› added 8 years ago

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TIL Whoopi Goldberg co-founded a company that makes medical marijuana products for women seeking relief from menstrual cramps. Goldberg says she was inspired to go into business by “a lifetime of difficult periods and the fact that cannabis was literally the only thing that gave me relief”.

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6EVxQ TIL that 1/3 of cats have no reaction to catnip. Many cats that don't respond to catnip do respond to honeysuckle wood. Honeysuckle contains a chemical that is similar to the active ingredient in catnip. Most likely, it is this substance that puts cats into a delightful, temporarily altered state.
dbxK TIL that racecar driver Alan Stacey died in 1960 when he crashed after being hit in the face by a bird at 120mph
R7MLl TIL during WWII American soldier John R. Fox died by calling an Artillery strike on himself. When a stunned soldier told him there was little chance of him surviving, he replied with "Fire it."
aawy TIL of the Atmos clock, a mechanical torsion pendulum clock which gets the energy it needs to run from temperature and air pressure changes in the environment, and can run for many years without human intervention. A temperature variation of only 1 degree is sufficient for two days operation.
Y7xnA TIL learned that Waffle House stays open 24/7/365 so reliably, even in disaster scenarios, that it's informally used by FEMA as a metric for disaster severity ("If Waffle House closes, get out of there!"). Their preparedness measures include mobile emergency generator trucks and "Jump Waffle Teams"