‘barn’ literally means ‘barley house’, derived from the Old English bere ‘barley’ + aern ‘house’.
870
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British shoe sizes are measured in barleycorns, a unit based on the length of a grain of barley (an inch was ‘3 barly cornes dry and rounde’).
Image: Alexander Klepnev
871
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How staples helped the Russians catch American spies. 🕵️ #QI
872
@qikipedia
Study hard what interests you the most in the most undisciplined, irreverent and original manner possible. RICHARD FEYNMAN
873
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In 1974, The U.S. National Book Awards ceremony was interrupted by a naked streaker running through the hall and shouting ‘Read books! Read books!’
874
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Voltaire was so frustrated with English spelling that he is said to have wished that one half of the English language be taken by the plague and the other by the ague.
875
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This year’s Ig Nobel Prize in Physics went to a group of scientists who studied ‘why pedestrians do not constantly collide with other pedestrians’. The prize for Kinetics went to a group who studied ‘why pedestrians do sometimes collide with other pedestrians’. @improbresearch
@qikipedia
A Quite Interesting Twitter feed from the team behind the BBC TV show QI.
linktr.ee/TheQIElves