› added 5 years ago

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TIL that the Australian bush ballad "Waltzing Matilda", also known as the country's unofficial national anthem, is actually about a travelling worker who steals the local landowners sheep to eat. Upon being chased by him and three policemen, he commits suicide by drowning himself in a local river.

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0dgxy TIL that circumstantial evidence is equally as valid as direct evidence. Fingerprints, DNA, or videos which help infer that a crime took place are circumstantial evidence, while direct evidence such as an eyewitness seeing someone commit the crime can sometimes be unreliable
jNN5N TIL that syrup (as in from maple trees) functions ecologically as anti-freeze to protect the plant from harsh winters.
x6JXk TIL Yiannis Kouros won the 1988 Westfield Sydney to Melbourne Ultramarathon (537 mi, 864 km) even though he started 12 hours behind the rest of the field after the organizers of the race challenged him to do so. In total, he won 5 of the 9 times the event was held.
oRNwR TIL that if we took all the surface water on earth and made it into a sphere, its diameter would only be 860mi or the distance between Salt Lake City Utah and Topeka Kansas.
D1XZr TIL of Musical Ear Syndrome, a for of tinnitus that causes one to hear music with no external source. The music can be a single instrument playing a simple melody or a complex arrangement of instruments, including vocals.