This thread is for all those random facts we all collect and have nothing to do with.
(It was about time we got a list thread...)
The first 32 seconds of the US version of Rammstein's album
Reise, Reise are the last 32 seconds of Japan Airlines Flight 123's cockpit voice-recorder.
Japan Airlines Flight 123 was, and remains, the worst single-aircraft disaster in the history of aviation. Out of the 15 crew and 509 passengers, only Ochiai Yumi, Yoshizaki Hiroko, Yoshizaki Mikiko, and Kawakami Keiko survived. All were sitting next to one another in row 56.
Standard 747 seating chart. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:747_Seating_Chart.gif)
Note: Japanese domestic air flights use an alternate 747 with extra upper deck seats.
Ochiai-san, Yoshizaki-san, and Mikiko-chan were found in the debris of the plane. Keiko-chan was found sitting in a tree.
For those non-Japanophiles among us:
*The names a "backwards" (i.e. Ochiai Yumi would be Yumi Ochiai to English speakers.)
*They are all women
*
-san is a respectful title for those of the same age (i.e. Ochiai-san and Yoshiaski-san)
*
-chan is a title for those of a younger age (i.e. Keiko-chan and Mikiko-chan.)
*Hiroko-san and Mikiko-chan are mother and daughter.[/list]
(I know which row I'm sitting in if I take a Boeing 747 to Hawaii...)
According to the pastafarians (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flying_Spaghetti_Monster) the world was created by a flying spaghetti monster
I need to stat the flying spaghetti monster now ... wow.
wow
...
wait
...
yup, wow.
Defenestrate means, literally "To throw out a window."
...Best. Word. EVAR!!!!
I just heard that word used on Dark Angel reruns.
Too bad the first time I read the word was in Complete Arcane.
Dude, Complete Arcane pissed me off with that. Defenestrating Sphere had nothing to do with windows, at all. I was livid.*
*I am, of course, being facetious here. I was just upset, not actually livid.
The composer Scriabin spent the last twelve years of his life writing a piece called Mysterium. Mysterium was to be a piece unlike any music ever experienced before, and Scriabin believed its week-long debut performance in the Himalayas (yes, the piece required seven days and seven nights of continuous performance) would literally bring the apocalypse, dissolving the world in bliss and replacing humans with "higher beings."
Luckily, Scriabin died in 1915 of an infection received when he cut himself shaving, having finished only the introduction to Mysterium, so the world is safe.
For now.
The impetus behind Otto Von Bismarck's drive to unite Germany was a college bet (for a case of champagne) with his American friend, John Motley.
In Pacific Grove, California, it is a misdemeanor to threaten or kill a butterfly.
In Alaska, it is illegal to intoxicate a moose. One has to wonder who first intoxicated a moose to make this law nessicary.
In Kansas City, Missiouri, the wording of the indecent exposure law legally allowed women to be topless. A popular case with a radio station who exploited this loophole led to the law being changed. (The law stated it was illegal to publically expose 'sexual organs.')
My personal favorite for dumb laws:
In Texas: When two trains meet each other at a railroad crossing, each shall come to a full stop, and neither shall proceed until the other has gone.
More Dumb Laws (http://www.dumblaws.com)
Quote from: Captain Xathan Redclaw(The law stated it was illegal to publically expose 'sexual organs.')
Baby, if this is wrong, I don't want to be right.
[spoiler=RAWR](http://img148.imageshack.us/img148/3039/pipeorganhn6.jpg)[/spoiler]
So if we click the spoiler button are we exposing the organs?
Trying to think of a way to answer that without being creepy.
You already failed...and I exposed your organ.
Eddie Van Halen played lead guitar on Michael Jackson's song "Beat It".
# In the movie the wizard of Oz, Judy Garland was the lowest paid of the main actors. Toto the dog made more money for the movie than she did.
QuoteEddie Van Halen played lead guitar on Michael Jackson's song "Beat It".
I thought I recognized that guitarist's sound. :)
The darning needle is another name for the dragonfly.
It is illegal to leave Wisconsin with a chicken on your head.
The Titanic actually had their engines in reverse when it struck the iceberg.
If they had hit the iceberg head on, they would most likely have survived.
A trinary star system (one with three stars) has yet to be accurately mapped. (I think)*
there are ten planets in our solar system.
Dragonflys are also known as snake doctors.
Which ten are those? I hear there's lots of disambiguity about defining the difference between planets and other large rocks that float around.
IN BRITAIN!
It is possible for a thief, after breaking and entering someone's house and thereafter falling down said house's stairs, to sue owner of said house, and actually win.
I'm not sure whether any of you will find this amusing, but they wanted to change the name of the red cross to the red triangle to stop it being insulting to non-christians.
QuoteI'm not sure whether any of you will find this amusing, but they wanted to change the name of the red cross to the red triangle to stop it being insulting to non-christians.
As I understand, the Red Cross already has several different logos that are used in various parts of the world, including a Red Crescent, Red Lion, Red Crystal, and Red Magen David Adom (the six-pointed star.)
The irony is that most of these symbols were added to avoid offending people's religious sensibilities, but the original Red Cross symbol was not designed after or named after the Christian cross-- it's just a color-reversed version of the Swiss flag.
It's not so much that it offended non-christians, but that a red cross branch (however that works) working entirely in a muslim/jewish country didn't particularly want to label themselves with what they saw as a christian symbol. The red crystal was made so that people would stop making brand new symbols representing the major religions of whatever country they worked in, because that symbol needs to be readily seen from far away, and identified without the aid of a reference book.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emblems_of_the_Red_Cross
The Red Crescent is getting quite a workout in Lebanon even as we speak. Both it and the Red Lion have been around for more than forty years.
When the great armament firm Krupp was dissolved in 1967, it made as much profit from lemonade as it did from its traditional projects.
Quote from: Captain Xathan RedclawDefenestrate means, literally "To throw out a window."
The Thirty Years War, lasting from 1618 to 1648, involved most of Europe's major powers. The war, which was rooted in a conflict between Protestant and Catholic factions, was initiated by an incident known as the Defenestration of Prague, during which Protestants threw a trio of Catholics out a castle window. The defenestrated Catholics, all of whom survived, fell roughly five stories and landed in manure.
More information about the Defenestration of Prague can be found at Wikipedia.org (//wikipedia.org).
Quote from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/90377_SednaSedna[/url], since it was one of the first of the new planetoids to be discovered that has a larger mass than your typical asteroids.
In '77, Chiron was the tenth planet, now it has been downgraded to a rogue planetoid/comet.
Sedna, according to some astronomers, is just one of many Transneptunian Plutonic sized entities likely to be found as our observation tech gets better.
In other words, the sky is filled with crap.
Sedna, the 10th planet, has a large X-shaped crater covering much of its surface.
On a roleplaying-related note:
The Epic Level Handbook suggests challenging high-level players with a dungeon that can only be accessed using teleportation magic.
Running an adventure featuring a dungeon that can only be accessed using teleportation will annoy your players.
Running an adventure featuring a dungeon in which every room can only be accessed using teleportation will cause your players to give up in disgust.
Deja Vu is the only DnD spell listed twice in the same book.
Quote from: Epic MeepoThe Epic Level Handbook suggests challenging high-level players with a dungeon that can only be accessed using teleportation magic.
Running an adventure featuring a dungeon that can only be accessed using teleportation will annoy your players.
Running an adventure featuring a dungeon in which every room can only be accessed using teleportation will cause your players to give up in disgust.
That reminds me of one of the maps in the old HeroQuest boardgame, which I fear I am dating myself by even mentioning. None of the doors were connected, and instead were labeled 2-12, and you rolled 2d6 each time you entered one to see which room you ended up in.
It was such a mean map, because if you actually found the massive gold mine this weird, haunted teleportation-fortress had been built on top of, and managed to haul out a huge armful of gold to the surface again, it all vanished-- it was illusory gold. >(
Quote from: Luminous CrayonThat reminds me of one of the maps in the old HeroQuest boardgame, which I fear I am dating myself by even mentioning.
Since I have already determined I am old I shall say that I still own this game.
Quote from: PoseidonQuote from: Luminous CrayonThat reminds me of one of the maps in the old HeroQuest boardgame, which I fear I am dating myself by even mentioning.
Since I have already determined I am old I shall say that I still own this game.
Old! Ha! I think I was playing D&D (barely) before you were born. Whippersnapper.
/casts resurrection
Live my Creature, LIVE!
We have eight planets in the solar system.
Scientists worry about wht we'll do when the sun burns out, in several billion years.
And people wonder why we don't have more cutting edge technology.
today the president had stuff in his colon removed and during the time that he was under anesthetics, Dick Cheney was our president
It's happens all the time, and it's not that big of a deal.
In other news, There are over a half dozen different sizes of computer case fan.
There are also over half a dozen sizes of fans of The Eagles (chosen arbitrarily)
The woods surrounding Mount Fuji are a popular site for making oneself taller.*
[spoiler=*]This is a horrible in-joke. The woods around Mt. Fuji are notorious for people going there to commit suicide. In fact, the woods are so massive that people simply come across bodies long after the bodies' owners have departed. Hanging is a quite common method, as you could have guessed.[/spoiler]
Quote from: PoseidonQuote from: Luminous CrayonThat reminds me of one of the maps in the old HeroQuest boardgame, which I fear I am dating myself by even mentioning.
Since I have already determined I am old I shall say that I still own this game.
Ugg.
I bought the fantasy trip when it was new. And I still own it, OGRE and GEV, not to mention a certain box and the dice which were rolled so much they have no edges. none.
The uslesss fact here is a corralative one. If Liz Danforth does the art for your rulebook, the odds are not good for the continued survival of that system.
(great fantasy artist. Not saying anything bad about her work, I'm just saying...)
The entire Ecology unit in my AP Biology book, especially when every example is with a species you never knew existed.
R.L Stein, the author of the Goosebumps series, is a fan of the Clevland Browns. And R.L isn't his real initials, but I forget his real name.
If I'm not mistaken, I think I heard somewhere that R.L. Stein is afrid of the dark.
I know Stephen King is, but when you have an imagination like his.....
Quote from: LordVreegThe uslesss fact here is a corralative one. If Liz Danforth does the art for your rulebook, the odds are not good for the continued survival of that system.
(great fantasy artist. Not saying anything bad about her work, I'm just saying...)
What about
Tunnels & Trolls? I believe she ahs artwork in the copy of their rulebook that I have and Flying Buffalo and T&T are still something of a going concern. I could be entirely wrong, though.
If you wish to know the full range of talent regarding character sketches, pull two D&D sourcebooks out at random. You'll probably get a decent scope.
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Actually, just pull one: The Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting. Some art looks professional and absolutely gorgeous, while other looks like it was drawn by a blind-folded moose. With the shakes.