Saturday, January 29, 2022

Coffee and Provocation


Record Numbers of Big Deer
The National Deer Association reports: "Deer hunters in the United States took more adult and mature bucks in the 2019-20 hunting season than ever reported, based on a near-record buck harvest of 2.9 million and a record 39% of those bucks estimated to be 3½ years or older."  Full 2022 deer report download available here.

Worst "Old Yeller" Movie Ever
Back in 2013, a Maryland transplant recipient died from a rabies-infected kidney.

Racist US Laws Grew Chinese Restaurants
Anti-Chinese immigration laws in the US restricted Chinese immigrants to merchant visas for fancy shops and restaurants, and the person getting the visa had to run the enterprise for a year. Some folks used all their cash to open a restaurant and then switched who ran it each year so that the rest of their family or investment group could get in.

War Asses
The earliest human-made hybrid animals were the “Kungas" of Syro-Mesopotamia, which were crosses between male Syrian wild asses and domestic donkeys.

Circling Around
Humans will walk in circles when lost unless there is some sort of external reference point.

The Universe Is Only 20 Years Old
The sun has only completed 20 orbits (i.e. galactic years) around our galaxy since its birth.

Hero Dog

There's No Coming Back for Them
King Tutankhamun owned a returning boomerang collection.

Re-growing Amputated Frog Legs
Amputated legs of frogs — complete with blood vessels, bones, and nerves — have been regrown with the aid of a regenerative cocktail made up of of five chemicals.

Bullshit Legal Opinions
"Yelling FIRE in a crowded theater" was a phrase first coined by Oliver Wendell Holmes in 1919 in Schenck v. United States as part of an excuse to imprison anti-war activists who published leaflets opposing the Draft. Holmes argued that the widespread dissemination of the leaflets was likely to disrupt conscription, and was akin to falsely shouting “Fire!” in a crowded theatre, which he argued is not permitted under the First Amendment. Holmes also wrote wrote the 8–1 majority opinion in Buck v. Bell, a case that upheld the Virginia Sterilization Act of 1924.

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