› added 9 years ago

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TIL Anthony Hopkins’s inspiration for Hannibal Lecter was a cat. “…I sort of modeled my walk on a cat’s. I like cats, and I love the way they pad around. I wanted to get that feel when Lecter is padding very quietly and stealthily in the shadows around the streets of Florence.”

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b607N TIL almost half of selfie-related deaths worldwide since October 2011 have taken place in India
KYgoJ TIL the most widely used Language in North America during the 1700s and 1800s was not English or Spanish but a universal form of Sign Language now known as Plains Sign. It allowed natives and colonists to cross language barriers and trade easily.
e0LXL TIL that the practice of worker's compensation has its origins in 18th century piracy. A system of compensation was established as a result of the occupation's high risk of injury and included payments for different types of injuries as well as giving crewmates less strenuous duties when injured.
7WKM TIL that the Dutch have a word, “swaffelen,” or, as it was told to me, “zwaffelen,” for the act of smacking one’s penis repeatedly against an object.
9Rx6 TIL NASA accidentally auctioned off for just $995 a bag that was used by Apollo 11 astronauts to collect the first lunar sample. When the buyer sent the bag to NASA for verification, the space agency realized its mistake and refused to return it.