12 Trivia Tidbits for Friday, June 7, 2024
You can buy Pee-wee’s playhouse, dance on a clown’s grave or represent the great state of New Jersey from beyond the grave. The world is your oyster.
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Pee-wee’s Playhouse Is on Sale for $5 Million
Paul Reubens’ Los Feliz home — 1.4 acres on a hilltop with views of the Hollywood sign and Griffith Observatory — has been listed for $4,995,000.
This Website Can Determine Geographic Location Based on Shadow Size
ShadowFinderColab can guess where any given picture was taken, based on an object’s height, the length of its shadow and the date and time of the photo.
Montana’s 5-Star Fossil-Hunting Hotel
Montage Big Sky is a mountain resort that offers an eight-hour Dino Dig, which includes a helicopter excursion to the Wickens’ Ranch excavation site.
Loud Car Lovers Are, Clinically, Assholes
A study that compared people’s attitudes toward loud car exhausts with results from a psychological evaluation found that loud car lovers tended to score higher on the “psychopathy and sadism” scale.
Pontiac Built a Translucent Car in 1939
Pontiac debuted the Deluxe Six Plexiglas at the 1939 World’s Fair, and stuffed a model in the trunk to show off just how see-through their futuristic horseless carriage was.
What If We Unionized the Roblox IKEA?
IKEA is jumping on the trend of major retailers opening up digital stores in Roblox, and they’re looking for 10 new U.K. employees to serve digital meatballs in their fake store that doesn’t exist, for $16 per hour.
World Record Snail Carnage
Catalonia’s L’Aplec del Caragol festival fed visitors a record 15 tons of snails over three days this year.
New Jersey Wants to Elect the First Zombie Congressman
Donald Payne, a popular six-term Congressman from New Jersey, won the Democratic nomination because voters didn’t seem to notice that he had died a few weeks before voting began.
Tokyo’s Municipal Dating App
To combat Japan’s declining birth rate, Kyoto city officials are developing a dating app to match the 70 percent of singles who say they’re open to marriage, but aren’t actively seeking a partner. Users have to provide proof of singledom, proof of income and pledge that they want to get hitched.
Scientists Have Pinpointed a Mechanism Responsible for Opioid Addiction
It’s the same molecular process that occurs when you learn a new skill: Neurons are slathered with fat cells, which somehow helps signals zip through the brain faster.
Dance Upon a Clown’s Grave
Joseph Grimaldi was absolute top dawg when it came to clowning in the early 19th century. His burial site, which was later dedicated as Joseph Grimaldi Park, features a pair of macabre coffin-shaped musical installations. Stomping on different parts of the coffin produces different pitches.
A Cause for Climate Optimism
ScienceAlert has compiled a batch of recent positive climate news. Among the good news: 2023 saw a “tipping point” in renewable energy tech (and solar power in particular); the world’s demand for fossil fuels has begun to decline for the first time since the Industrial Revolution; and one study even saw signs that CO2 levels may have actually peaked in 2023.