12 Farm-Fresh Trivia Tidbits for Sunday, October 20, 2024
The Largest-Ever Sex-Crime-Related Donation on Behalf of a Catholic Archdiocese
The Archdiocese of Los Angeles will pay $880 million to settle sex abuse claims, the largest-ever payment by a single archdiocese. Hooray?
Climate Change Is Coming for Halloween
Economists expect non-chocolate candy to be the lion’s share of candy purchases, if not this Halloween then in the near future. Chocolate prices have jumped 40 percent over the last four years, mainly due to consistent bad weather in West Africa where most cocoa plants are farmed.
An 81-Year-Old Cast Her First-Ever Vote for Horrifying Reasons
It’s being treated as a feel-good story for some reason, but a Georgia woman just voted for the first time in her long life because her husband had always forbidden her from doing it. He’s dead now, so, that’s nice.
One Megastructure Is Projected to Use 20 Percent of the World’s Steel
Neom, the metropolis being planned in the Saudi desert that includes a 100-mile-long single-building city, is banking on using one-fifth of the world’s steel to get over the finish line. Just a master class in sustainability through and through.
Dubai’s Flat-Ass Skyscraper
The designs for Dubai’s Muraba Veil tower were just unveiled, showing a 1,200-foot-high tower that’s only 73 feet wide. The similarly-sized Empire State Building is 187 feet wide.
One Part of Rihanna’s ‘SOS’ Is 100 Percent Easter Eggs
Evan Gobart, who wrote “SOS,” revealed that the entire second verse is just a list of other song titles: “Take On Me,” “Take Me On,” “Head Over Heels.” Every line is the title of a #1 hit from the ‘80s, because he thought it would be “super clever.”
Three Babies Have Been Born on the Golden Gate Bridge
It’s statistically unlikely, but all three babies who were born in traffic hovering over frigid waters have been boys.
The First OG U.S. Constitution to Be Sold in Over a Century
In 2022, someone found only the eighth known original copy of the Constitution, stuffed in the back of a filing cabinet in North Carolina. That copy just sold at auction for $9 million. The last time one of these was sold, it went for $400 in 1891.
America’s Newest National Park
West Virginia’s New River Gorge was established as a National River in 1978, but became the newest National Park designation in 2020.
‘Smart’ Insulin Can Turn Itself On and Off
Scientists have developed a synthetic insulin that can detect blood sugar levels, and activate or deactivate itself depending on the need.
Does Blowing on Hot Food Actually Cool It Down?
A little bit! A highly scientific (YouTube) study found that a plate of instant mashed potatoes that had been blown on would be 15 to 18 degrees cooler after two minutes than a plate that had been sitting unblown.
Big Tech Is Driving Modern Science
Three Google-linked researchers received Nobel Prizes this year, for research related to A.I. It’s not a great sign that a company with that much money and lobbying power, and so few scruples, is the gatekeeper to the future of human knowledge of the universe.