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PHIL BRODIE BAND'S FUN PAGE . . ENJOY
updated
for July 2010
. .AMAZING
FACTS AND LOTS OF USELESS INFORMATION !! NEW
ONE EVERY MONTH unless I am away or PC is in a mood If you would like
to contribute to this page I am only an email
away.
Did You Know . .
. ???
*The
oldest known written fairy tales stem from ancient Egypt, c. 1300 BC ,
eg The Tale of Two Brothers, and fairy tales appear in written literature
throughout literate cultures, as in The Golden Ass, which includes Cupid
and Psyche, Roman, 100200 AD, or the Panchatantra, India 3rd century
BCE, but it is unknown to what extent these reflect the actual folk tales
even of their own time.
*In 1937 brothers Dick and Mac McDonald
open a hamburger stand called "The Airdrome" at the airport
in Monrovia, California.
On May 15th
1940 the McDonalds
opened their first McDonald's restaurant, on U.S. Route 66, at 14th and
E St. In 1972, The McDonald's system generated $1 billion in sales through
2200 restaurants; in
1980 the 6000th McDonald's restaurant opened in Munich, Germany; by 2009
McDonalds had 31,000+ outlets worldwide.
*A World Toilet Summit has been
held every year since 2001; also in 2001, the World Toilet Organization
aka WTO, declared
its founding day, November 19th,
as World Toilet Day
(The venue for the 2010 World Toilet Summit has yet to be announced)
*In London on June 13th 2009 over
1,000 cyclists stripped off to take part in the World Naked Bike Ride.
The sixth annual protest against oil dependency and car culture saw riders
stage nude rallies in more than 40 locations around the world. In London,
the naked cyclists, some painted with anti-oil slogans, followed a six-mile
(10km) route from Hyde Park Corner past the Houses of Parliament and through
the West End.
*In the United Kingdom, where the
use of scarecrows as a protector of crops dates from time immemorial,
they are called a Mommet in Somerset, Murmet in Devon, Hodmedod in Berkshire,
Tattie bogle or Bodach-rocais in Scotland and a Bwbach in Wales
*American jockey
Eddie Arcaro, who won more American Classic Races than any other jockey
in history and is the only rider to have won the U.S. Triple Crown twice,
rode 250 losers before winning his first race. (In 1962, he
ended his career having competed in 24,092 races and having won 4,779
with record setting earnings of $30,039,543.)
*Except that
the word kyanos (cyan) was used for dark blue enamel, the Ancient
Greek lacked a word for blue and Homer called the colour of the sea "wine
dark"
*
'Allegedly' the earliest identified
use of the exact phrase "the
whole 9 yards"
dates from 1942, in the Investigation of the National
Defense Program: Hearings Before a Special Committee Investigating the
National Defense Program, by Admiral Emory Scott Land, who said "You
have to increase from 7.72 to 12 for the average at the bottom of that
fifth column, for the whole nine yards". This use refers to the total
output statistics for the nine new shipyards that produced "Liberty
Ships" with unprecedented speed, crucial to the course of World War
II. I don't know what gave rise to the phrase.
*
The most frequently
quoted explaination of the term "the whole 9 yards" came from
WWII fighter pilots in the South Pacific. When arming their airplanes
on the ground, the .50 caliber machine gun ammo belts measured exactly
27 feet, before being loaded into the fuselage. If the pilots fired all
their ammo at a target, it got "the whole 9 yards."
There
are several claims for this phrase.
The
yard is quite an old measurement.
*The
whole 9 yards... In early
Scotland, a gentleman wore a kilt. There were two types of kilts, one
for casual wear, and one for formal affairs. The formal one took 9 yards
of tarten. The tailor would inquire to which kilt was needed, and the
reply
if it was for a formal one was Ill take the whole
9 yards
This one could be fairly old.
*When looking at statues of a person
on a horse, if the horse has both front hooves in the air, the person
died in battle. If the horse has one front hoof in the air the person
died as a result of wounds received in battle. If the horse has all four
hooves on the ground, the person died of natural causes. This
is a myth .. shame really, I like the idea.
*Out of 268 stations, there are
only two stations on the London Underground that have all five vowels
in them - Mansion House and South Ealing.
(year 2009)
*A scallop has 35 eyes and they
are all blue. Their
eyes can't see shapes, but can detect light and motion.
*Some 30% of local residents in
Shanghai say cycling is their main means of transport and 60% of locals
pedal to work every day. With the possible exception of China, the Netherlands
boasts more bicycles per capita than any other country - at least 16-million
bikes for the 16-million Dutch. Roughly 30% of all urban trips in the
Netherlands are on bicycles, compared with 2% in the UK.
*Their are at least 250,000 species
of insects constituting the order Coleoptera or beetles, making it the
largest order in the animal kingdom. Among
the approximately 5,000 widely distributed beetles of the family Coccinellidae
is the Ladybird; the name originated in the Middle Ages, when this little
beetle was dedicated to the Virgin Mary and called "beetle of Our
Lady".
*In the nursery rhyme Jack and Jill
, Jack represented the French King, Louis XVI who "Lost his Crown"
in the Revolution, while Jill who (or rather her head) came tumbling after,
was Marie Antoinette
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