› added 8 years ago

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TIL The tarantula hawk stings and paralyzes a tarantula, drags the specimen to a brooding nest, and lays a single egg on the spider’s abdomen. The wasp larva hatches, creates a hole in the spider’s abdomen, and enters to feed, avoiding vital organs for as long as possible to keep the spider alive.

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b9WM9 TIL Gayla Peevey, the little girl who sang, "I Want a Hippopotamus for Christmas," is still alive, and was only ten years old when she recorded the song in 1953.
xVgVk TIL that Soap Operas got their name from radio dramas which were sponsored by soap manufacturers.
8NmP TIL that two male, maneless, man eating lions rumored to have killed over 130 construction workers would sneak into camp at night & drag workers out of their tents while they were sleeping. They were eventually killed by a British soldier who in the process, was singled out & stalked by the lions.
9wKmQ TIL that Hello Kitty is not a cat; she's a British third-grader with a twin, according to Sanrio
AkdB TIL the Nazis also made a film called “Titanic”. It was an anti-British propaganda piece about the famous shipwreck. The RAF bombed the theater it was to have premiered in and later sunk the ship it was filmed on, resulting 3x the deaths as the Titanic.