› added 12 years ago

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TIL that TASER is short for ‘Thomas A Swift’s Electric Rifle’

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via reddit.com

wLP1o TIL there are 4 animals who use sunlight as energy: the eastern emerald elysia (a sea slug), the mint-sauce worm, the oriental hornet, and the embryos of the spotted salamander.
gQ08 TIL that WWII fighter pilot James Howard won the medal of honor for single handedly taking on 30+ German fighter planes all by himself to protect a group of American bomber planes.
bDop TIL Since 2005, the Parents Television Council has deemed Family Guy the Worst TV Show of the Week on at least 40 occasions, and has filed many complaints to the FCC for “oblique sexual innuendo”. Seth MacFarlane responded “it was like getting hate mail from Hitler.”
NWlE TIL: Scientists found a tomato plant on a volcanic island and were perplexed as to how it got there. Turns out it grew up fertilized in the poop left by a previous researcher.
5YRlB TIL: The US has its own version of the international foot measurement, the US Survey Foot Measurement.