› added 9 years ago

133

TIL Blink 182’s manager told them they needed a radio song on 2001’s album Take Off Your Pants and Jacket. Mark Hoppus vowed to make the cheesiest “throwaway fucking single” he could, and wrote “The Rock Show” in 10 minutes.

yVYep TIL: In the 1920s, the Radium Ore Revigator popular enough that the company could not keep up with demand. It was a water crock lined with radioactive materials (uranium). You would fill it up with water to irradiate it overnight. The irradiated water would cure arthritis, senility, and flatulence.
LQR7Q TIL that the ship that inspired the German gunboat Louisa in the the film "The African Queen" is still in use today. The MY Liemba serves as a passenger and cargo ferry in Lake Tanganyika, Tanzania. It was first built in 1913 and as of 2024 is undergoing renovation before returning to use
DQKZD TIL that Latimer Road tube station has automated announcements asking people not to take photos of the adjacent Grenfell Tower, partly out of respect for the people who died there and partly so that camera flashes don't distract tube drivers
vPdg8 TIL The French cartoonist Nadar was the first person to take aerial photographs, shooting from a balloon, and the first to take photographs underground, taking pictures of the Paris Catacombs.
GAZWE TIL a book club in California spent 28 years reading Finnegans Wake by James Joyce, beginning in 1995 and finishing in October 2023. At first the club read two pages per month, however it eventually slowed to just one page per month. In November, the group started the book again.