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TIL the honeymoon is a relic of marriage by capture, based on the practice of the husband going into hiding with his wife to avoid reprisals from her relatives, with the intention that the woman would be pregnant by the end of the month.

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69Nn8 TIL 55 million years ago, the North Pole was a lot like Miami today. There were palm trees and alligators, and the temperature was around 74° F.
V9G TIL - Stores cannot charge you a fee or set a minimum limit for Mastercard or Visa. Refuse to pay these and threaten to report the merchant if they do. They can be fined $1,000s for violations under their agreement. http://bit.ly/LgDNoM
Rd56 TIL Landmines planted on the coasts during the Falklands War accidentally created penguin sanctuaries. The penguins are too light to detonate the mines, so they live and breed safely. The sanctuaries are so popular and profitable that there are efforts to prevent removal of the mines.
nbRb TIL in 1984 Rick Gibson was given 2 human 10-week-old fetuses which had been dehydrated for 20 years. Gibson rehydrated then freeze-dried them and attached them as earrings to a female mannequin head. The sculpture was titled Human Earrings. As a result, Gibson was expelled from Goldsmiths College.
Bra1e TIL of Qian Xuesen, a Chinese aerospace engineer who was a founding member of JPL. When he was stripped of his security clearances during the Red Scare despite protests by his colleagues, he moved back to China where he became well known as the "Father of Chinese Rocketry"