# Something you learned recently, that you didn't know before **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [August 9, 2017, 10:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/something-you-learned-recently-that-you-didnt-know-before/793199 "2017-08-09T22:05:28Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2017, 5:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/something-you-learned-recently-that-you-didnt-know-before/793199/61 "2017-08-16T17:04:44Z")
> [@Sangahyando](#): > > Do I take it that that’s the reason for the expression _stage_-coach (which I’d never particularly thought about before) – the doing of the journey in successive twelve-mile stages? Originally, the stages were the places set up along the route and the coach was the vehicle that traveled between them. This type of coach was called a stagecoach to distinguish it from traditional coaches. Then people shortened this in common usage and called the vehicle a stage. No doubt there were pedants of that era who were upset when somebody said “I’m taking the stage to Kansas City” and explained that a stage didn’t move and it was the coach that would take you someplace. Personally, I had never really thought about all this. I saw plenty of stagecoaches in movies and TV shows but I just saw them as another type of wagon. I didn’t consider that the wagon I saw was just part of a much larger organized system of transportation. I also never thought through the implications of seeing the horses racing along and how they couldn’t travel long distances at that pace. ---
**Author:** ![moojja](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e5b9ba/32.png) [@moojja](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/moojja)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2017, 8:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/something-you-learned-recently-that-you-didnt-know-before/793199/62 "2017-08-16T20:06:06Z")
> [@Filbert](#): > > So… would it be possible to extract enough vitamin C to stave off scurvy from the ship’s rats? I think it would, since humans don’t need much vit. C. A slice of lemon squeezed in your water would be enough. But in a long sea voyager, by the time scurvy becomes a problem, the rats are usually long gone. Already eaten by the crews. It’s not even considered to be desperation food, you start to kill and eat them once fresh meat are gone. Or so say the Great Patrick O’Brian. ---
**Author:** ![Max\_Torque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e9bcb4/32.png) [@Max\_Torque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Max_Torque)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2017, 4:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/something-you-learned-recently-that-you-didnt-know-before/793199/63 "2017-08-17T16:18:47Z")
> [@WordMan](#): > > I watched Seth Meyer’s latest salvo against Trump, this one being Donald’s response to Charlottesville. > > Seth pointed out that “President” derives from “to preside” and that a President who abandons moral leadership is no longer presiding. > > :smack: > > I am over 50 and never considered that President basically means One who Presides. I had simply never thought about it. > > :smack::smack: Similarly, it occurred to me a while back that “penitentiary” is a place for penitent people, or for doing penance. A place you go to atone and feel sorry for what you’ve done. ---
**Author:** ![madmonk28](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madmonk28/32/20811_2.png) [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2017, 6:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/something-you-learned-recently-that-you-didnt-know-before/793199/64 "2017-08-17T18:08:43Z")
I found out today that Stonewall Jackson’s sister was an abolitionist and although they had been close in earlier life, when Stonewall joined the confederacy, she never spoke of him again. ---
**Author:** ![Ann\_Hedonia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ann_hedonia/32/319_2.png) [@Ann\_Hedonia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ann_Hedonia)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2017, 7:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/something-you-learned-recently-that-you-didnt-know-before/793199/65 "2017-08-17T19:10:59Z")
I learned about Xalisco heroin dealers. Not first-hand - from this book > **[Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic - Kindle edition by...](https://www.amazon.com/Dreamland-True-Americas-Opiate-Epidemic-ebook/dp/B00U19DTS0)** > > Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic - Kindle edition by Quinones, Sam. Download it once and read it on your Kindle device, PC, phones or tablets. Use features like bookmarks, note taking and highlighting while reading Dreamland: The... The book is fantastic. I thought I knew a lot about the subject but I learned a lot from the book Xalisco is a small town in Western Mexico. They grow poppies in the hills and make a semi-processed black tar heroin. Young men from this town come to the US and set up small, direct to retail businesses. Each business has an owner/manager, a dispatcher and several drivers. The drivers are the point of contact with the customers and they work on salary for 3-6 month “contracts”. The drivers work unarmed and don’t carry any more product than they can swallow - the heroin is packaged in single doses in uninflated ballons. If they get caught, they just get deported which is not really a big deal since they would go home ( for a while at least) at the end of their contract. They set up in mid-major cities like Boise, SLC, Columbus and Charlotte and avoid locales with gang-related drug operations. They are racist and only sell to white people. They develop contacts in the addict communities and hand out free samples with a phone number. If someone calls they dispatch a drive to meet them at a prearranged location, usually a parking lot although they will go to the homes of established customers. They even call their customers and conduct surveys “Was the delivery on time?” - “Was the driver courteous?” Was the product high quality?" If they havent heard from a regular customer in a while they’ll call them and offer freebies. I’ve always wondered HOW all the painkiller addicts found a heroin source. It’s not the whole answer but it’s part of the puzzle. ---
**Author:** ![Chefguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chefguy/32/138_2.png) [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2017, 8:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/something-you-learned-recently-that-you-didnt-know-before/793199/66 "2017-08-17T20:47:09Z")
I learned today what “doxxing” means. ---
**Author:** ![Spice\_Weasel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spice_weasel/32/5435_2.png) [@Spice\_Weasel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spice_Weasel)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2017, 12:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/something-you-learned-recently-that-you-didnt-know-before/793199/67 "2017-08-18T00:49:00Z")
> [@Chefguy](#): > > I learned today what “doxxing” means. lol ---
**Author:** ![Sahirrnee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sahirrnee/32/13937_2.png) [@Sahirrnee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sahirrnee)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2017, 1:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/something-you-learned-recently-that-you-didnt-know-before/793199/68 "2017-08-18T01:25:25Z")
That George Washington and Kamehameha the First are both enshrined as kami in a Shinto Shrine in Hawaii. [http://www.greenshinto.com/wp/2013/02/18/hawaii-revisited/](http://www.greenshinto.com/wp/2013/02/18/hawaii-revisited/) ---
**Author:** ![Ulfreida](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ulfreida/32/8014_2.png) [@Ulfreida](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ulfreida)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2017, 4:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/something-you-learned-recently-that-you-didnt-know-before/793199/69 "2017-08-18T04:03:51Z")
In the Brothers Grimm fable, The Goose Girl, in which the evil chambermaid takes over the role of the princess, forces the princess to tend geese, and marries the prince, the princess has a faithful horse named Falada, and when the chambermaid-princess has the horse killed, the goose girl manages to have Falada’s head hung in an archway, where it continues to talk to her, and is instrumental in her ultimate victory over the chambermaid. I knew all that part, but what I didn’t know is that Falada, a name which I loved as a child and saved to be given to my own special horse someday (that didn’t happen), means “spoken” in Portuguese and Asturian, a related western Iberian language. Past participle of falar. This made my day. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2017, 4:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/something-you-learned-recently-that-you-didnt-know-before/793199/70 "2017-08-18T04:13:50Z")
And in Galego as well, spoken and co-official in Galicia, the part of Spain that’s just north of Portugal. The Asturian language is called Bable; the dialect of Spanish spoken in Asturias is called Asturiano (academic Spanish) or Asturiañu (dialectal version). Asturias is in the middle of Spain’s northern coast and was one of the starting points for the Reconquista; it is a one-province region which combines some highly industrial and highly technical cities with tiny villages where each house has one cow because they don’t have room for more than one; the heir-apparent to the throne of Spain gets three titles of Prince and is usually called Prince of Asturias (Princess in the current edition). There, more things about Asturias than you ever wanted to know 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Jennshark](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Jennshark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jennshark)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2017, 4:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/something-you-learned-recently-that-you-didnt-know-before/793199/71 "2017-08-18T16:26:10Z")
I learned that California Condors are actually vultures, they were renamed “condors” to escape the deleterious vulture label so people would like them and help save them from extinction. And it worked. ---
**Author:** ![Jennshark](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Jennshark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jennshark)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2017, 4:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/something-you-learned-recently-that-you-didnt-know-before/793199/72 "2017-08-18T16:38:38Z")
And I finally realized that the root meaning of “Alpine” is “of the Alps.” It’s evolved into general usage to indicate certain altitudes/flora ecologies, but its origin is Alp-ish. Recently I learned something that challenges the received wisdom from my family of deer hunters that herds are always made up of a stag who presides over a family of females and fawns (boys get kicked out of the herd early). The last two weeks a lovely deer herd has been visiting the field behind our house at dusk; all seven of them are bucks – two of them are even 12-points! The youngest still has velveted antlers. ---
**Author:** ![Dendarii\_Dame](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/bbce88/32.png) [@Dendarii\_Dame](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dendarii_Dame)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2017, 8:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/something-you-learned-recently-that-you-didnt-know-before/793199/73 "2017-08-18T20:34:17Z")
Guinea pigs can jump. Saw one on Twitter jump a fence as high as its head. ---
**Author:** ![elfkin477](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a9a28c/32.png) [@elfkin477](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfkin477)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2017, 12:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/something-you-learned-recently-that-you-didnt-know-before/793199/74 "2017-08-19T00:29:25Z")
> [@Jennshark](#): > > I learned that California Condors are actually vultures, they were renamed “condors” to escape the deleterious vulture label so people would like them and help save them from extinction. > > And it worked. Oh, this probably explains why whenever I see a picture of one I first think it’s a vulture and get surprised it’s really a condor… ---
**Author:** ![Lucas\_Jackson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lucas_jackson/32/303_2.png) [@Lucas\_Jackson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lucas_Jackson)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2017, 12:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/something-you-learned-recently-that-you-didnt-know-before/793199/75 "2017-08-19T00:59:23Z")
That in the Momas & the Popas song California Dreamin’ they sing, “… and I pretend to pray” instead of “… and I began to pray”. ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2017, 4:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/something-you-learned-recently-that-you-didnt-know-before/793199/76 "2017-08-19T04:24:27Z")
> [@Lucas\_Jackson](#): > > That in the Momas & the Popas song California Dreamin’ they sing, “… and I pretend to pray” instead of “… and I began to pray”. That’s interesting. We sang it in chorus when I was a teenager, and I distinctly remember the word being “began”. I didn’t know until today that this classic Chicago song was called “Questions 67 & 68”. [![]( " - YouTube") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qupeVLtXWLY) ---
**Author:** ![pullin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/c57346/32.png) [@pullin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pullin)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2017, 10:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/something-you-learned-recently-that-you-didnt-know-before/793199/77 "2017-08-19T10:31:20Z")
> [@Olentzero](#): > > You confuse the matter, sir. There are two books by Ingersoll Lockwood; the first, “Baron Trump’s Marvellous Underground Adventure” is a Munchhausen-style adventure fantasy that has little or nothing to do with politics, and “1900, or the Last President” is a rabid little anti-Populist potboiler that can be summed up as “William Jennings Bryant sucks LOL”. It does mention a man named Pence - once. What a relief. I can quite\ searching the books for words like “stock market” or “crash”. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Annoying\_Buzz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/eb8c5e/32.png) [@Annoying\_Buzz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annoying_Buzz)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2017, 2:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/something-you-learned-recently-that-you-didnt-know-before/793199/78 "2017-08-21T14:48:40Z")
I learned two things recently that I could have gone quite happily without knowing. 1. Necrosis in Japanese is “necrosis”, at least for the two doctors I spoke to. 2. Even when my life is being threatened by a violent nutcase, I will look at naked breasts. These two pieces of information were not related. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2017, 3:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/something-you-learned-recently-that-you-didnt-know-before/793199/79 "2017-08-21T15:24:28Z")
> [@Lucas\_Jackson](#): > > That in the Momas & the Popas song California Dreamin’ they sing, “… and I pretend to pray” instead of “… and I began to pray”. I didn’t realize this until I read this post (and corroborated it with online listing of the lyrics). ---
**Author:** ![mistymage](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mistymage/32/459_2.png) [@mistymage](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mistymage)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2017, 6:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/something-you-learned-recently-that-you-didnt-know-before/793199/80 "2017-08-21T18:11:29Z")
> [@Jennshark](#): > > Recently I learned something that challenges the received wisdom from my family of deer hunters that herds are always made up of a stag who presides over a family of females and fawns (boys get kicked out of the herd early). The last two weeks a lovely deer herd has been visiting the field behind our house at dusk; all seven of them are bucks – two of them are even 12-points! The youngest still has velveted antlers. That’s called a bachelor herd: [Bachelor herd - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bachelor_herd) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/something-you-learned-recently-that-you-didnt-know-before/793199.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/something-you-learned-recently-that-you-didnt-know-before/793199.md?page=5)