TIL that in Raiders of the Lost Ark, the sound of the snakes was a combination of someone running their fingers through a warm cheese casserole and a skateboard on wet sponges.
TIL John Ratzenberger came up with the Cheer’s character Cliff Clavin at his audition (for another part). On his way out the door he asked the producers if they had a bar ‘know it all’ and proceeded to improv the idea on the spot. They wrote it into the show.
TIL the reason that purple has traditionally been associated with royalty was because, in Ancient Rome, the only source of purple was milking and fermenting the liquid from a snail. It took 12,000 snails to produce 1 gram of dye! This made the Caesars declare it their exclusive color.
TIL that Waffle House has a unique way of staging orders in their kitchens called the Magic Marker System that does not require a written order. This involves placing items like ketchup packets, napkins or tomato slices at specific locations on the plate to serve as a visual order for the cook.
TIL that 13 US states have laws prohibiting the sale or trading of cars on Sundays. These so-called 'blue laws' were originally meant to keep people pious and promote church-going.
TIL Semaglutide, the molecule found in weight loss drugs like Ozempic, was originally developed following research into a similar compound discovered in Gila monster venom.
TIL Egg yolk color preferences are regional. For example, research has found that, on average, German consumers like yolks darker than UK consumers. Large scale egg producers know these preferences and can manipulate the yolk color, via feed, to dial in the right colors for the right market.
TIL NFL teams collectively eat 80,000 Uncrustables every week. The reason they are so popular is they are calorie dense, but not too heavy, tasty and "delicious even if they got crushed"
TIL Soviet foreign minister Vyacheslav Molotov claimed that the bombing raids of Finland during the Winter War were 'humanitarian food deliveries.' So, the Finns called the Soviet bombs 'Molotov bread baskets' and developed firebombs, which they called 'Molotov cocktails,' to go with the bread!
TIL birds have pneumatic bones. This means that, even if they have a blocked windpipe, if they also have an exposed broken bone, they can use that bone to gather oxygen from the air (a bone snorkel) and not suffocate!
Seattle before and after removing the Alaskan Way Viaduct in 2020
TIL Headlight brightness has roughly doubled since 2015, according to data from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety. Much of this is due to the replacement of halogen headlights with LEDs.
TIL Using machine learning, researchers have been able to decode what fruit bats are saying--surprisingly, they mostly argue with one another.
TIL the inventor of the snow globe, Erwin Perzy, stumbled on the idea while trying to find a way to amplify light in surgical rooms. He found that holding a bulb next to a water globe filled with reflective, white particles boosted the light. He later used the concept to make snow scene souvenirs.
TIL Valentine's Day may have roots in the Roman festival of Lupercalia. At the festival, naked priests, smeared in the blood of a goat would parade through the streets with strips of bloody goat hide, whipping any women they saw. Men randomly drew women's names from jars to be coupled with.
TIL Up until the late 19th century in Naples, pasta was a street food eaten with bare hands. People would tilt back their head and lower the pasta into their open mouths, often one uninterrupted fistful after another. Tourists would come to Naples just to watch the locals eat in the streets.
TIL Business tycoon Armand Hammer (great-grandfather of actor Armie Hammer) tried to buy baking soda company Arm & Hammer because he got tired of people thinking he already owned it due to the similarity to his name. He never bought it but did eventually sit on their board of directors.
TIL researchers have observed that every culture has a word for black and white. When a culture has a third word for a color, it is always red. If it has a fourth word, it is either yellow or green
TIL Cool Whip contains the emulsifier Polysorbate 60, a major ingredient in many sexual lubricants
Cool Whip contains the emulsifier Polysorbate 60, a major ingredient of many sexual lubricants
TIL Cool Whip contains an emulsifier called Polysorbate 60, a major ingredient in some sexual lubricants
Do you have a saying or phrase inspired by a movie (not a phrase in the movie) that you have incorporated into your life?
TIL Coca-Cola bottles their iconic beverage, in some places, with a yellow cap to indicate that it is kosher for Passover (i.e., made without corn syrup).
Coca-Cola bottles their iconic beverage, in some places, with a yellow cap to indicate that it is kosher for Passover (i.e., made without corn syrup).
