I think the best way to learn is by absorbing as many useless and interesting facts as possible. Sure, they don’t usually help you get jobs, or boost your chances on acing a pop quiz , but you’re still broadening your mind.
Take a look at these interesting (albeit random ) images, and you may learn a thing or two. And who knows; some of it may be useful.
“Abandoned Yellow Brick Road in North Carolina.”
In case you’re deep into Wizard of Oz trivia, I’m guessing you’ve probably never seen this before. But at one point, there was a fully operational amusement park based on the movie called Land of Oz, which just so happened to be in Beech Mountain , NC.
It’s open for tours these days, but it’s an otherwise empty amusement park.
“Skull and helmet of a Greek soldier, who fell in the Battle of Marathon around 2500 years ago.”
The one thing about ancient Greeks is that they were really good at recording history. This soldier was part of the battle of Marathon, which happened sometime in 490 BCE.
Only 192 Athenian soldiers died in that battle, and were all buried in the same mound . This guy was one of them. Cool!
“27 Years Ago, Jeff Bezos started a book store called Relentless.”
Before Amazon became the corporate giant we know it to be today, it went through several name changes. It first started out as Relentless, which is a domain name Bezos has owned since 1994. Fun fact, if you type relentless.com into a search bar, it’ll automatically redirect you to Amazon.
According to Business Insider , other potential names for Amazon included Awake, Bookmail, and Browse.
“The US – Mexican border.”
Unless you live in a border town, or you go across the border into Mexico a lot, you’ve probably never seen what the border really looks like. And it sure is interesting, the way the U.S. side has so many buildings, while the Mexico side isn’t nearly as sprawling.
I wonder who decided to put such large American cities right at the border?
“The evolution between my final take on an origami portrait compared to my first attempt. Practice makes perfect as we say.”
The latest one is the one on the left, while the right picture is the first attempt. If you look closely, you can see the outline of a person’s face, back, and shoulder.
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And it’s so cool! I didn’t know you could make paper do that. I swear, art can be anything.
“Morrison’s shelter in WW2 UK used to protect from air raids while sleeping.”
When I learned about WWII in school, I didn’t learn about these. But apparently, this was one of many shelters people in London could buy to help protect themselves from bombings. As claustrophobic as they look, they also seem pretty durable, so they were probably responsible for saving many lives.
“Human visual colour spectrum vs. that of a dog.”
There’s a misconception that dogs can only see in black and white. They can actually see some color , though. Mainly blue and yellow tones. They’re colorblind by our standards, but like colorblind people, they can still see some parts of the rainbow.
It kind of sucks, knowing that our dogs are missing out on so many pretty things. Then again, they probably don’t care.
“A sari that costs more than a Mercedes Benz car!!”
Reddit user sritalks, who posted this photo to the website, says that this gorgeous sari was hand woven and made of pure silk. It also has a bunch of different precious stones woven into it, including “gold, diamond, platinum, silver, rubies, emeralds, yellow sapphires, blue sapphires, cat’s eyes, topazes, pearls and corals.”
It costs about 5 million rupees, which is the equivalent of $75k!
“I recently found out spring onions have flowers!”
I mean, it makes sense that plants like spring onions and garlic have flowers. But you never see the flowers in the store, so unless you grow your own, how are you to know? I’m not sure what I’ll ever do with this kind of knowledge, but I’m glad I know now.
“Found this while cleaning out a box in the attic.”
I for sure didn’t know that a book like this could ever exist. No, it doesn’t tell you how to do anything illegal (so don’t ask!). It’s about herbal remedies and stuff like that. Things that can improve your health naturally. Whoever titled the book sure did have a sense of humor, though.
“The First Quarter Moon captured from my own backyard!”
Now this is an awesome closeup of the moon during one of its phases!
When we see a First Quarter moon (a half moon), or any other phase for that matter we usually can’t see the dark part because the sun isn’t shining on it. But, I mean, it’s still there. You just have to look a little closer.
“The claw of a male southern cassowary compared to a human hand.”
I guess because we’re constantly surrounded by animals that are smaller than us (rodents, cats, most dog breeds), it’s easy to forget that big old animals exist, too.
A cassowary is a flightless Australian bird that’s hailed as the most dangerous bird in the world . They can kick. Real hard. So watch out.
“A hedgehogs skeleton.”
Today, I learned that hedgehog quills are made of the same stuff our hair and fingernails are made of: keratin . They’re pretty sturdy, too, and hedgehogs can have around 6000 of them on their bodies.
…But. Their quills aren’t bones. So I guess this technically isn’t part of its skeleton per se…
“A House built on a small room.”
This house reminds me of all the weird buildings I used to make in the Sims as a kid (and the weird buildings I make in the Sims as an adult). It at least looks sturdy, so it has that going for it.
But it would be so weird living in a house like that.
“A barge on a canal crossing over a boat on a river.”
Whoa, how cool! A canal that passes over a river. It’s basically like having a river on top of another river.
If you were wondering, this canal is in Germany, and is called the Minden Aqueduct . The bridge has existed since 1914, but got a couple of redesigns. The most recent iteration opened in 1998.
“It was the gold light of the sunset coming into the cave at just the right angle to light up this section of ice.”
I guess it makes sense that ice can do that, but I’ve never seen it do that before. Which is super impressive! It gives the appearance of a giant, glowing rock.
The picture was taken in a cave in Iceland, which is totally unsurprising given how otherworldly that entire country looks.
“This behemoth pinecone…”
I’m willing to bet you’ve never seen a pinecone this big before. And if you have, I really want to know what kind of life you live to have seen one.
It’s hard to tell, but based on the size, this could be either one of two things: either it’s the pinecone of a Coulter pine , or it’s a Pokemon. Nothing in between.
“They made a warning sign specifically for bicyclists crossing train tracks.”
Now there’s a sign they probably didn’t teach you about in driving school. Not that it would really matter, since it’s pretty straightforward. The road is uneven thanks to the train tracks, which could be dangerous to an unwitting cyclist. It was really nice of them to warn people.
“Unabomber (Ted Kaczynski) wore shoes with fake soles to hide his true shoe size when he was committing crimes.”
The Unabomber is a pretty notorious criminal. It took the FBI years to track him down and finally put him behind bars. And he did a lot of horrific things, too.
But here’s one fact I definitely didn’t know. I guess the fact that he evaded the authorities for so long is a result of his ability to hide his identity.
“Outgrowing its cage.”
Trees have a nasty habit of engulfing things they have no right to engulf. Then again, it serves us right for encroaching on their territory. Trees need space, and they’ll take that space one way or another, so it seems.
I’ve seen trees swallow plenty of things, but nothing quite like this.
