TIL: Today I Learned

TIL-the earliest recurring pro-basketball player on Parks and Rec's first name is Detlef, and it was NOT Dead left, like a nickname for having a bad ass left arm or something. Just saying, I've never heard the name Detlef before Parks and Rec.
 
Without looking him up I know from his name he is german or with some german connection. Nobody else whould have such name.
 
He was "the German guy in the NBA" before Nowitzki came around. He played for the Sonics during their NBA Finals run in 1996, and I remember him giving a pretty good showing against Jordan's Bulls.

Man, I feel old now.
 
Today I learned that OKCupid started out as SparkMatch, a matchmaking service offered by TheSpark.com, best known for their Sparknotes. I actually had several SparkMatch accounts back in the day. One of them was me posing as a certain British pop star, who I shall not name here. I managed to get several people believing that I really was this pop star.

So, basically, today I learned that technically I'm a catfisher on OKCupid.
 
Today I learned that OKCupid started out as SparkMatch, a matchmaking service offered by TheSpark.com, best known for their Sparknotes. I actually had several SparkMatch accounts back in the day. One of them was me posing as a certain British pop star, who I shall not name here. I managed to get several people believing that I really was this pop star.

So, basically, today I learned that technically I'm a catfisher on OKCupid.
I'm not buying you're Sting, even for a moment.
 
Last week I learned about the Excursionist Perk for United Airlines that allows a free one-way flight embedded in a round trip itinerary between two different regions when using mile redemption travel. In my case, outbound is San Francisco to Auckland and return Melbourne to SFO, then the free flight (pay fees) is Christchurch to Perth, for 80000 miles and $200.
 
It was very common until recently for Nazis to be portrayed by Jewish actors. By portraying them as inept, bullying, vicious but incompetent villains, they were striking at the Nazis' projected image as Aryan supermen and giving them a legacy as fools and losers. Mel Brooks in particular loved invoking Nazis as incompetent mooks, even in times and places where they made no sense (Blazing Saddles to name one example).

Major Strasser in Casablanca was played by Conrad Veidt who fled Germany because he was married to a Jewish woman. While supposedly a fearsome Nazi officer, Strasser fails to prevent the escape of a major resistance leader, has his men chased out of a saloon by a song, is killed by a local small business owner, and his murder only casually investigated by a disinterested police force.
 

GasBandit

Staff member
Video's a couple years old, but I just saw it today for the first time -

TIL: Cheap calculators these days put fake solar cells on their face because we're used to cheap calculators being solar.

 
TIL that "dogie", as in cowboy speak, "Git along little dogie," didn't refer to cattle dogs assisting with the drive. A 'dogie' is an orphaned or neglected calf.
 
TIL that NOT ONLY did I have to wake up super early for High School JUST because of bus schedules but ALSO that teenagers require more sleep than kids or adults! And because I went to a terrible vocational school that was a fuck while away, I woke up TWICE as early! So my inner teenager...is KINDA screaming right now.
 

GasBandit

Staff member
TIL that NOT ONLY did I have to wake up super early for High School JUST because of bus schedules but ALSO that teenagers require more sleep than kids or adults! And because I went to a terrible vocational school that was a fuck while away, I woke up TWICE as early! So my inner teenager...is KINDA screaming right now.
Whenever someone talks about teenagers needing more sleep, they're trying to get teenagers to go to bed earlier, not say they should be allowed to sleep in.
 
Whenever someone talks about teenagers needing more sleep, they're trying to get teenagers to go to bed earlier, not say they should be allowed to sleep in.
Not correct. Teenagers have a weird circadian rhythm, which makes getting up in the morning harder.

When my son had to take the bus, he had to catch it at 6:15, so he had to get up around 5:15, how many teenagers do you think go to bed 9 hours before that?
 

GasBandit

Staff member
Not correct. Teenagers have a weird circadian rhythm, which makes getting up in the morning harder.

When my son had to take the bus, he had to catch it at 6:15, so he had to get up around 5:15, how many teenagers do you think go to bed 9 hours before that?
I didn't say it was reasonable, I said that was what they were trying to do (IE, you're not allowed to have a life... do your homework and go to bed!)
 
I didn't say it was reasonable, I said that was what they were trying to do (IE, you're not allowed to have a life... do your homework and go to bed!)
There are movements to start high school later (and really it should be the younger kids who start earlier, and the older kids who start later) but the problem is that high schoolers tend to have their afternoons packed and then, yes, they won't have time for everything.
 

GasBandit

Staff member
I feel like 24 hours isn't enough, myself. Like, I want to sleep 9 hours... but then I want to be awake 18... and then sleep another 9. And so on and so forth. The Circadian Rhythm is bunk.
 
I feel like 24 hours isn't enough, myself. Like, I want to sleep 9 hours... but then I want to be awake 18... and then sleep another 9. And so on and so forth. The Circadian Rhythm is bunk.
My brain has to be forced to sleep more than 6 hours. It's vastly irritating.
 
I also recently learned waking up in the middle of the night is...normal...all this time I thought it was STRAIGHT sleep but NOPE-awake is chaos, sleep is chaos, WE ARE A NIGHTMARE SPECIES!
 
I also recently learned waking up in the middle of the night is...normal
Up until about the 1600’s, it was considered normal to wake up in the middle of the night for a couple hours, grab a bite to eat, read, chat up your friends/family, and then head back to bed. Sort of an inverse of the midday siesta.

—Patrick
 
Up until about the 1600’s, it was considered normal to wake up in the middle of the night for a couple hours, grab a bite to eat, read, chat up your friends/family, and then head back to bed. Sort of an inverse of the midday siesta.

—Patrick
To be fair, they went to sleep around 8pm and got up around 5am in some seasons.
 
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