{"id":53703,"date":"2017-12-24T17:06:27","date_gmt":"2017-12-25T01:06:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/?p=53703"},"modified":"2017-12-24T17:06:27","modified_gmt":"2017-12-25T01:06:27","slug":"weekly-wrap-volume-171","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/index.php\/2017\/12\/weekly-wrap-volume-171\/","title":{"rendered":"Weekly Wrap Volume 171"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"pf-content\"><div class=\"highlighter\">This is a weekly wrap of our popular Daily Knowledge Newsletter.\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/todayifoundout.us5.list-manage.com\/subscribe?u=1b41057449af09fd2f4481595&amp;id=cfe94f6138&amp;group[7741][1]=true&amp;group[7741][2]=true\" target=\"_blank\">You can get that newsletter for free here<\/a>.<\/div>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-thumbnail wp-image-53620\" src=\"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/UFO2-150x150.png\" alt=\"UFO2\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" srcset=\"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/UFO2-150x150.png 150w, http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/UFO2-90x90.png 90w, http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/UFO2-75x75.png 75w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 150px) 100vw, 150px\" \/><a href=\"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/index.php\/2017\/12\/weve-pronouncing-word-ufo-wrong\/\">Apparently We Have All Been Saying &#8220;UFO&#8221; Wrong?<\/a><\/p>\n<p>We here at TodayIFoundOut are firmly in the camp that language is constantly evolving and grammar lives to serve language and effective communication, not the other way around. Putting aside the issue of unintentional mistakes, intentional use of atypical grammar isn\u2019t really something to get inherently upset or high and mighty about. And certainly those who claim some word, like \u201cirregardless\u201c, isn\u2019t actually a word are never correct -all words are words from the moment someone first coins them, at least according to pretty much every major dictionary editor out there. (More on this in one of my favorite articles from the past year on&#8230;(<a href=\"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/index.php\/2017\/12\/weve-pronouncing-word-ufo-wrong\/\">more<\/a>)<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-thumbnail wp-image-53645\" src=\"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/kevin-bacon-150x150.png\" alt=\"kevin-bacon\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" srcset=\"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/kevin-bacon-150x150.png 150w, http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/kevin-bacon-90x90.png 90w, http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/kevin-bacon-75x75.png 75w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 150px) 100vw, 150px\" \/><a href=\"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/index.php\/2017\/12\/origins-six-degrees-kevin-bacon\/\">Who Invented the Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon Game?<\/a><\/p>\n<p>The basic premise of any person being within six degrees of relationship to each other traces back to at least 1929, mentioned in the short story \u201cChain-Links\u201d from the book Everything is Different, by Hungarian author Frigyes Karinthy. In the story, Karinthy was putting forth the idea that, with advances in technology, despite vast distances between people and the growing world population, the world was actually shrinking from an interconnectedness standpoint- a trend that would no doubt only continue over time. As such, a game is proposed in the story as follows&#8230;(<a href=\"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/index.php\/2017\/12\/origins-six-degrees-kevin-bacon\/\">more<\/a>)<\/p>\n<p><strong>This Week\u2019s YouTube Videos<\/strong><strong>\u00a0(<a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/user\/TodayIFoundOut?sub_confirmation=1\">Click to Subscribe<\/a>)<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=1MJPiHctEYs&amp;t=172s\">Margaret Thatcher and Her Frugal Ways<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=_qFfzGK-ImE\">That Time a 61 Year Old Farmer Won One of the World&#8217;s Most Grueling Athletic\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 Competitions<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=gSeqGL-CZ_c\">Is the Happiest Man in China Photo Real or Fake?<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=ZuV_mTQrSA0\">That Time a Guy Won the Lotto a Second Time Reenacting His First Win for the\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 Press<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=njPdhNKhZY8\">Forgotten History: The Remarkable Walter Hunt and His World Changing\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 Inventions<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=oyjaUMbfaac\">The Truth About the Origin of the Candy Cane<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=XcpgmzHVc1E\">What Ever Happened to Everyone&#8217;s Friend MySpace Tom?<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong><span id=\"bonusfacts\">Bonus<\/span> Quick Facts:<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>If you\u2019re looking for a traditional Christmas dinner in Japan, you have to look no further than your local KFC, where this is the Christmas dinner of choice for the majority in the Land of the Rising Sun. According to KFC, this particular unusual Christmas tradition dates back to the 1970s when supposedly a customer at the chain\u2019s Aoyama store observed that, in a land bereft of the customary turkey for a celebratory dinner, fried chicken was the next best thing. This idea eventually percolated up to the corporate offices of KFC and prompted the company to start a huge advertising campaign in Japan called \u201cKurisumasu ni wa kentakkii!\u201d (Kentucky for Christmas!) in 1974, which became ludicrously popular thanks to this campaign and the popularity of American culture in Japan at the time.<\/li>\n<li>The song Silver Bells was originally titled Tinkle Bells, first appearing in \u201cThe Lemon Drop Kid,\u201d a 1951 film starring Bob Hope. Needless to say, these two things would have surely resulted in the song getting a few chuckles had composer Jay Livingston\u2019s wife, Lynne Gordon, not stepped in. Said the co-composer of the song Ray Evans, \u201cWe never thought that tinkle had a double meaning until Jay went home and his wife said, \u2018Are you out of your mind? Do you know what the word tinkle is?\u2019\u201d (Of course, referring to the fact that it is another word for urination often used with kids.)<\/li>\n<li>Mistletoe tends to spring from bird droppings that have fallen on trees, with the seeds having passed through the digestive tract of birds. From this, it should come as no surprise that the name \u201cmistle\u201d or \u201cmissel\u201d meant \u201cdung\u201d and \u201ctoe,\u201d which came from the Anglo-Saxon \u201ctan,\u201d meant \u201ctwig.\u201d Thus, mistletoe is another way to essentially say \u201cpoop twig.\u201d Not only is mistletoe a poop twig, but most varieties of this plant are partial parasites, being unable to fully sustain themselves via photosynthesis, so they leach what they need from the particular tree they are growing on. Nothing like finding one\u2019s true love kissing under a parasitic poop twig\u2026<\/li>\n<li>While Arnold Schwarzenegger is best known for his acting and his work while Governor of California, he was actually remarkably successful even before any of that. Before he was thirty, he\u2019d already served in the army, won numerous body building competitions, while simultaneously going to business school and working at a health club. Once he immigrated to America, he continued to compete in bodybuilding competitions while also starting a bricklaying business, which he then used the profits from to start a mail-order business selling fitness related products like workout instructional materials. He then used the profits from that and his winnings in body building competitions to start a real estate investing business, ultimately making him a millionaire in his 20s, long before his breakthrough role at the age of 35 in the 1982 Conan the Barbarian.<\/li>\n<li>Former New York Herald publisher James Gordon Bennett, Jr. once owned a 300 ft. yacht, the $635,000 ($17.8 million today) Lysistrata built by William Denny &amp; Son of Dumbarton, Scotland. Among many other luxuries, the yacht included a padded stall for a cow, so he\u2019d always have fresh milk, cream, and butter while he was at sea.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Other Interesting Stuff<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-thumbnail wp-image-53712\" src=\"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/12-days-of-christmas-340x486-150x150.png\" alt=\"12-days-of-christmas-340x486\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" srcset=\"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/12-days-of-christmas-340x486-150x150.png 150w, http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/12-days-of-christmas-340x486-90x90.png 90w, http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/12-days-of-christmas-340x486-75x75.png 75w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 150px) 100vw, 150px\" \/><a href=\"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/index.php\/2016\/12\/making-sense-holiday-song-12-days-christmas\/\">Making Sense of the &#8220;12 Days of Christmas&#8221;<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Even the most ardent fans of Christmas will agree \u2013 the song \u201cThe Twelve Days of Christmas\u201d does not make a whole lot of sense. What is a partridge doing in a pear tree? Partridges are ground-nesting birds! So where did perhaps the most earworm inducing Christmas song in history come from, and why are there twelve days in it, instead of just one? To begin with, while most people today only celebrate one day of Christmas, the holiday actually is supposed to encompass twelve days for many religious groups. While the exact days differ depending on the sect of Christianity, for most, the holiday begins on December 25th (Jesus\u2019s birth) and ends on January 6th, which is known as the \u201cEpiphany.\u201d In between there are three feasts to&#8230;(<a href=\"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/index.php\/2016\/12\/making-sense-holiday-song-12-days-christmas\/\">more<\/a>)<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-thumbnail wp-image-53686\" src=\"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/christmas-bird-150x150.png\" alt=\"christmas-bird\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" srcset=\"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/christmas-bird-150x150.png 150w, http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/christmas-bird-340x340.png 340w, http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/christmas-bird-768x768.png 768w, http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/christmas-bird-640x640.png 640w, http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/christmas-bird-90x90.png 90w, http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/christmas-bird-75x75.png 75w, http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/christmas-bird.png 2000w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 150px) 100vw, 150px\" \/><a href=\"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/index.php\/2017\/12\/christmas-bird-count\/\">The Bird Count<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Frank Chapman was an ornithologist, publisher of Bird-Lore magazine, and curator of birds at New York City\u2019s American Museum of Natural History at the turn of the 20th century. He enjoyed Christmas as much as anyone, but there was one yuletide tradition he abhorred: \u201cside hunts,\u201d in which groups of people divided into teams and spent the day roaming the countryside shooting every animal they came across. The hunted included rabbits, foxes, squirrels, and plenty of birds. Not for food\u2014hardly any animals were eaten\u2014but for sport. At the end of the day each team counted their kills, and the team that had the most animals was the winner. Chapman wanted to come up with a replacement for the side hunts that wouldn\u2019t involve the pointless slaughter of so many animals, especially birds. Why not count&#8230;(<a href=\"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/index.php\/2017\/12\/christmas-bird-count\/\">more<\/a>)<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-thumbnail wp-image-53714\" src=\"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/Krampus-150x150.jpg\" alt=\"Krampus\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" srcset=\"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/Krampus-150x150.jpg 150w, http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/Krampus-90x90.jpg 90w, http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/Krampus-75x75.jpg 75w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 150px) 100vw, 150px\" \/><a href=\"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/index.php\/2014\/12\/krampus-christmas-demon\/\">Krampus, the Christmas Demon<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Santa Claus has long been the symbol of Christmas, bringing joy and presents to all the good girls and boys. But if you are child in Germany, Austria, and other parts of the Alps region, there may be something much more dark, mischievous, and grumpy hidden in the shadows next to dear old St. Nick. That something is Krampus, the Christmas demon. A beast-like creature with fangs, fur, and horns, Krampus announces his presence with loud bells and terrorizes the kids who have been naughty during the year. While Santa gives the good ones gifts and joy, Krampus gives the bad ones beatings with a&#8230;(<a href=\"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/index.php\/2014\/12\/krampus-christmas-demon\/\">more<\/a>)<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-thumbnail wp-image-53715\" src=\"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/Christmas-truce-340x239-150x150.jpg\" alt=\"Christmas-truce-340x239\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" srcset=\"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/Christmas-truce-340x239-150x150.jpg 150w, http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/Christmas-truce-340x239-90x90.jpg 90w, http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/Christmas-truce-340x239-75x75.jpg 75w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 150px) 100vw, 150px\" \/><a href=\"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/index.php\/2012\/12\/december-24-1914-the-christmas-truce\/\">December 24, 1914: The Christmas Truce<\/a><\/p>\n<p>On the whole, people don\u2019t generally like to kill one another. Most wars throughout history are often more about the agendas of the state\u2019s leaders than the soldiers on the field actually inherently feeling any real malice towards those they are asked to try to kill or otherwise defeat. Few events in history illustrate this as well as a remarkable episode that took place during WWI when, despite the orders of their commanding officers and leaders, the soldiers threw aside their weapons, got out of the trenches and had a make-shift Christmas party with those that just hours before they\u2019d been trying to kill. This momentous event has become known as The Christmas Truce&#8230;(<a href=\"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/index.php\/2012\/12\/december-24-1914-the-christmas-truce\/\">more<\/a>)<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-thumbnail wp-image-53716\" src=\"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/Reindeer-340x227-150x150.png\" alt=\"Reindeer-340x227\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" srcset=\"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/Reindeer-340x227-150x150.png 150w, http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/Reindeer-340x227-90x90.png 90w, http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/Reindeer-340x227-75x75.png 75w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 150px) 100vw, 150px\" \/><a href=\"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/index.php\/2016\/12\/real-reindeer-became-associated-christmas\/\">The Very Real Reindeer and How They Became Associated With Christmas<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Unlike Santa, elves or even clean coal, reindeer are real. They may not fly, but there\u2019s a good deal of truth around the many myths of Christmas\u2019s favorite animal. Yes, they do live in extremely cold conditions. Yes, they are known to pull sleds. And, yes, their noses really do turn a shade of red given the right conditions. First off, caribou and reindeer essentially are the same animal and are classified as the same species (Rangifer tarandus). They are also both part of the deer family, or cervidae, which also includes deer, elk and moose. However, there are subtle differences. \u201cReindeer\u201d is often used to describe the domesticated animals, the ones that are herded&#8230;(<a href=\"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/index.php\/2016\/12\/real-reindeer-became-associated-christmas\/\">more<\/a>)<\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This is a weekly wrap of our popular Daily Knowledge Newsletter.\u00a0You can get that newsletter for free here. Apparently We Have All Been Saying &#8220;UFO&#8221; Wrong? We here at TodayIFoundOut are firmly in the camp that language is constantly evolving and grammar lives to serve language and effective communication, not the other way around. Putting aside the issue of unintentional [&#8230;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":183,"featured_media":53620,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,646],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-53703","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-today-i-found-out","category-most-popular"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53703","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/183"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=53703"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53703\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":53729,"href":"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53703\/revisions\/53729"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/53620"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=53703"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=53703"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=53703"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}