h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I'd like to add an addendum though:

"Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night [nor maddeningly pointless and completely unnecessary government shutdown] stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds."

Way to go guys.

Fact or folklore?

Ford, made the first pick-up trucks, so called because
they shipped them to dealers in crates that the new owners
had to assemble using the crates as the beds of the trucks.
The new owners had to go to the dealers to get them, thus
they had to "pick-up" the trucks.


~jwf~

I think that that is an interesting piece of folklore, jwf.

B.B. King named his guitar Lucille after a woman he never met.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EGsvAMRFivo





TL;DW: At a nightclub where he was playing, two men got into a fight over a girl named Lucille. While fighting, the two men caught the club on fire. He realized he left his guitar in the building and ran back in for it and nearly died. The name Lucille reminds him never to do anything like that again.

Giles Mompesson was possibly the worst ever English MP. He was elected for the constituency of Greater Bedwyn in 1614 and 1621, but was fined, expelled from Parliament and told to parade up the Strand "with his face in a horse's anus" for abusing his royal monopoly for the licensing of inns and manufacture of gold thread.

Oh, there are several folks I'd like to see ordered to do the same.

Ferinstance, since we can't seem to be able to jail any bankers, could we at least have those CEOs who received large bonuses while they banks they ran into the ground got federal bailouts do this?

Steady on chaps, think of how the horse might feel about this. Mind you if we take 'horse's anus' in its perjorative sense would that make a 'daisy chain' of bankers?

A Human CEOntipede?

~jwf~

The background music for those anti-piracy ads often seen on DVDs and Blu-Ray discs, the ones the state, "You wouldn't steal a car...", was stolen.

Source: http://www.abc.net.au/science/articles/2013/01/29/3678851.htm

Scroll through the Comments section:


~*~
leopatross :

30 Jan 2013 12:44:24pm

Following a little twitter exchange, I believe there's a correction to be made to the story.

Mostly, "Piracy - it's a crime" the "you wouldn't steal a ..." video created in part by the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) was announced on 27 July 2004 on the Singapore Government site. see here: http://web.archive.org/web/20041211213308/http://www.ipos.gov.sg/main/newsroom/media_rel/mediarelease1_270704.html

You can see from that media release that it is describing the video we are familiar with. A copy of the video was uploaded to youtube on May 4 2006. which confirms that this video is the one we are familiar with, and has the music discussed in the opening paragraphs above at that time. Youtube link here: http://youtu.be/K_vHwfDNGdg

It is highly unlikely then that the "Piracy - it's a crime" video to be the video misused as Reitveldt states he wasn't approached to do the music for the local film festival until 2006.

So where does the myth that this video is the video in which BREIN used the work of Melchior Reitveldt without permission? It appears to come from the original english language story about this issue on torrentfreak.com http://torrentfreak.com/copyright-corruption-scandal-surrounds-anti-piracy-campaign-111201/

The article does not mention this video at all, and only discusses the misuse on dutch dvds. That story does include a screenshot of the "Piracy - it's a crime" video in a caption. It appears that from that picture many other sources assumed that that is the video being discussed. No mention of overseas dvds appear until the blogosphere got their hands on the story. It adds colour to the story, and allows for a few jokes but unfortunately doesn't have any other relevance. This is especially unfortunate for Melchior who would have been up for a lot more than 1 million euros!
~*~


*Referring to ABC News* ---> Fact checking is a lost art.

That makes it a totally useless fact

Good catch, Mr. X.

In 1379 a girl was born in Yorkshire called Diot Coke.

The oldest-known living bristlecone pine,
a type found in California, Nevada, and Utah,
is more than 4,700 years old.

It suddenly accrues to me that this fact might be
useful to someone with an Environmentalist agenda.
Not sure how, but they do have a way of making these
things sound important if not actually relevant to anything.
Then again I don't know how you tell a tree's age without
cutting it down or boring it to death.


~jwf~

4700 years? Meh, a mere blink of an eye.

In the Mediterranean, there's a giant sea grass that is estimated to be at least 12,000 years to 200,000 years old. Most likely it's around 100,000 years old. Since it reproduces asexually it is constantly cloning itself.

Yes, this is useful to environmentalists because shore development, pollution and global warming is threatening it.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/9066393/Ancient-seagrass-Oldest-living-thing-on-earth-discovered-in-Mediterranean-Sea.html


On a related note, the world's largest organism is a subterranean fungus under Oregon that could span 10 square kilometers. It's also rather old, between 2,400 and 8,650 years.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/strange-but-true-largest-organism-is-fungus/

I have a vague recollection of hearing about submarine organisms that divide their cells about every thousand years or so. So vague it's useless.

I think there are some jellyfish that could be considered immortal.

Ah yes, here it is. If stressed, it can revert its cells to a younger form and also clone itself in vast numbers.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/01/090130-immortal-jellyfish-swarm.html

On an unrelated note, JFK purchased 1,200 Petit Upmann Cuban cigars just before signing the 1962 trade embargo that outlaws the importation of Cuban products til this day.

http://www.irishcentral.com/roots/john-f-kennedy-snagged-1200-cuban-cigars-before-ordering-us-trade-embargo-on-cuba-video-139004464-237788511.html

Buzz Aldrin's mother's maiden name was Moon.