› added 7 years ago

999

TIL Japanese monks mummified themselves while still alive. The practice required the mummifying monk to eat only nuts, buds, and roots for at least three years. When death was near his disciples would put him into a box at the bottom of pit, pack charcoal around the box and bury their master alive.

VMndG TIL Nikola Tesla used Sanskrit words in his descriptions of natural phenomena. After meeting Swami Vivekananda, Tesla began using the words 'Akasha', 'Prana', and the concept of a luminiferous ether to describe the source, existence and construction of matter.
Rdmw TIL that WD-40 has been used remove a python snake that had coiled itself around the undercarriage of a bus, and that police officers also once used WD-40 to remove a naked burglar who was trapped in an air conditioning vent.
697ZQ TIL Screech owls can have symbiotic relationships with Texas blind snakes, bringing them to their nests where they clean up parasites and insects
X0Xwj TIL US president Benjamin Harrison was widowed while in office in 1892. Four years later, Harrison married his dead wife's niece and had a daughter with her. His adult children who were around 40 years old, were horrified that their father married their cousin and didn't attend the wedding.
jNN7N People naturally have a morbid curiosity about the Titanic disaster, wondering about every little detail of that fateful April night in 1912, and slowly but surely virtually every detail has been revealed since.