› added 8 years ago

789

TIL that the Scythians were the first people to adopt smoking cannabis (though they mixed it with opium) en masse, and the elite even had solid gold bongs to smoke out of, 2400 years ago.

Read more news.nationalgeographic.com

via reddit.com

xVJOB TIL at one point, if you lived in Washington DC you could get free goldfish from the government.
kkB7 TIL that the trick from “Office Space” and “Superman III” of stealing tiny fractions of a cent from a large number of transactions to stealthily accumulate a stolen fortune has a name: salami slicing
lobrA TIL of Gabriele Gast, an East German spy who was a high-ranking West German intelligence officer. She spied to continue seeing her lover in East Germany and was never paid for her spy work. However, she later learned that her lover was a professional Stasi seducer who strung her along for 20 years.
Q6RX TIL the financial firm Cantor Fitzgerald sued American Airlines for negligence for letting 9/11 hijackers board their flights. The attacks led to the deaths of numerous Cantor Fitzgerald employees and the destruction of their World Trade Center office. They settled out of court for $135 million.
x6kPD TIL of The Beetle (1897), a novel about a shapeshifter in London. It was so popular upon release, that it sold six times as many copies as Dracula.