› added 7 years ago

156

TIL Chris Columbus was originally suppose to direct "National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation," but dropped out because Chevy Chase was difficult to work with. A few weeks later he got the script for "Home Alone," which revitalized his career.

Read more slashfilm.com

via reddit.com

bQ97 TIL that British Members of Parliament are not allowed to resign, instead they have to be appointed in the nominal position of ‘Crown Steward and Bailiff of the Chiltern Hundreds’ which disqualifies them from holding office.
mxkkR TIL of Aurora, an exascale computer that neuroscientists plan to use to make a map of the human brain, or connectome. The brain has more connections than the milky way has stars; mapping it would represent the single largest dataset ever collected about anything in the history of the world.
bx6E TIL that because the concrete of the Hoover Dam was poured into individual, rectangular shaped sections–rather than with a single, continuous pour–the physical dam itself will survive up to 10,000 years and be one of the last remaining visible and recognizable monuments of humans on the planet.
p8PpN TIL That a German shepherd named Talero stayed next to the body of his owner for 23 days, after he had died in a snow storm. He prevented animals from attacking the body, and tried to keep his owner warm by sleeping by his side.
NXYgJ Today I learned that, while A. A. Milne, the creator of Winnie the Pooh, named the character after his son's teddy bear, Pooh's design was actually based on another teddy bear named Growler, who was owned by the son of Milne's illustrator, E. H. Shepard.