# 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:** 93
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2021, 5:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/1844 "2021-04-27T17:42:48Z")
> [@hogarth](#): > > Scientists managed to trick beavers into building a beaver dam on dry land by playing a tape recording of running water in the middle of a field near a beaver pond. I chuckled at that one. Not that I doubt the authors, but it’s pretty darn amazing the beavers were fooled. Lots of differences between swimming and walking while working on your project. Not to mention the especially benign “current” out in that field. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2021, 5:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/1845 "2021-04-27T17:46:06Z")
> [@Roderick\_Femm](#): > > It took a couple of minutes for the penny to drop, then I realized – that’s probably mostly opioid ODs Now there’s a great advertising slogan idea for those psychopaths behind Purdue Pharma: > Opioids: they’re safer than COVID! ---
**Author:** ![Treppenwitz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/treppenwitz/32/3445_2.png) [@Treppenwitz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Treppenwitz)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2021, 9:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/1846 "2021-04-28T21:50:27Z")
For the epic album **Dusty In Memphis** , Dusty Springfield recorded the final vocals in… New York. > **[‘Dusty In Memphis’: The Strange Story Of Springfield’s Indisputable Classic](https://www.udiscovermusic.com/stories/dusty-springfield-dusty-in-memphis-album/)** > > 'Dusty In Memphis,' widely held to be the greatest album in the distinguished catalog of Dusty Springfield, was released on March 31, 1969. > Recordings got under way with Wexler, Dowd and Mardin all in the control room at American. The great session players known collectively as the Memphis Cats added their studio expertise. But for all her vocal greatness, Springfield’s insecurities (and a certain uneasiness in these new surroundings) made the Memphis sessions difficult for all concerned. Notwithstanding the authentic Southern flavour of the tracks, the album’s title belied the fact that Dusty’s final vocals for it were recorded at later sessions in New York. j ---
**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:** [April 29, 2021, 2:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/1847 "2021-04-29T02:31:35Z")
Y’ever yawn and saliva squirts out of your mouth? > **[Spitting](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gleeking)** > > Pages for logged out editors learn more > > Spitting is the act of forcibly ejecting saliva or other substances from the mouth. The act is often done to get rid of unwanted or foul-tasting substances in the mouth, or to get rid of a large buildup of mucus. Spitting of small saliva droplets can also happen unintentionally during talking, especially when articulating ejective and implosive consonants. > Spitting in public is currently considered rude and a social taboo in many parts of the ... ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2021, 3:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/1848 "2021-04-29T03:11:10Z")
I sprayed my dentist that way earlier this week. Somehow I doubt the medical industry actually accepts “Gleeking / Gleaking” as the correct terminology for this. Most 6th graders? Sure. Medical folks? No way. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2021, 3:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/1849 "2021-04-29T03:24:45Z")
The huge Nimitz-class aircraft carriers that have been the backbone of the US Navy for two generations all have a design flaw that causes a serious list to starboard; they must all flood part of their port damage control voids to straighten the ship. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2021, 3:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/1850 "2021-04-29T03:37:52Z")
I’m not disputing you, but I’d love to read more about the engineering in this. Have you a cite? ---
**Author:** ![Machine\_Elf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/82dd89/32.png) [@Machine\_Elf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Machine_Elf)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2021, 10:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/1851 "2021-04-29T10:57:14Z")
I googled “nimitz carrier starboard list” and got lots of hits. Here’s the first: [https://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/33439](https://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/33439) TL, DR: it’s a real thing, and apparently normal operation with some ballast tanks flooded for list correction is considered a bad thing because it limits the ability to make further/necessary corrections after sustaining list-inducing combat damage. The document proposes a solution involving solid ballast (which is more dense than seawater and can be more advantageously positioned), but it doesn’t say whether that was ever implemented. That was an abstract; if you want the full 159-page PDF, click **[here](https://apps.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a425773.pdf)**. A bit of a headscratcher, that. You’d think after they floated the first Nimitz carrier and spotted the list, they would have just bolted some extra iron to the port side and called it done. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2021, 2:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/1852 "2021-04-29T14:23:46Z")
Thank you. It’ll be tomorrow before I’ve had a chance to read it all. As you say, from an engineering POV it’s surprising they didn’t accomplish a bolt-on fix from the git-go. OTOH, from a contract management / bureaucratic POV I can see a lot of reasons that might have been “too hard”. ---
**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:** [April 29, 2021, 2:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/1853 "2021-04-29T14:28:26Z")
This is disturbing > [@](#): > > **US investigating possible mysterious directed energy attack near White House** > > Federal agencies are investigating at least two possible incidents on US soil, including one near the White House in November of last year, that appear similar to [mysterious, invisible attacks that have led to debilitating symptoms](https://www.cnn.com/2021/03/12/politics/state-department-havana-syndrome-coordinator/index.html) for dozens of US personnel abroad. > > Multiple sources familiar with the matter tell CNN that while the Pentagon and other agencies probing the matter have reached no clear conclusions on what happened, the fact that such an attack might have taken place so close to the White House is particularly alarming. > > Defense officials briefed lawmakers on the Senate and House Armed Services Committees on the matter earlier this month, including on the incident near the White House. That incident, which occurred near the Ellipse, the large oval lawn on the south side of the White House, sickened one National Security Council official, according to multiple current and former US officials and sources familiar with the matter. > > In a separate 2019 episode, a White House official reported a similar attack while walking her dog in a Virginia suburb just outside Washington, [GQ reported](https://www.gq.com/story/cia-investigation-and-russian-microwave-attacks) last year. > > Those sickened reported similar symptoms to CIA and State Department personnel impacted overseas, and officials quickly began to investigate the incident as a possible “Havana syndrome” attack. That name refers to unexplained symptoms that [US personnel in Cuba](https://www.cnn.com/2018/03/02/politics/us-embassy-cuba-staff-reductions-attacks) began experiencing in late 2016 – a varying set of complaints that includes ear popping, vertigo, pounding headaches and nausea, sometimes accompanied by an unidentified “piercing directional noise.” Note that these took place last November. I don’t know if that has any significance. [https://www.cnn.com/2021/04/29/politics/us-investigating-mysterious-directed-energy-attack-white-house/index.html](https://www.cnn.com/2021/04/29/politics/us-investigating-mysterious-directed-energy-attack-white-house/index.html) ---
**Author:** ![Filbert](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/filbert/32/3433_2.png) [@Filbert](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Filbert)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2021, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/1854 "2021-04-29T17:14:12Z")
According to my mother, who worked with beavers at a zoo for a while back in the 70s, they’re not the brightest animals- they had a pond in their enclosure, which had no water flow and was drained and cleaned out weekly, yet every week they’d build a shiny new dam across it using anything they could find. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Bredin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/96bed5/32.png) [@John\_Bredin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Bredin)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2021, 6:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/1855 "2021-04-29T18:54:07Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > Somehow I doubt the medical industry actually accepts “Gleeking / Gleaking” as the correct terminology for this. Most 6th graders? Sure. Medical folks? No way. I’ve done this to my dentist, and he’s called it gleeking. ---
**Author:** ![AskNott](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asknott/32/5790_2.png) [@AskNott](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AskNott)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2021, 7:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/1856 "2021-04-29T19:59:44Z")
Gleek is a very old word with several meanings over the years. One Shakespeare character (I don’t remember which) is asked if he can sing. He says something like, “I can gleek a little.” An old Webster’s says it means “music, musicians” It also meant “joke, jibe” as far back as 1530. More recently, it’s a fan of the Glee TV show. This is from a brief swim through the entries at [onelook.com](http://onelook.com) If I had access to an OED, maybe I could give you a firmer link from gleek to the origin of glee clubs ---
**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:** [April 29, 2021, 9:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/1857 "2021-04-29T21:52:09Z")
> [@AskNott](#): > > it’s a fan of the Glee TV show I was thinking you could form a gleek club whether you can sing well or not ---
**Author:** ![Crane](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crane/32/3495_2.png) [@Crane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crane)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2021, 2:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/1858 "2021-04-30T14:45:06Z")
What form of energy are we talking about? ---
**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:** [April 30, 2021, 3:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/1859 "2021-04-30T15:05:37Z")
It’s in the article. Appears to be microwave. But, of course, no one has detected it while the apparent attacks were taking place. ---
**Author:** ![Superdude](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/superdude/32/13450_2.png) [@Superdude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Superdude)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2021, 8:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/1860 "2021-05-01T08:27:26Z")
Judith Love Cohen, who worked for NASA (she helped design the Abort Guidance System that rescued Apollo 13), went to work on the day she was in labor. She took a printout of the problem she was working on to the hospital with her. She called her boss and said she finished the problem. She then gave birth to a son. That son is actor [Jack Black](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judith_Love_Cohen?wprov=sfti1). ---
**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:** [May 1, 2021, 2:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/1861 "2021-05-01T14:34:58Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > Not that I doubt the authors, but it’s pretty darn amazing the beavers were fooled. Lots of differences between swimming and walking while working on your project. Not to mention the especially benign “current” out in that field. I recently saw some video clip of a house-raised baby beaver building dams on the living room rug with toothbrushes and dog toys. ---
**Author:** ![Knowed\_Out](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/knowed_out/32/7380_2.png) [@Knowed\_Out](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Knowed_Out)\ **Post date:** [May 2, 2021, 7:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/1862 "2021-05-02T19:01:24Z")
I remember a game show JB was on, and he called his mother as his lifeline. Now I see why. ---
**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 3, 2021, 3:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/1863 "2021-05-03T03:21:16Z")
On Facebook, some people were talking about olden times, asking if anybody had danced around the May pole and such. I started researching and found: > May (in Latin, _[Maius](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maius)_ ) was named for the [Greek Goddess](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greek_God) [Maia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maia_(mythology)), who was identified with the [Roman era](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_era) [goddess](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goddess) of fertility, [Bona Dea](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bona_Dea), whose [festival](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Festival) was held in May. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674.md?page=92) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674.md?page=94)