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REAL DEALS HERE -- WIN BIG WITH THOUSANDS IN PRIZES + RackNerd's NEW YEAR OFFERS! (New Year 2024)
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I am fine. I have reached my last year's goals (I passed the exam), but work didn't do itself, so now I have a little bit of backlog to solve
And how are you? How did you meet the New Year?
A Tudor-era book was discovered hiding in plain sight.
In 2023, Alison Palmer saw a 16th-century prayer book—a Book of Hours published in 1527—at the University of Cambridge, and it looked very familiar … just like a book featured in a circa 1533 Hans Holbein portrait of Thomas Cromwell, chief advisor to Henry VIII (who sentenced Cromwell to death). A team of experts reviewed the evidence and concluded it was the same book in Cromwell's portrait. It was among the volumes left to Cromwell’s secretary, Ralph Sadleir, and it came to Cambridge through the wife of the secretary’s grandson. According to a press release, the bejeweled tome “is thought to be the only object from any Tudor portrait to survive to this day.” Catherine of Aragon and Anne Boleyn each owned their own edition of the book.
A document thought to be a forgery was shown to be the real deal.
Famous documents are occasionally found to be forgeries. In 2023, the opposite occurred. Graduate student and Mental Floss contributor Vanessa Braganza was perusing Harvard University’s Widener Library when she spotted a copy of The Countess of Pembroke’s Arcadia by Philip Sidney on the shelf. It was donated to Harvard in 1913 after businessman Harry Elkins Widener died on the Titanic and left behind his personal library. Elizabethan author and Philip Sidney’s sister Mary Sidney Herbert was thought to be the book’s original owner, but in the 1940s, Harvard’s rare books librarian William A. Jackson claimed it was a forgery. Harvard accepted his argument until 2023, when Braganza proved it really was from the 16th century. The university was pleased to hear it had owned an authentic piece of rare literature all along.
Good to see you @MrEd
WONDER WHEN CHEF WILL GET BACK...
hype hype hype!!!
RACKNERD PARTY 2024!!!
page 342
Is it a close person, or are you doing that "publicly"? Anyways, nice to see such events, people usualy are more selfish than think about others...
That is the way it is. Always something to do.
I'm good. I covered the OGF on New Years.
I live in a town of 320,000 people. 250,000 arrived by tour bus, 50,000 arrived by plane, and an unknown number arrived by car to spend New Years here. I figured we would watch the fireworks from the balcony instead of going out with that kind of crowd around.
February was once spelled with a double “u” and it means purification.
One of the first fun facts to know about February is that it is named after the Latin word “februum,” which means purification. This is because ancient Romans held purification rituals during the month.
February was once 23 days.
February could have been the shortest day of the year. The original length of February was 28 days, but it was later shortened to 23 days in order to make the calendar align better with the lunar cycle. Eventually, Julius Caesar added two extra months to the calendar and restored its original 28-day length. Now, February has 29 days every leap year.
The leap year is to align with the astronomical year.
Did you know that the phenomenon that occurs every four years is in fact a corrective measure? The actual number of days in a regular year is 365.2422 days long, and not 365 days. That is why the extra day is added to February, the shortest month, to balance out this discrepancy, and play catch up. So, each time we “leap”, we are trying to catch up with the Earth’s orbit.
You have to beat the odds to be a leaper.
According to the U.S. Census Bureau data, 205,000 people in the U.S. have a February 29 birthday. In translation, that means 0.07% of the population or a probability of 1 in 1,461. If you’re a leaper (leap-year baby), you have beaten the odds. However, that also means you may celebrate your actual birthday four times lesser than most people.
Women can propose to men during leap years.
Though women proposing to men may still be a little uncommon (but not radical), it has become a fun and lighthearted part of February lore in many cultures around the world. In some countries such as Finland and Denmark, it has evolved to allow women to propose on any day of a leap year, not just February 29. So, ladies, you don’t have to wait for a proposal when you can be the one popping the question.
LOL, I'm too old to be selfish. It is going to somebody who will use it.
Valentine’s Day comes from the Romans.
Valentine’s Day is a popular day all over the world. In America alone, 145 million Valentine’s Day cards are sent each year. However, it is believed that this day originated from the Roman festival of Lupercalia, which celebrated fertility and love.
Conservators found a hidden image under a René Magritte painting.
René Magritte’s 1943 painting The Fifth Season isn’t among his most lauded paintings, but as we discovered in 2023, it harbored a secret: Under the two men holding frames on a street was the image of a woman—possibly the artist’s wife. It was found by conservators at the Royal Museums of the Fine Arts of Belgium using infrared reflectography. If you look hard enough, you can find evidence of it in the painting.
Chipotle is testing a new robot.
In 2022, Chipotle introduced a chip-making robot named “Chippy,” and last year, we learned Chippy will have a friend: The company announced that they’re currently testing a robot named “Autocado,” which slices, cores, and peels avocados so human employees don’t have to. It could potentially cut the time it takes to make a batch of guacamole in half, so consider this a win for people behind and in front of the counter.
An iOS update finally got rid of that ducking autocorrect.
We’ve all been there: You’re on your iPhone, typing out a heated text complete with f-bomb, when that f-bomb morphs into the d word: duck. But in fall 2023, Apple finally issued an autocorrect update in iOS17. As Craig Federighi, Apple’s senior vice president of software engineering, put it, “In those moments where you just want to type a ducking word, well, the keyboard will learn it.”
February is all about the heart (literally).
Although February 14 is all about celebrating love and giving your heart, this month is also National Heart Month in the United States. This time of year is to raise awareness about heart disease and the importance of heart health. So we can say February is indeed a hearty month.
But in February, you can also eat all the snacks you want.
It is bizarre that National Snack Food Month coincides with the month when we celebrate heart health. But, we aren’t complaining because snacks are essentials. If you are planning to binge and indulge in all of your favorite snacks and treats, this may just be a justifiable reason to do so. From chips and dip to popcorn and candy, it’s a month of Netflix and chill.
We may have gotten a step closer to flying cars in 2023.
We’ve been hearing about flying cars since well before The Jetsons. But we hopefully got closer to that reality when Alef Aeronautics received permission from the FAA to test its Model A car, which is the first flying automobile that can be parked on the ground in a conventional parking spot. Alef expects it to be available in 2025 for a bargain $300,000. But don’t reserve it just yet: It has a lot of testing to be done.
So you witnessed how it would feel like if population would double
My family has been watching fireworks through the window for the last 8 years. Maybe next year we will try to go somewhere, but we are still young (3 years for the smallest)
February is also National Cherry Month.
Just as how August is a fruity month, February is National Cherry Month in the United States. It is a time to celebrate the delicious fruit and its many health benefits. Take some time to appreciate the beauty of cherry blossoms, which typically bloom in late winter or early spring.
There are no full moons in February.
Another one of the more fascinating facts about February is that it is the only month that can pass without having a full moon. This is because the lunar cycle is about 29.5 days long, which means that some years February only has 28 days, and in those years, there isn’t enough time for the moon to go through a full cycle.
Though rare, a full moon can occur in February. We call them Snow Moon.
A super-reflective white paint was developed.
In 2023, The New York Times reported that scientists had developed a paint so white and reflective that 98 percent of the sun’s rays bounce right off it. The coating was developed by a team at Purdue University led by mechanical engineering professor Xiulin Ruan. The idea is to use the paint on rooftops, where it would do its ray deflecting thing and keep items cooler inside the buildings. According to the scientists, the paint is as much as 8°F cooler than the air around it during the day; at night, that number drops to as much as 19°F cooler.
Wawa debuted its pizza.
This summer, Wawa—the uber-popular convenience store—added a new item to its menu: Pizza. Like the chain’s hoagies, you choose between a couple of sizes and pile on the toppings you prefer. The pizzas are served from 4 p.m. to 3 a.m. and are made fresh in dedicated pizza ovens, which means around a 20 minute wait. Don’t even ask what’s in the sauce—that’s proprietary.
July 2023 was really, really hot.
According to scientists, July was most likely the hottest month ever recorded in human history—a fact that was declared on July 27th. “We don’t have to wait for the end of the month to know this,” United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres said. “Short of a mini-ice age over the next days, July 2023 will shatter records across the board.”