# Tell us an interesting random fact you stumbled across (Part 1) **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [April 13, 2020, 3:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674 "2020-04-13T03:19:22Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 18
**Author:** ![Fretful\_Porpentine](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fretful_porpentine/32/2873_2.png) [@Fretful\_Porpentine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fretful_Porpentine)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2020, 11:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/341 "2020-05-26T23:22:57Z")
During the Great Plague in London, Samuel Pepys got invited to the home of a guy who showed off his HOME MUMMIFICATION PROJECT. One of his host’s servants had died (not of the plague, they were pretty careful about how they disposed of plague bodies) and the host decided to dry the corpse out in his oven, apparently just to see if it would work :eek: And you thought some of the quarantine craft projects you saw on Instagram were weird … ---
**Author:** ![Paul\_in\_Qatar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ccd318/32.png) [@Paul\_in\_Qatar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Paul_in_Qatar)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2020, 2:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/342 "2020-05-27T02:58:40Z")
In 1945 US Navy medical people observed that Lou Gehrig Disease was 100 time more common among the native population of Guam than among mainland Americans. This was noted by a number of smart people. By 1960 this was no longer the case. It is not obvious what the heck changed. 1945 was in the modern era. They had astrolabes and primitive incandescent lamps. Maybe they reports were wrong. Still it is darn odd. ---
**Author:** ![Aspidistra](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aspidistra/32/3894_2.png) [@Aspidistra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aspidistra)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2020, 3:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/343 "2020-05-27T03:22:10Z")
Facebook tells me that civil war era cannonballs [could have gunpowder inside them](https://www.kansascity.com/news/nation-world/national/article242928591.html). I always thought all the gunpowder went into the cannon itself, but apparently not always. (Also - only in writing this post did I realise this is American civil war, not English civil war. I saw “Kent” and made an obvious, but apparently incorrect, assumption…) ---
**Author:** ![jtur88](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e9c0ed/32.png) [@jtur88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jtur88)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2020, 3:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/344 "2020-05-27T03:25:05Z")
> [@Wallaby](#): > > Australian cricketer Mark Waugh once made 4 scores of zero in succession. He briefly earned the nickname ‘Audi’. > > In summarising individual scores in a game, a bowler’s performance per innings is listed as ‘Wickets (outs) taken, for runs conceded’. So ‘4 for 23’ or ‘2 for 96’ etc. Taking five wickets in an innings is known as a ‘Michelle’ (Pfeiffer). Mark Waugh should have switched to ice hockey. The NHL then would have have had two players with the same last name, but with no letters in common: Mark Waugh and Patrick Roy, pronounced the same. ---
**Author:** ![lobotomyboy63](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobotomyboy63/32/2900_2.png) [@lobotomyboy63](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lobotomyboy63)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2020, 12:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/345 "2020-05-27T12:37:31Z")
> [@Aspidistra](#): > > Facebook tells me that civil war era cannonballs [could have gunpowder inside them](https://www.kansascity.com/news/nation-world/national/article242928591.html). I always thought all the gunpowder went into the cannon itself, but apparently not always. > > (Also - only in writing this post did I realise this is American civil war, not English civil war. I saw “Kent” and made an obvious, but apparently incorrect, assumption…) You have to create a free account to read that and I chose not to. Another article in that vein: > **[140-Yr.-Old Cannonball Kills Civil War Fan](https://www.cbsnews.com/news/140-yr-old-cannonball-kills-civil-war-fan/)** > > Va. Collector Died While Disarming 19th-Century Ammunition In His Driveway I too always assumed cannonballs were just solid metal balls. A more recent (WWII) that made the news in Germany. Check out the photo of the crater it made, taken by drone: > **[Crater in German field apparently caused by WWII bomb](https://www.delawareonline.com/story/news/2019/06/25/world-war-ii-bomb-apparently-explodes-german-farm-field/1556557001/)** > > A crater 33 feet wide and 13 feet deep has appeared in a field in central Germany, apparently caused by a World War II bomb exploding in the middle of the night. Seems to be a problem in many many places around the world: > **[Unexploded ordnance](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unexploded_ordnance)** > > Unexploded ordnance (UXO, sometimes abbreviated as UO), unexploded bombs (UXBs), and explosive remnants of war (ERW or ERoW) are explosive weapons (bombs, shells, grenades, land mines, naval mines, cluster munition, and other munitions) that did not explode when they were employed and still pose a risk of detonation, sometimes many decades after they were used or discarded. When unwanted munitions are found, they are sometimes destroyed in controlled explosions, but accidental detonation of eve... ---
**Author:** ![Dung\_Beetle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dung_beetle/32/7945_2.png) [@Dung\_Beetle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dung_Beetle)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2020, 1:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/346 "2020-05-27T13:02:32Z")
Neil Young is married to Daryl Hannah. :eek: I heard that on Sirius XM yesterday and thought the DJ must have misspoken. ---
**Author:** ![WildaBeast](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wildabeast/32/6_2.png) [@WildaBeast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WildaBeast)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2020, 3:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/347 "2020-05-27T15:37:24Z")
> [@Aspidistra](#): > > Facebook tells me that civil war era cannonballs [could have gunpowder inside them](https://www.kansascity.com/news/nation-world/national/article242928591.html). I always thought all the gunpowder went into the cannon itself, but apparently not always. Yep. I learned all that touring an (American) Civil War battlefield in my Boy Scouting days. IIRC there were three main types of projectiles they fired from cannons: [ul] [li]“Solid shot” – the solid metal balls most people are familiar with. [/li][li]“Shells” – A hollow metal ball filled with gunpowder and a fuse sticking out a small hole. Basically the old timey “bomb” seen in many cartoons. The fuse got lit by the exploding powder inside the cannon, and ideally the shell would explode just after hitting the target if they timed it right. This is the sort of ammunition they’d use for breaching the wall of a fortification. [/li][li]I forget the name of the third kind, but it IIRC it was essentially a canister packed with small pellets, more or less a giant cannon sized shotgun shell. The idea with that one was to fire a spray of shrapnel at enemy soldiers.[/li][/ul] ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2020, 3:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/348 "2020-05-27T15:53:10Z")
> [@WildaBeast](#): > > [ul] > > [li]I forget the name of the third kind, but it IIRC it was essentially a canister packed with small pellets, more or less a giant cannon sized shotgun shell. The idea with that one was to fire a spray of shrapnel at enemy soldiers.[/li][/ul] “Canister shot”, natch. ---
**Author:** ![DesertDog](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/desertdog/32/11503_2.png) [@DesertDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DesertDog)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2020, 4:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/349 "2020-05-27T16:00:30Z")
> [@WildaBeast](#): > > I forget the name of the third kind, but it IIRC it was essentially a canister packed with small pellets, more or less a giant cannon sized shotgun shell. The idea with that one was to fire a spray of shrapnel at enemy soldiers. It was called (wait for it) Cannister. The naval equivalent is Grape Shot. In the movie _Master and Commander_ it’s the [opening shot](https://youtu.be/Ulp_FMbFo8o?t=93) of the first battle. Also, up to and including World War II, the Royal Navy referred to gun calibers (calibres :)) by the weight of the solid iron shot of that diameter – in the clip you can hear Aubrey mutter, “Eighteen-pounders.” By WWII it was relegated to the small stuff, chiefly [anti-aircraft guns](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/QF_2-pounder_naval_gun) even though they never ever fired solid shot. Ninja’d. (Shakes fist at **Alessan** ) ---
**Author:** ![Bijou\_Drains](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bijou_drains/32/2814_2.png) [@Bijou\_Drains](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bijou_Drains)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2020, 4:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/350 "2020-05-27T16:31:47Z")
> [@Dung\_Beetle](#): > > Neil Young is married to Daryl Hannah. :eek: I heard that on Sirius XM yesterday and thought the DJ must have misspoken. she is 59 he is 74. I thought she was younger. ---
**Author:** ![Dung\_Beetle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dung_beetle/32/7945_2.png) [@Dung\_Beetle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dung_Beetle)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2020, 5:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/351 "2020-05-27T17:36:06Z")
Yeah, she’s not the young mermaid she used to be. I see that their age difference is less than that between me and my husband, but they seem more of a mismatch somehow! ---
**Author:** ![Bijou\_Drains](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bijou_drains/32/2814_2.png) [@Bijou\_Drains](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bijou_Drains)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2020, 6:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/352 "2020-05-27T18:26:46Z")
Young divorced his wife of 36 years and then started dating Hannah in 2014. They married in 2018. It’s her first marriage but she was with JFK Jr. and Jackson Browne for long stints. ---
**Author:** ![Bijou\_Drains](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bijou_drains/32/2814_2.png) [@Bijou\_Drains](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bijou_Drains)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2020, 11:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/353 "2020-05-29T11:18:31Z")
Nikon still sells film cameras but they are low end models. ---
**Author:** ![lobotomyboy63](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobotomyboy63/32/2900_2.png) [@lobotomyboy63](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lobotomyboy63)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2020, 1:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/354 "2020-05-29T13:19:53Z")
Here’s your matching vocab quiz du jour… Match these to ten descriptions below: aglet, dysania, glabella, griffonage, interrobang, muselet, petrichor, tittle, vagitus, wamble 1. Space above and between eyebrows 2. Pleasant smell when it rains after dry spell 3. Sheath at the tip of a shoelace 4. To feel nausea 5. Cry of an infant 6. Wired cage holding champagne cork 7. Chronic difficulty getting out of bed 8. Illegible handwriting 9. Dot over lowercase i or j. 10. Combined ? and ! at end of sentence Space above and between eyebrows: glabella Pleasant smell when it rains after dry spell: petrichor Sheath at the tip of a shoelace: aglet To feel nausea: wamble Cry of an infant: vagitus Wired cage holding champagne cork: muselet Chronic difficulty getting out of bed: dysania Illegible handwriting: griffonage Dot over lowercase i or j.: tittle Combined ? and ! at end of sentence: interrobang If you have a typewriter, type a ? then backspace and type ! over it, and I guess you’d have a crude interrobang. Quoting from the article linked below: American Martin K. Speckter …. proposed the concept of a single punctuation mark in an article in the magazine TYPEtalks.[9] Speckter solicited possible names for the new character from readers. Contenders included exclamaquest, QuizDing,[10] rhet, and exclarotive, but he settled on interrobang. He chose the name to reference the punctuation marks that inspired it: interrogatio is Latin for “rhetorical question” or “cross-examination”;[11] bang is printers’ slang for the exclamation mark. [Interrobang - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interrobang) I like “exclamaquest” and “exclarotive.” ---
**Author:** ![Dung\_Beetle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dung_beetle/32/7945_2.png) [@Dung\_Beetle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dung_Beetle)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2020, 1:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/355 "2020-05-29T13:45:19Z")
Thanks, **lobotomyboy63**! That was fun! I thought I had a pretty good vocabulary but missed dysania, muselet, vagitus, and wamble. ---
**Author:** ![DesertDog](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/desertdog/32/11503_2.png) [@DesertDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DesertDog)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2020, 2:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/356 "2020-05-29T14:10:38Z")
Only ones I knew were tittle – thanks to _1776_ – and aglet. Don’t remember where I picked that up from. ---
**Author:** ![lobotomyboy63](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobotomyboy63/32/2900_2.png) [@lobotomyboy63](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lobotomyboy63)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2020, 2:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/357 "2020-05-29T14:11:37Z")
> [@Dung\_Beetle](#): > > Thanks, **lobotomyboy63**! That was fun! I thought I had a pretty good vocabulary but missed dysania, muselet, vagitus, and wamble. Sure thing, and to give credit where it’s due: something longer went around on Facebook and it had some easy ones so I edited it down and looked up a few, modified the clues. I swear, long ago I saw a word on a poster in an English classroom and wanted to use it. However, the internet won’t confirm: comper, meaning “semi-colon.” Do you see why? com(ma)+per(iod). Quoting link below: It’s no accident that a semicolon is a period atop a comma. Like commas, semicolons indicate an audible pause—slightly longer than a comma’s, but short of a period’s full stop. > **[Semicolons | Punctuation Rules and Examples](https://www.grammarbook.com/punctuation/semicolons.asp)** > > A semicolon (;) indicates an audible pause and can replace a period if the writer wishes to narrow the gap between two closely linked sentences. ---
**Author:** ![Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spectre_of_pithecanthropus/32/12343_2.png) [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2020, 9:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/358 "2020-05-29T21:02:14Z")
A strip of northernmost Ohio was once claimed by Connecticut, being at the same latitude. This was the Western Reserve, as recalled by the name Case Western Reserve University. In my mind’s eye I had always thought of the Northeast as being more north than ti actually is. Sent from my SM-G950U using Tapatalk ---
**Author:** ![Zyada](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zyada/32/3028_2.png) [@Zyada](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zyada)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2020, 9:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/359 "2020-05-29T21:09:53Z")
> [@DesertDog](#): > > Only ones I knew were tittle – thanks to _1776_ – and aglet. Don’t remember where I picked that up from. Well, if you’re like me, you got “aglet” in the late 70s from a book about words that you didn’t know there was a word for. Aglet was the first entry in that book. ---
**Author:** ![jaycat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jaycat/32/3015_2.png) [@jaycat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jaycat)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2020, 9:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/360 "2020-05-29T21:41:05Z")
> [@lobotomyboy63](#): > > . . . It’s no accident that a semicolon is a period atop a comma. Like commas, semicolons indicate an audible pause—slightly longer than a comma’s, but short of a period’s full stop. > > [Semicolons | Punctuation Rules and Examples](https://www.grammarbook.com/punctuation/semicolons.asp) My fellow typesetters and I, back in the days of yore, referred to parentheses as “toenails” and an exclamation point was a “bang.” For ease of communication, way fewer syllables. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674.md?page=17) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674.md?page=19)