Today (well, a few days ago) I learned that retired basketball star Kareem Abdul-Jabbar is an author- and not just on the topic of sports; he's written a number of novels about Mycroft Holmes, the brother of Sherlock.
What have you learned today?
- Thread starter hanselthecaretaker
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Today I learned that Betty White had a variety TV show in the '50s, and one of the performers was a black tap-dancer by the name of Arthur Duncan. When her show reached nationwide exposure, Southern television stations complained about his presence and threatened a boycott. Her response: "I'm sorry, but, you know, he stays. Live with it."
Duncan would later on be the first black member of Bob Hope's USO troupe, and then the first full-time regular black member of a TV variety show, The Lawrence Welk Show, from '64 to '82. He hadn't known about the controversy when it was happening, and credited White with helping to start his career.
Duncan would later on be the first black member of Bob Hope's USO troupe, and then the first full-time regular black member of a TV variety show, The Lawrence Welk Show, from '64 to '82. He hadn't known about the controversy when it was happening, and credited White with helping to start his career.
Today I learned that Game Mania, sort of our local Gamestop equivalent that went belly up in spring 2024, is back as purely a webshop.
It's kinda pitiful tho. Small selection. No peripherals. No secondhand. No customer loyalty program. Absolutely no reason to buy there over, say, Bol or Fnac.
It's kinda pitiful tho. Small selection. No peripherals. No secondhand. No customer loyalty program. Absolutely no reason to buy there over, say, Bol or Fnac.
Am a little ashamed to admit that only of late have finally understood what Warhammer 40k was even parodying. Cos while people kept saying it was tongue in cheek I was at a loss as to what was the joke...what tongue in who's cheek god damnit! Perhaps a secular/non religious form of spiritual upbringing is to blame, cos now it all makes sense: what if Christian evangelicals won the whole universe!
Only sharing this shame cos it's made it far easier to appreciate the whole... everything. So maybe another stranger out there with similar ignorance might also find a pathway to more enjoyment in these trying times as the structures around us buckle and poison under the weight of line-must-go-up economics optimising an ever blander mainstream conveyer belt of entertainment. Must find what few joys we can in thrall of the downward spiral.
Oh and the Jarhead film had sequels?? Lol, for reasons intimately woven within the aforementioned shit I just yapped. One of those "more interesting to learn about why they exist instead of watching them" situations
Only sharing this shame cos it's made it far easier to appreciate the whole... everything. So maybe another stranger out there with similar ignorance might also find a pathway to more enjoyment in these trying times as the structures around us buckle and poison under the weight of line-must-go-up economics optimising an ever blander mainstream conveyer belt of entertainment. Must find what few joys we can in thrall of the downward spiral.
Oh and the Jarhead film had sequels?? Lol, for reasons intimately woven within the aforementioned shit I just yapped. One of those "more interesting to learn about why they exist instead of watching them" situations
And there are people who can't look past the "eight-foot-tall warrior monks in power armor murdering everything and looking grim doing it" aspect.
In fairness, I think a lot of people are a bit vague on the joke, including people that write for 40k, which muddles things.
Which is another layer of irony since one of the things the Emperor ended up doing in the back story prior to the Horus Heresy - unless I have grossly misunderstood - was that religion was basically de facto outlawed and replaced with the Imperial Truth (basically science and reasoning) by the Emperor himself BUT after he was placed on the Golden Throne, the whole God Emperor thing really took off thanks in no small part to a book called Lectitio Divinitatus written by Lorgar, Primarch of the Word Bearers (which I have until like, a month ago, read as World Bearers >.>) who was one of the Primarch's who turned traitor and fell to Chaos with Horus. The Emperor had denied, fervently, his own divinity but Cults worshiping him cropped up everywhere - thanks Lorgar - and became de jure after his death because the Lectitio Divinitatus was incorporated into the running of the state and then the Ecclesiarchy rose up from the largest of those which was based on Terra.
The fucking tragic irony in WH40K is a goddamn mobius strip.
This is obviously a very, very condensed simplification because WH40K lore is so dense I'm surprised its not radioactive but yeah, hilarious.
That wasn't a thing until the Horus Heresy books came out, I think, and in one of the very earliest ones of those we see a person who has become an Imperial Saint because they are full of the Emperor's divinity or whatever. Apparently the Emperor was telling everyone that gods and daemons and stuff weren't real while being a god and given god powers to people...presumably to cause internal conflict, and to make sure his forces were surprised when they fought daemons.
Today I learned that, during World War I, the Germans disguised the merchant cruiser SMS Cap Trafalgar to look like the British ship RMS Carmania in order to infiltrate the British fleet. Unfortunately for them, on their first outing, the first British ship they encountered was the real RMS Carmania, which promptly attacked and sank the impostor.
Christ, you almost feel sorry for them. I kind of hope the German captain's first words to the British captain was something like "Well one of us is going to have to change".
That's hilarious.
Anyway, today I learned that The NFL's Chicago Bears' logo is intentionally asymetrically. I was watching the Packers v. Bears game and noticed what I thought was a pretty egregious mistake by the grounds crew who painted the signature wishbone "C" at the 50-yard line. Since NFL fields are only the biggest stages in sports, I thought it hard to believe such an error would go unnoticed, so a little Google research later, and indeed, the logo is supposed to look like that. I'm more surprised it took me +35 years of football watching to notice this little idiosyncrasy of one of the NFL's most iconic brands.
Probably the best explanation of propaganda I know of, in a mere sub 10 minutes.
Do you mean biggest stages as in sheer number of people who watch the game or the physical size of the field?
I don't mean either literally assuming you're combing my statement to point out that a soccer pitch is physically bigger and that soccer is more widely watch around the world. I was just casually noting that the NFL is the biggest sport in America, so something like an obvious logo goof in the middle of the field of play where millions of people would see it wouldn't have gone unnoticed.
Oh shit yeah, that makes sense. And in my defence I was going to mention an Australian Football League pitch. Which are huge. But no I see what you mean. A stage as widely watched as the NFL means that kind of goof wasn’t gonna skate by unnoticed.
…but why tho?
Anyways, I figured the knot part was literal but not the reasoning behind it -
Haven’t found anything definitive, but one reason I’ve found consistently is that a symmetrical wishbone “C” wouldn’t look as good when applied to the round surface of the helmet. But my gut says it was a mistake made decades ago that just became a part of their identity.
Today I learned why tennis players scrutinize the balls before selecting the two they serve with. For their first serve, they want newer balls with as little fuzz (from being used) as possible to allow for a hard, fast first serve with little air resistance. As first serves are typically out of bounds given raw force rather than strategic placement is the intent, for the second serve, they choose a fuzzy/worn ball that has increased air resistance and allows for more controlled, surgical placement on the court.
Wake me up when it replaces $hitty chemo.