Things you didn't know until very recently...

Despite Botulinum toxin being one of the most lethal naturally occurring substances known to science,

Stupid wikipedia making me learn terrifying things.

Boulinum toxin. Cosmetics is crazy.

It is the most toxic protein known[1][2] with an LD50 of roughly 0.005-0.05 µg/kg.

LD = lethal dose. Why would let this stuff anywhere near your face? Ever?

edited 27th Apr '09 8:10:45 PM by Tzetze

Why would let this stuff anywhere near your face? Ever?

"Oh, look, you're starting to get lines in your face. Here's the name of a plastic surgeon I recommend- he'll make you look pretty again in no time. You'd look real pretty with botox injections. Don't you want to look pretty?"

edited 27th Apr '09 9:27:55 PM by English Ivy

L. Ron Hubbard's wife was named Mary Sue.

Boulinum toxin. Cosmetics is crazy.

Fun stuff. I think my favorite poison is still saxitoxin, though — found in several marine species, it's a fast-acting, highly potent paralytic which leaves the victim conscious and lucid. Death is normally secondary to respiratory failure, but with correct dosage it doesn't paralyze involuntary muscle systems.

edited 27th Apr '09 9:33:55 PM by Nornagest

Chocolate chip cookies were a happy accident wilst some one was trying to make chocolate cookies.

Tim Burton's involvement (or rather, his lack thereof) in The Nightmare Before Christmas.

Oddly enough, chips were an accident.

A cook who had to deal with a customer who kept complaining that his potatoes were too thick, after a few tries, got fed up. So, he cut them extremely thin and fried 'em, offering them to the patron sarcastically. He loved them; thus, the potato chip was born.

Actually, I knew this for a long while. Jinxed's cookie story just reminded me of it. That, and I truly feel, from the bottom of my heart, that all people should know the Origin Story of the most Epic Anime Villain Food.

edited 27th Apr '09 11:42:14 PM by Little_Serge

Did you get that of Nickelodeon?

When people append "^^^" or "vvv" to their posts to indicate who they're responding to, the number of ^s or vs is important. ^ for the post previous to yours, ^^ to two posts ago, and so on.

A person's style of tapping out Morse Code is called a "fist", and experienced radio operators can tell who is sending a code by listening to this. Supposedly. I learned this one night in a bar.

@wellinever: Actually, I picked it up on that Urban Legends show that played on TLC... I didn't get to watch Nickelodeon as a kid, actually... apparently, I wasn't missing much...

@EI: That is actually very informative, I need to reread some posts now :P.

@Miss Hap: That is... awesome.

Well, what I've been doing is using ^^^ to refer to the post above mine, not one three posts above. That's the wrong way to do it.

I didn't know that different vegetable oils have different smoke points until a couple days ago. I just thought that olive oil was for cooking with meat or pasta, and canola or corn oil for sweets.

Until recently, I couldn't believe it wasn't butter!!!

I've been using ^ erroneously, if that's the case. I'd often put ^^ just to emphasize that there was a ^ there.

I've never used the "correct" number of carets. I use two because it's easy to overlook only one. If I'm referring to a post further back than the one immediately above mine, I use "@Handle:" or "Handle,"

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^This was a good idea.

I didn't know that those ^ things were called carets until 2 posts ago.

Thanks, Madrugada!

edited 28th Apr '09 4:56:01 PM by Little_Serge

I didn't know airing wine meant letting it sit (in a glass) upwards of ten or twenty minutes. I had always thought it was closer to a minute.

When people append "^^^" or "vvv" to their posts to indicate who they're responding to, the number of ^s or vs is important. ^ for the post previous to yours, ^^ to two posts ago, and so on.

That's not as standard as you seem to think it is.

edited 28th Apr '09 5:53:08 PM by CTrombley

I learned that Madagascar will freak out over... well anything. Like all it takes is for somebody to sneeze in Canada and they close their shipyards.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

@EI. I know it's been said but I didn't know about these until very recently.

@Little Serge. Neither did I really, but my family had a holiday in New Zealand, and there was payTV in every hotel. That’s why I asked.

edited 29th Apr '09 3:28:04 AM by wellinever

The million ^'s you put on your posts to say how far up you are responding to makes it look like you're spamming. No more than three should ever be needed, and if you still want to use them to say who you're responding to, just quote for anything beyond three.

Perhaps with an @Username: on the start too, to make it clear who you're talking to.

The names of Egyptian rulers are often followed in hieroglyphs by the formula "may he live long, prosper, and be healthy". This formula is so common that Egyptologists usually abbreviate it in translations as LPH. Makes you wonder where "live long and prosper" really came from, eh?

Also, although a beehive may look busy, by tracking individual bees, scientists found that bees are doing nothing two-thirds of the time.

Finland is not a Scandinavian country. Iceland was a part of the Kingdom of Denmark until 1944.