Can we have an "OMG I can't believe I never realised that!" thread?

[TwigTheWonderKid]

Mine is Sandie Shaw. I can't believe it had never occurred to me until tonight that her name is a play on Sandy Shore.

@ememem84 It's twice as big as the UK!

@ememem84 Madagascar nearly 2 and a half times bigger than the U.K.!

Peanuts grow underground 🥜

Birds can poo when they're flying, they don't have to be sitting down!
I've been pooed on by seagulls a few times!

Madagascar is bigger than the UK!! Mind blown!

The ones that keep things cold are "reefers" (short for refrigerated.)
I remember that from the song 'Convoy'. "Cab over Pete with a reefer on"

@BikeRunSki Perhaps he was thinking of Wells?
A fortnight (2 weeks) is short for fourteen nights, similar to Shakespeare's "sennight" (seven nights=1 week)

Australia hasmountains, imaginatively some are called 'the snowy mountains' the largest area of permenant snow in one country is in Australia

What about Russia? Or Greenland? They must have larger areas of snow?! Is the South Pole a 'country'?

In Greenland it's more ice than snow. Parts of Greenland have less rain than the Sahara.

I'm astounded by the number of people saying they didn't know about dandelion clocks. I used to love blowing them and watching them parachute off in the breeze as a child until one day my mum told me not to do it or we'll get more dandelions on the lawn.

Mentioning the Sahara reminds me
Antarctica is the largest desert by size in the world. It's classed as a desert as less than 51mm of rain falls there yearly.

@sueelleker, maybe 🤔, but Wells is a good 5 hours plus away.

It only struck me a few days ago why 'Head and Shoulders' shampoo is called that. I'd always assumed it was a claim that it was head and shoulders above other shampoos.

Watching a youtube DIY tutorial the other day, and the. guy says "remember, it's always Righty-tighty, lefty loosie. " this is going to change my life! Lightbulbs, screwdrivers. sodastream gas cartridges, taps....

@lamagree. - I learnt that rhyme whist watching My Family, as a grown-up adult, Zoe Wannaker mentioned it. I was astounded.

My 20 year old son just taught me something. I was pouring some coke in a glass and it fizzing up. He said, why don’t you pour it against the edge of the glass, then it will stop fizzing up. I did, and it stopped!

I never knew the dandelion one either. And as a poster commented about Shaun the sheep, the penny just dropped 😀

Russia used to own Alaska, they sold it to America as it was wasteland. They didn’t know about the reserves of gold and oil when they sold it.

@Iamagree not ALWAYS but for most things yes!

panicstationsready
Oh, and I was born in 1960. A mere 15 years years after the end of WW2. THAT blew my mind. WW2 is proper history, not a few years before I was born!!!

Try being born in 1945 like me!

Because the roots of a dandelion are a strong diuretic, the French name is Pissenlit (piss a bed).

@Ninkanink (and @DrFoxtrot) If we take the bow as having bunny ears, once you have tied the first bow you then just tie a second bow using the two ears...
I can’t think of any other way to do a double bow, but maybe there is?

There is - you tie the second bow the other twist handedness to the base knot, like you would a reef knot. That double knot is completely secure and will not pull out.

If you tie them both samehanded (which is the natural way to do it) then it'll pull out.

If the whereabouts of Hawaii freaks you out, check out where Alaska is.

It's tacked onto the left side of Canada and has no land border with the USA

Surely everyone knows where Alaska is? As in attached to Canada...

@RandomMess, check out some of the previous posts.

That fact alone will blow some minds.

Years ago, peanuts were called “ground nuts” which gives a clue as to how they grow. They were often sold in their shells, with bits of earth attached, rather like new potatoes sometimes are.

I always thought Skegness was in Scotland.

So did I, Harry. It just sounds as though it is.

Try it! Tie a double knot as usual. Once it’s done, tug on one shoelace. If it tightens the knot you’ve got the wrong one and you can just pull the other one instead, and hey presto! Your double knot will melt away!

Thank you ninkanink. Every day is a school day on here.

If you put cheese on cream crackers then heat in the microwave when you take them out the crackers will still be room temperature and crunchy but with melted cheese so easier to eat

Planning on trying this tonight.

My gran called Dandelions 'pissy beds', this thread has now taught me why !

In France they are called "dents-de-lion" ("lion's teeth" - which is where we get dandelion from, and there other name is "piss-en-lit" - which as your gran says, is" pissy bed"

Cows have best friends ?

They do. They pal up.

There is a farm near us where there was a herd of cows and a bull.

There was one cow who had no friends. My heart ached for her, poor thing.

And the bull had a favourite wife. While he did his duty by all of them, in his leisure hours he was with one particular cow all the time - they grazed together, used to lie next to each other in the field. All the other cows just stayed out of the way.

He was broken-hearted when she died (so the farmer told me - I asked what had happened to her when I realised she had disappeared). It was a very long time before he "re-married".