Couldn’t find anything on snoring cow omens. According to Wiki, whistling on board a sailing ship is bad luck, it’s thought to encourage the wind to increase. On ships where whistling was taboo, the cook was usually excused, because as long as he was heard whistling he wasn’t stealing food.
Goats were more sure-footed on sailing ships than cows, and ancient mariners would leave breeding pairs on remote islands to provide food for future visitors. Oh, and goats snore, too.
Famed mariner Josh Slocum was once advised to purchase carpet tacks by a merchant. He balked until the merchant explained why he needed them. They were to be scattered over the deck after dark in case pirates attempted to board the vessel undetected. The tacks were a burglar alarm, and according to Slocum, they worked.
Tacks were employed in the design of “Turtle Boats,” Korean warships of the late 1500s for similar reasons.
I’d never heard of the Beano Grenade until now.
I read in a USNI publication that 90% of intercontinental communications are via submarine cable. The same was true in 1850.
Infrasound – the frequency of fear? [h/t Carl L.]
A Mumbo Jumbo was not a niceguy.
The 17 equations that changed the course of history. Pythagoras of Samos was good, but Leonhard Euler came up with the concept of the square root of negative 1, and much more. Also, Euler is not pronounced “yū’-lər.” It’s a Swiss surname, pronounced “ōē’-dər.”
Pheeew. Jingle Bells is a racist song because of minstrel shows?
[Top image is a panel from “Ploopy The Ghost” by F.O. Alexander, ca. 1940. Franklin Osborn Alexander was the cartoonist who provided the classic graphics for the board game Monopoly.]
Tacky Raccoons 