Today I learned...

RakshaMK
Try being 4'10", obese with neck and shoulder problems and 2 arthritic knees! So many impossibilities! You never truly appreciate being young, slender and fit until you're not any of those!

Shelflife

shysal I too am reading Where the Crawdads Sing and had to Google Crawdads. An amazing story so beautifully written! Had no idea crayfish were vocal !

They cannot sing, the title comes from a saying the girls mother used when she told her to go as far as you can way out yonder where the crawdads sing. I guess it meant go someplace far from the world deep in the swamps where anything can happen..... maybe

I heard that lobsters whistling in boiling water is caused by air escaping, but it does sound rather horrible!

I learned today how naive I was being to imagine one rehearsal would be enough to perfect my year three’s Easter service before they are let loose to perform it in front of their grownups on Friday!

Treetops05 used to work as an amanuensis. I hope the job she did was not connected with anything haruspical!

I learned today that there is a button in the car [2nd hand Honda Jazz] that turns both wing mirrors inward when I've parked the car. We've had the car 4 months and still haven't worked out all the digital gizmos. The automatic full beam frightened the life out of me the first time it happened. Something new every day.

Sorry - typo (I changed it to make it more understandable!)

Your mother carried you, your eggs were formed when you were in your mother's womb, so she carried you whilst you were carrying your future babies.

Daddima

winterwhite

Please could you unpack your post about eggs (human) for me MS?

It was one mothering sunday (not Christmas) when I learned very very belatedly that marzipan can be bought ready made. What a game changer.

And me! I don’t understand where the grandchildren eggs come in. I know I was born with all the eggs I would ever need.

And they were formed when you were in your mother's womb, so she carried you whilst you were who carrying your future babies.

winterwhite

Please could you unpack your post about eggs (human) for me MS?

It was one mothering sunday (not Christmas) when I learned very very belatedly that marzipan can be bought ready made. What a game changer.

And me! I don’t understand where the grandchildren eggs come in. I know I was born with all the eggs I would ever need.

Please could you unpack your post about eggs (human) for me MS?

It was one mothering sunday (not Christmas) when I learned very very belatedly that marzipan can be bought ready made. What a game changer.

Today I learned that married men live longer than single men and married women have shorter lifespans than single women.

Married men have longer lifespans because of their wives making them go to the doctor and nagging them about their driving.

Married women live shorter lifespans due to the chronic stress of stopping their husbands unaliving themselves

Today I learned that Hot Cross Buns have nothing at all to do with Easter; they've been around for thousands of years and the cross on top doesn't refer to the Crucifixion as it's the wrong shape. The buns are thought to date back to pagan times and the cross which divides the bun into four and which is more like a plus-sign is more likely to signify the four seasons. And also that the word Easter never appears in the Bible; Good Friday doesn't have anything to do with Easter; when we talk about Easter Saturday we should in fact be calling it Easter Eve and the Easter Week starts on Easter Sunday and runs through to the real Easter Saturday.

Guess what I've been to a talk on today!

How anyone thinks it's acceptable to boil sea creatures alive to eat baffles me. I find it terribly upsetting.

Berwick upon Tweed, the bonny borders town which I'm currently visiting, has changed hands 13 times between English and Scottish rule. In its day, it was one of the most wealthy merchant towns in England.

Yes, they are and the Aussies do tend to call a spade a shovel, a lovely garden a back yard etc.

Callistemon21

Fleurpepper

Only in some parts of the USA Calli.

I really wouldn't fancy eating a crawdad!
😁

Similar crustaceans are known as bugs in Australia.
Equally offputting

I love Morton Bay Bugs, so tasty.

Today I learned that a ‘tester’ is a canopy over a four-poster bed. The answer to a crossword clue from yesterday -‘canopy’ - which I couldn’t solve, was revealed today by the answers to yesterday’s crossword in the i newspaper. Knowing this will be no use to me unless the next time I am touring a stately home and in a grand bedroom I can point to the tester and say “That canopy is called a ‘tester’ you know”.

A fact that I’ve known for a long time but still fascinates me is the fact that I carried the eggs of my grandchildren.
That’s because a female foetus is born with all the eggs she will ever need.

Mollygo

I learned that a blue butterfly larva can trick its way into an ant colony and eat its hosts as a thank you.

Yes, wasn't that brilliant!!

grandtanteJE65

Callistemon21

I learnt that, as soon as the clocks go forward, the flies come out. They must hatch out on the first sunny day.

Poor you!

Here as soon as the clocks were put forward it started snowing, so we haven't any flies yet.

All disappeared into the crocodile now - sorry, the Dyson!

It's the bees next, they make a beeline (sorry) for the conservatory and I try to rescue every one.

I learned that a blue butterfly larva can trick its way into an ant colony and eat its hosts as a thank you.

I learnt what the word “Contrapposta” means
( to stand with one leg bent forward at the knee and your weight on the other leg). Lots of statutes do this

I've today learned that my puzzle/worry/frustration about all the clocks in the house going wrong was because no one reminded me that the clocks should be put forward this weekend!

lizzypopbottle

I don't/won't eat anything with more than four legs or fewer than two (although I do eat certain fish). I think it's my mother's ingrained example of shuddering at the sight of insects, spiders, slugs and worms. I'm not scared of them, although I do have a slight aversion to spiders if they invade my home, but eating them doesn't appeal so no lobster, crab, prawns, shrimps, hard shell shellfish, or crawdads etc. I remember, with a mother-like shudder, my grandad eating cockles from a jar, with a pin. I also remember the rotten, dead crabs my children used to present after finding them washed up on the beach. The way marine pollution is going, I'm probably quite sensible.

OP I look up definitions of previously unknown words that I find in books I'm reading. I try to use them in a sentence but some of them are so obscure I can't find a sensible way, (I'm re-reading Reginald Hill's Dalziel and Pascoe series. He sprinkles them liberally). Here are some examples:

haruspical - relating to or having the characteristics of an haruspex.... Hmm...
amanuensis - a literary or artistic assistant, in particular one who takes dictation or copies manuscripts

haruspex
noun
noun: haruspex; plural noun: haruspices

(in ancient Rome) a religious official who interpreted omens by inspecting the entrails of sacrificial animals.

Nice! Not!

Treetops05

Sorry, no idea where that symbol appeared from - I meant special...

You probably pressed the "s" too long, and got the German double s as a result.