What have you learned today?

hanselthecaretaker

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What mountain goats do when attacked by eagles -

Max props to those eagle talons, but much madder props to the friggin mountain GOAT.
 

lostinreality

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A few random things I learned on r/animalsbeingderp

Elephants physically cannot jump... lol. Never really crossed my mind but not its stuck.

Polar bears aren't white!!!! Their fur are just clear and reflective so it appears white. Just saw a pic of a polar bear shedding it's fur and it looks terrifying lmao.

A random healthline article popped up in my FB newsfeed: The longest recorded pregnancy was 375 days... imagine carrying a whole-ass baby for a year. The baby probably already had arm-pit hair.

A random fact I learned from work: headhunting is vastly different from outsourcing (i.e., this company vs this company). Was writing a short email and got scolded on this. Apparently headhunting firms find specific individuals/freelancers and outsource companies are basically an extension of HR.

Random celebrity fact(?) my coworker shared with me: Taylor swift is re-recording her albums because of something with her previous label not giving her the rights? What a power move lol.
 

hanselthecaretaker

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I never knew this was a thing, including the issues that the thing creates -

792,331.8397 U.S. short tons of used clothes are exported to these place every year, just from the U.S. alone, and a huge chunk of that ends up in landfills.

The fuck.


More and more civilization…what a damn mess we’re makin’ of things.

-Arthur Morgan, circa over a century before any of this bs.


COSUUUUUUMMMMME!!!!
 
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Xprimentyl

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I never knew this was a thing, including the issues that the thing creates -

792,331.8397 U.S. short tons of used clothes are exported to these place every year, just from the U.S. alone, and a huge chunk of that ends up in landfills.

The fuck.


More and more civilization…what a damn mess we’re makin’ of things.

-Arthur Morgan, circa over a century before any of this bs.


COSUUUUUUMMMMME!!!!
One of my favorite jokes is that there are thousands of children in 3rd world countries who believe the Buffalo Bills won four consecutive Super Bowls.
 
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Elvis Starburst

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When Microsoft says don't fuck with the Windows OS registry... ya don't fuck with the Windows OS Registry
 

Gordon_4

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When Microsoft says don't fuck with the Windows OS registry... ya don't fuck with the Windows OS Registry
That has always been a warning in the vein of 'Here there be dragons'. So while it is wise nominally to not fuck with the registry, you still can. Its just at your own risk. @Phoenixmgs does it all the time to create his preferred installation of Windows. And I've done it a few times to resolve certain issues.
 

EvilRoy

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Those brown coffee stirsticks have that shape not to act as tiny shitty straws, but because the tubes stiffen the stick so it can be more effectively used to stir coffee. Even though everyone uses them as tiny shitty straws.
 

Xprimentyl

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Those brown coffee stirsticks have that shape not to act as tiny shitty straws, but because the tubes stiffen the stick so it can be more effectively used to stir coffee. Even though everyone uses them as tiny shitty straws.
... I never knew of anyone who used them as actual straws, but that does sound like good engineering. Also unnecessary engineering seeing as the wooden stir stick does the job just fine without having to account for lack of stiffness.
 

EvilRoy

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I mean, maybe when I was a kid... Haven't seen them in quite a long time though. It's usually some "sustainable" option now.
... I never knew of anyone who used them as actual straws, but that does sound like good engineering. Also unnecessary engineering seeing as the wooden stir stick does the job just fine without having to account for lack of stiffness.

Everybody does this, you're weird not me.

Although come to think of it I haven't seen them since before covid and the idea of stirring a drink with a stick someone else may have fondled is kind of iffy. I wonder if stuff like the gas station box of sugar cubes and box of stir sticks that everyone just digs in with their fingers will ever come back.
 

Xprimentyl

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Everybody does this, you're weird not me.

Although come to think of it I haven't seen them since before covid and the idea of stirring a drink with a stick someone else may have fondled is kind of iffy. I wonder if stuff like the gas station box of sugar cubes and box of stir sticks that everyone just digs in with their fingers will ever come back.
I assumed you were talking about these double-barreled deals; am I wrong? Because the openings are so incredulously small, drinking hot coffee through them is basically an effort in futility if you're trying to actually enjoy your coffee.

1637338793219.png

That said, I DO have a habit of preferring stir straws (normal single-barreled ones) over normal straws with my cocktails. The much smaller opening makes the drink last longer; I'm still able to get a genuine gulp, but I buy fewer drinks. I still buy too many, just fewer than a lethally shit-faced me would buy if I spent the night drinking through a garden hose, the idea being liquor can be piled up, but is metabolized at a rate not necessarily in synch with your rate of consumption. You can drink too much, and not realize it until 3-4 drinks later when drinking with a normal straw; a smaller straw ensures you drink in moderation and know pretty much immediately when your limit is being approached.
 

Xprimentyl

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Now I'm gonna call these "Super Spitwad Guns".
Stir straws are far from optimal for spit wads. I mean, you could probably manage a minor, disgusting inconvenience through one, but a whole "wad" is a tall order. No, you need a drinking straw for a spit wad. That said, assuming you're an adult and well outside of grade school age, you might as well just throw a good old fashioned punch seeing as a spit wad from one adult to another can only result in a fist fight.
 
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TheMysteriousGX

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I learned that when the queen dies, by law, damn near everything shuts down in Britain for two weeks, the stock exchange goes down for a day, and the BBC is legally prevented from showing comedies.

So naturally, with the whole "the queen will not be making appearances until February after visiting the hospital" thing going on right now, there's a very funny conspiracy theory floating around that she's being Weekend at Berni's to avoid shutting down the shops during the holiday buying rush
 

Gergar12

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Car dealerships and service centers are closed on Sundays. Thanks a lot, religion. If my car breaks down on Saturday night, and I need to get to work on Monday I would be screwed. Also, I tried getting the part on Amazon, and various websites, but Amazon doesn't have it, and the other delivery websites take at least 8 days.
 

EvilRoy

The face I make when I see unguarded pie.
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I assumed you were talking about these double-barreled deals; am I wrong? Because the openings are so incredulously small, drinking hot coffee through them is basically an effort in futility if you're trying to actually enjoy your coffee.
Oh yeah. Honestly I just have nice memories of being a kid and trying to drink tea through one of those straws. I never liked tea, but I did like spending time with my grandmother so I would sit and screw around with the straw while she had her teatime. Sometimes I still do it (or did pre covid) but never when I have a coffee that I expect to actually enjoy. I've spent so much time on the road I used to know exactly which family owned gas station had the best coffee and the cleanest bathrooms in a huge number of small towns, but the best of the bottom shelf is still bottom shelf.

Speaking of weird useless knowledge, I learned that the little holes in most North American wall socket plugs are probably just for manufacturing purposes, but there's no 100% certain answer because nobody really wrote one down when the specification for the holes was originally produced. Credit to this guy:
 

Ezekiel

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I figured out how those anime fansubbers are able to link separate OPs and EDs to episodes during playback. Which I'm not a fan of, for two reasons. One, only some players support it and it can be clunky. Two, they always use clean versions of the OP and ED. I can't even read Japanese/kanji, but you don't remove the credits. Ever. Those clean OPs and EDs exist as bonuses only.

But I had to link the opening and credits like that for Aeon Flux, because the DVDs have the EDs and season 3 OP already separate. It always bugged me that I'd have to view them separately, unless I use my DVDs, which have annoyingly long CG animated menus. Plus, the show is on three separate DVDs, which is inconvenient. The files were impossible to muxe together because the OP and EDs only had single stereo tracks, while the episodes had stereo, surround 5.1 and commentaries. I'd get an error that said they have different numbers of channels. What I had to do to link them then was duplicate the stereo tracks of the OP and EDs twice, add them to the same multiplex in MKVToolNix, name them accordingly (for convenience)...

Stereo
Surround 5.1
Commentary

...and then go to Output, go to "Previous/Next segment UID" on the right-hand side and add the OP to the "Previous" and the ED to the "Next" and then muxe. Separate files that combine during playback. It's not ideal. When I tested the files after, two of 12 attempts failed to correctly switch from stereo to 5.1 on my receiver. Also, if an episode doesn't have commentary, then it's confusing for the user to click the commentary track in the opening and then hear no sound during the episode. I'd have to create more copies of the OP and ED (with two stereo tracks instead of three) to avoid that. Another confusing thing that made it take longer for me to figure out what I was doing is that when you right-click in MPC-HC and go to Audio, it tells you all the tracks are in "stereo, 192 kbps", because it's going off the first file (the OP). You have to go into Properties > MediaInfo to see the real audio information of the episode you've clicked on.

aeon flux.jpg
 
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