# Tell us an interesting random fact you stumbled across (Part 2) **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [July 25, 2024, 3:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785 "2024-07-25T15:06:02Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 143
**Author:** ![Melbourne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b5e925/32.png) [@Melbourne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Melbourne)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2025, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/2841 "2025-07-06T23:37:56Z")
> [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](#): > > emeteries don’t necessarily keep permanent records of who’s buried where Even gravestones are “permanent records”. A problem is that permanent records don’t last permanently. ---
**Author:** ![Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/elmer_j.fudd/32/1211_2.png) [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elmer_J.Fudd)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2025, 11:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/2842 "2025-07-06T23:51:08Z")
> [@Melbourne](#): > > A problem is that permanent records don’t last permanently. My Junior High councilor lied to me? ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2025, 3:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/2843 "2025-07-07T15:32:45Z")
They were waiting until you fixed that C- you got in Social Studies before telling you the truth. ---
**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:** [July 10, 2025, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/2844 "2025-07-10T20:43:54Z")
Ever hear of Alfonsina Strada? Me either, before yesterday. She is the only woman ever to take part in a cycling grand tour (the great stage races\*: Tour de France, Giro d’Italia, Vuelta a España). She rode in the 1924 Giro. > The ‘start list’ was reduced because of a strike, so the organiser Gazzetta dello Sport allowed independent riders to enter without support teams, as they provided bed, board and massage. **The event was unique because of the participation of Alfonsina Strada, the only female competitor in the history of the Giro**. Entry number 72 was granted to Alfonsin Strada to conceal her gender. She successfully completed the first 7 stages but a series of crashes and punctures between L’Aquila and Perugia led to her exclusion [_that is to say, she failed to make the time cut-off for the stage_](such was her heroism that the organisers allowed her to continue each stage without inclusion in the overall classification) [ie, _riding the route with the other racers, but excluded from race results_]. [Source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1924_Giro_d%27Italia#) Even aside from the above she was a remarkable woman; born piss-poor, but made a life for herself: > She rode her first race at about 13, winning a live pig. She won nearly all the girls’ races she entered and many of the boys’ events. Her reputation brought an invitation to ride the Grand Prix of St Petersburg in Russia in 1909. She was such a success that the Tsarina Alexandra⋅wanted her husband, Tsar Nicholas II of Russia, to give her a gold medal….. She won 36 races against men…. Last year was the 100th anniversary of her participation in the Giro. I am flabbergasted that I had never heard of her before yesterday. Why was the 2024 Giro not one long celebration of her achievement? She should be better known and celebrated. I’m doing my bit. > **[Alfonsina Strada](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alfonsina_Strada)** > > Alfonsina Strada (16 March 1891 – 13 September 1959) was an Italian cyclist, the only woman to have ridden one of cycling's three major stage races. She started in the Giro d'Italia in 1924 when the organisers mistook her for a man. Newspapers called her The Devil in a dress. > Her racing career included an Italian record which lasted 26 years. She died aged 69 as she propped up her motorcycle after riding it to a bicycle race. > Born Alfonsina Morini at Castelfranco Emilia, near Modena, she was ... j \*- there is now a matching set of three women’s grand tours. Cycling is getting better. Update: In the first part of this thread [I wrote about Millie Robinson](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/2995), the winner of the inaugural (short lived) Women’s Tour de France in 1955, another trailblazing woman, but even less well known these days than Strada. I am pleased to report that as of Feb 2024, Robinson has a wiki page. > **[Millie Robinson](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millie_Robinson)** > > Mildred Jessie "Millie" Robinson (3 December 1924 - 23 January 1994) was an Irish-born Manx road and track cyclist. A multiple-time British time trial and road racing champion in the 1950s, she also won the first Tour de France Féminin in 1955 and broke the women’s world hour record in 1958. > Robinson was one of nine children (six boys and three girls) born to Thomas and Sarah Robinson in County Mayo, Ireland. In 1935, the family relocated to Peel on the Isle of Man, where she attended Peel Cl... ---
**Author:** ![Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/elmer_j.fudd/32/1211_2.png) [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elmer_J.Fudd)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2025, 9:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/2845 "2025-07-10T21:06:43Z")
> [@Treppenwitz](#): > > She successfully completed the first 7 stages but a series of crashes and punctures between L’Aquila and Perugia led to her exclusion [_that is to say, she failed to make the time cut-off for the stage_](such was her heroism that the organisers allowed her to continue each stage without inclusion in the overall classification) [ie, _riding the route with the other racers, but excluded from race results_]. Three other (male) finishing riders were also allowed to continue despite exclusion. 90 riders started the race and only 30 (including Strada) finished. The roads really sucked back then. ---
**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:** [July 14, 2025, 5:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/2846 "2025-07-14T05:01:25Z")
Apparently this is one way juice is extracted from sugar cane. Especially interesting is that the press including the gears look carved by hand. > **[Detailed Explanation on Instagram: "In India, sugarcane juice is typically...](https://www.instagram.com/reel/DMBGPjHuwDc/?igsh=NTc4MTIwNjQ2YQ==)** > > 326 likes, 7 comments - detailedexplanation on July 12, 2025: "In India, sugarcane juice is typically made using a sugarcane juice extractor machine, commonly known as a sugarcane crusher or ganne ka ras machine. These machines come in both manual... ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2025, 5:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/2847 "2025-07-14T05:52:32Z")
They don’t talk much about the Glorious Revolution in England, where James II was deposed without bloodshed. Turns out there was bloodshed - out of James’s nose. He had an army out to attack William of Orange but had to stop for two days because of a bad nosebleed. James’s commanders switched over to William, and James’s army was weakened too much to win a battle. He fled and William marched into London unopposed. ---
**Author:** ![eschereal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eschereal/32/18939_2.png) [@eschereal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eschereal)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2025, 11:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/2848 "2025-07-15T23:51:03Z")
Some elsewheres, I used the word “addlepation”, which apparently does not actually exist, in the dictionary anyway. So I did some exploring and learned that “addle” derives from a ME word that means “rotten”, which comes from an OE word that means “pool of excrement” (cognate with a nearly identical old German word). Hence, “addlepated” (which _is_ in the dictionary) literally means “shithead”. ---
**Author:** ![Melbourne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b5e925/32.png) [@Melbourne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Melbourne)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2025, 9:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/2849 "2025-07-16T09:42:58Z")
Or perhaps ‘piss head’. ---
**Author:** ![Mark\_Finn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/34f0e0/32.png) [@Mark\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mark_Finn)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2025, 5:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/2850 "2025-07-16T17:02:59Z")
In 1946, after a period of hyperinflation, Hungary exchanged one new Forint for 400 octillion old Pengos. That’s a 4 followed by 29 zeros. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2025, 5:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/2851 "2025-07-16T17:19:51Z")
Why did they bother preserving any value for the Pengo at all? I would have thought all stored value lost at that point. Was it that the government didn’t want to completely default on the Pengos it theoretically owed people? ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2025, 8:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/2852 "2025-07-16T20:30:00Z")
Here’s the Wikipedia entry on the history of the Hungarian pengő and the forint, The pengő lost value after World War I very quickly. It lost value even more quickly after World War II. Only when they introduced the forint did the value more or less stabilize. They intend to eventually place the forint with the euro. Many people had hugely large collections of pengős when they went out of use. Letting people exchange pengős for forints allowed the government to say that they knew that people had tried to keep up with the hyperinflation, while no conversion at all would come across as making fun of those people: > **[Hungarian pengő](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hungarian_peng%C5%91)** > > The pengő (.mw-parser-output .IPA-label-small{font-size:85%}.mw-parser-output .references .IPA-label-small,.mw-parser-output .infobox .IPA-label-small,.mw-parser-output .navbox .IPA-label-small{font-size:100%}Hungarian: \[ˈpɛŋɡøː\]; sometimes spelled as pengo or pengoe in English) was the currency of Hungary between 1 January 1927, when it replaced the korona, and 31 July 1946, when it was replaced by the forint. The pengő was subdivided into 100 fillér. Although the introduction of the pengő wa... > **[Hungarian forint](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hungarian_forint)** > > The forint (.mw-parser-output .IPA-label-small{font-size:85%}.mw-parser-output .references .IPA-label-small,.mw-parser-output .infobox .IPA-label-small,.mw-parser-output .navbox .IPA-label-small{font-size:100%}Hungarian pronunciation: \[ˈforint\] ⓘ, sign Ft; code HUF) is the currency of Hungary. It was formerly divided into 100 fillér, but fillér coins are no longer in circulation. The introduction of the forint on 1 August 1946 was a crucial step in the post-World War II stabilisation of the Hun... ---
**Author:** ![I\_Love\_Me\_Vol.I](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/i_love_me_vol.i/32/521_2.png) [@I\_Love\_Me\_Vol.I](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/I_Love_Me_Vol.I)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2025, 8:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/2853 "2025-07-17T08:51:25Z")
> [@Cervaise](#): > > [RTL Today - Ten years after gold: Luxembourg's table football team wins silver in World Cup](https://today.rtl.lu/sport/local/a/2317054.html) > > So if you’re a back-of-the-bar competitor with dreams of international celebrity, take heart, because there’s a sport made for you. By golly, that is an incredibly tedious and frighteningly boring thing to watch as a spectator. It really couldn’t get much worse than this. Some say baseball consists of a few seconds of action accompanied by minutes or hours of nothing… [table football](https://youtu.be/y6VovwQWLUY?t=239) is that times a million. It has mere _microseconds_ of action along with minute upon minute of utter zzzzzzzzzzzzzz. Do not recommend. ---
**Author:** ![Cervaise](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cervaise/32/16693_2.png) [@Cervaise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cervaise)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2025, 9:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/2854 "2025-07-17T09:02:00Z")
Oh, I don’t know. I find it weirdly fascinating — in short doses, to be sure, but still — to observe the uncanny level of finesse and ball control displayed by the top players, in what I normally think of as a rowdy, loose-limbed bar game. Here’s a three minute highlight video for the curious. [![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/0j9TxzwRr6E/hqdefault.jpg "ITSF World Cup 2014 - Men Final Singles") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0j9TxzwRr6E) I mean, I wouldn’t want to sit and watch this for a whole hour (and the focused attention of the refs in the background is pretty funny), but there’s at least a marginal bit of interest for me in the supernatural reflexes and crazy-high quality of play. ---
**Author:** ![Melbourne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b5e925/32.png) [@Melbourne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Melbourne)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2025, 3:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/2855 "2025-07-18T03:41:20Z")
We used to watch arcade game players for the same reason - Galaxian, Defender, etc. Nothing objectively interesting about the subject, but lightning fast reflexes and awesome level of awareness. ---
**Author:** ![Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/earl_snake-hips_tucker/32/3269_2.png) [@Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Earl_Snake-Hips_Tucker)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2025, 2:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/2856 "2025-07-19T14:55:31Z")
The community of Orange, and thus William of Orange, are coincidental spellings with the fruit and color and are completely unrelated etymologically. The fruit started out with an initial ‘n’, but by the time it made it into Western Europe, it had gotten dropped in Italy. ---
**Author:** ![Pardel-Lux](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pardel-lux/32/20182_2.png) [@Pardel-Lux](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pardel-Lux)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2025, 3:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/2857 "2025-07-19T15:07:20Z")
The oranges seem to have taken a weird route all the way from China to Italy because in Spain the initial N is maintained till this day: naranja. ---
**Author:** ![Frodo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/frodo/32/302_2.png) [@Frodo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frodo)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2025, 3:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/2858 "2025-07-19T15:07:29Z")
Spain is not Western Europe then? ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Drake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ad7895/32.png) [@Dr.Drake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Drake)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2025, 3:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/2859 "2025-07-19T15:08:45Z")
They were kicked out in 1588 over the Armada Incident. They’re Southern Europe now. ---
**Author:** ![Pardel-Lux](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pardel-lux/32/20182_2.png) [@Pardel-Lux](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pardel-Lux)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2025, 3:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785/2860 "2025-07-19T15:24:10Z")
Checks **[name](https://www.loc.gov/collections/sir-francis-drake/articles-and-essays/drake-biography/armada/)**, checks **[post](https://armadainvincible.com/)**, right. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785.md?page=142) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-2/1004785.md?page=144)