Everyone in Iceland is on a first name basis, and people are listed by first name in the telephone directory.
The word geyser comes from Iceland. The Icelandic verb geysa means “to gush” and an erupting spring in northwestern Iceland, at Haukadalur, is named Geysir. Iceland is home to one of the greatest concentrations of geysers in the world.
Glíma is the Scandinavian martial arts system used by the Vikings and still practiced in modern day Iceland. The word glíma in Old Norse means glimpse or flash, describing the systems techniques, which include throws, blows, kicks, chokes, locks, pain techniques and weapon technique, and is comparable with the best complete martial arts systems from around the world.
Berserkers (or berserks) were Norse warriors who are primarily reported in the Old Norse literature to have fought in a nearly uncontrollable, trance-like fury, a characteristic which later gave rise to the English word berserk. It has been suggested they consumed hallucinogens before battle, particularly the mushroom amanita muscaria. The name came from their reputed habit of wearing a kind of shirt or coat (serkr) made from the pelt of a bear (ber-) during battle. The bear was one of the animals representing Odin, and by wearing such a pelt the warriors sought to gain the strength of a bear and the favor of Odin.
Good trivia!
Wenceslas, Duke of Bohemia, in honor of whom the song “Good King Wenceslas” was written, was assassinated at age 28, possibly by order of his own brother, Boleslav the Cruel.
In play:
The KA-BAR (say “kay bar”) is the contemporary popular name for the combat knife first adopted by the US Marine Corps in WWII. It originated in 1942.
The KA-BAR knife company makes other knives, but we Marines and many others refer to the Marine combat knife as “the” KA-BAR (or Ka-Bar, or Kabar, kabar, etc -
we Marines cant alwaze spell rite;
M A R I N E = Muscles Are Required, Intelligence Not Expected
:D).
kabar picture here - overall knife length about 12").
The owner of the KA-BAR trademark, the Union Cutlery Co. of Olean, New York, began using the name on its knives and in its advertising in 1923 after receiving a testimonial letter from a fur trapper, who used the knife to kill a wounded bear that attacked him after his rifle jammed. According to company records, the letter was only partially legible, with “ka bar” readable as fragments of the phrase “kill a bear”.
nm - double post.
Dag-gummed iPad!
“The Ballad of Davy Crockett”, used on the Disney TV series “Davy Crockett” and the film Davy Crockett, King of the Wild Frontier, starring Fess Parker, mentions the legend that Davy “kilt him a b’ar when he was only three.” The 1950’s TV series started a fad of boys wearing coonskin hats, complete with tail.
The Davy Crockett was a U.S. Army tactical nuclear recoilless gun for firing the M-388 nuclear projectile, and one of the smallest nuclear weapon systems ever built.
The Ashmore and Cartier Islands are the smallest external territory of Australia, with a land area of only 2.6 km[sup]2[/sup].
There are over 300 islands in the Aleutians, a string of islands 1,200 miles long, including 57 volcanoes and belonging to Russia and the USA.
The world’s largest island in a lake on an island in a lake on an island has probably never been visited at all; its very existence may have been discovered by computer searching of Google images.
[Canada, 69.793° N, 108.241° W]
Heard Island and the nearby McDonald Islands are remote external Australian territories located 4,100 km southwest of Perth, and about 1,500 km north of Antarctica. The islands are home to Australia’s only active volcanoes. Volcanic activity occurred on the McDonald Islands during the 1990s, resulting in a doubling in size of the islands and and an increase in elevation of about 100 m.
The cliff-lined coasts and rocky shoals also make access to the islands from the sea very difficult. As a result, only two successful landings have been made on the McDonald Islands: in 1971 and 1980.
The death of Alexander III King of Scots in 1286 led to a succession crisis since his only heir was a 3-year old granddaughter. Among the nobles who signed a covenant (the Turnberry Band) with Robert de Brus was Aonghas Mór (d. ca 1295, son of Donald) the Lord of Islay and other islands. The Lords MacDonald descend from Aonghas Mór, who is sometimes called “the first McDonald.”
Tsar Alexander III of Russia is said to have had such physical strength that he bent metal fire pokers with his bare hands to amuse his children.
When the Imperial train derailed at Borki on 29 October 1888, Alexander held the collapsed roof of the royal car on his shoulders while his family escaped the crash site uninjured.
Jimmy Dean’s song “Big Bad John”, about a ne’er-do-well coal miner who redeems himself by holding up a collapsed roof to save his friends, implicitly at the cost of his own life although he was saved in a sequel, “The Cajun Queen”, won Dean the 1962 Grammy Award for Best Country & Western Recording.
Rumors that iconic actor James Dean avoided the draft by registering as a homosexual appear to be of doubtful authenticity. He most likely avoided service because he was an extremely near-sighted Quaker, which was sufficient cause for him to be excused.
Although he later denied it and claimed only to have received a student deferment, rocker Ted Nugent (“Cat Scratch Fever”), now better known for his semicoherent hard-right political views, told High Times magazine in an interview that he avoided the Vietnam War draft by showing up for his physical high on meth, dirty, and with poopy pants.
President Richard Nixon made an awkward, unannounced visit to the Lincoln Memorial to talk to young Vietnam War protesters early one morning in May 1970, with his butler and Secret Service men in tow. White House staff later worried that he was acting irrationally.