› added 12 years ago

166

TIL In 2004 a man started a “project” to find his sister a boyfriend. He secretly spied on her with a variety of James Bond style gadgets and disguises for months, keeps diary of shenanigans, ends up getting caught. [Long read, hilarious]

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via reddit.com

jAGN TIL New Hamphire prison inmates that have to make license plates, stamp their state motto “Live Free or Die” …hour after hour, day after day,
l7RD5 TIL that the Russian Empire built a fort on the island of Kauai in Hawaii called Fort Elizabeth with permission from the local ruler.
nWXnG TIL that over 2,000 years ago the Greek astronomer Eratosthenes estimated the Earth’s circumference to be equivalent to 26,000 miles, a 5% error. He did this based on the Sun shining down wells in the Egyptian cities of Alexandria and Styene and knowing how far apart they were.
9mYG TIL of David Kootook, a 14 year old Inuit boy who survived for 23 days in -40 degree weather after a plane crash in the Arctic. He refused offers by the pilot to eat the body of a fellow passenger and died of starvation 23 days later. Upon rescue, the pilot said “Welcome to the camp of a cannibal.”
mxgly TIL that the terms "lowercase letters" and "uppercase letters" are known as such because older letter printing presses stored the two types of letters on separate cases. The shift key is also called the shift key due to it being used to shift the two cases.