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TIL a popular Christmas decoration in the Nordics, the Yule Goat, is a tradition going back to pre-Christian days. A popular prank was to place a goat made of straw in your neighbour’s house without them noticing, and the victim would then repeat the act

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kJ89W TIL about Operation Midnight Climax, a CIA program in the 1950s and 1960s that involved the use of prostitutes to lure unwitting individuals into apartments that had been set up with hidden cameras and microphones. Part of MK-Ultra
ZpdDB TIL a beehive fence is a fence built to deter elephants based on their natural fear of bees. The fence is set up off the ground at chest height and contains hives spaced every 10 metres. If an elephant disturbs the fence, then hives shake and the bees become agitated, and the elephants are deterred.
M6AK TIL the Kargil war in 1999 between India and Pakistan is the only war ever between two countries where both have weapons of mass destruction.
8aXOK TIL that Constantine V of the Byzantine Empire (r. 741-775) was so loved for his ability as a general that following the defeat of the Byzantine army by the Bulgarians at the battle of Pliska in 811, a group of soldiers broke into his tomb and begged his corpse to come back and lead them again.
B4vx TIL that during American Civil War some soldier’s wounds glowed blue; soldier’s whose wounds glowed had a better chance of surviving, and so the glow was called “Angel’s Glow”. Now it is known that the luminescence is due to bacteria that produce antibiotics and that live in nematodes