Pollyanna principle

The Pollyanna principle "describes the tendency for people to agree with positive statements describing themselves." Basically, we subconsciously focus on the positive, while consciously we look at the negative. The term refers to a young girl named Pollyanna in a 1913 novel of the same name, who displayed a limitless amount of optimism.

This concept is similar to the Barnum effect.

Great Migration

The Great Migration lasted from 1910 to 1930, when 2 million black Americans migrated from the south to the northeast, midwest, and west in search of jobs and an escape from discrimination. Another period, the Second Great Migration, stretched from 1940 to 1970 and involved 5 million blacks. As a result of both movements, 80% of black people resided in the cities.

But there has been another migration called the New Great Migration, which began around 1965, in which black people have been moving back south. This is because of improved racial relations and the de-industrialization of the northeast and midwest.

Why do birds have wattles?

To dissipate heat. Plus, it's an ego thing for the male birds.

Why do we eat turkey for the holidays?

Basically, Americans found them easy to slaughter and big enough to feed crowd, at a relatively cheap price. We also brought the custom of eating turkey from Britain. It wasn't until 1863 that Thanksgiving was officially declared a national holiday.

Our fellow... subjects?

From the Library of Congress:

Recent hyperspectral imaging of Thomas Jefferson’s rough draft of the Declaration of Independence has clearly confirmed past speculation that Jefferson made an interesting word correction during his writing of the document, according to scientists in the Library of Congress’ Preservation Research and Testing Division (PRTD). Jefferson originally had written the phrase "our fellow-subjects." But he apparently changed his mind. Over the word “subjects” he inked an alternative, the word "citizens."

The correction seems to illuminate an important moment for Jefferson and for a nation on the eve of breaking from monarchical rule: a moment when he reconsidered his choice of words and articulated the recognition that the people of the fledgling United States of America were no longer subjects of any nation, but citizens of an emerging democracy.

This was discovered this past July.

Small Business Saturday

The first ever Small Business Saturday will be held this Saturday. It's a day to support your local small businesses, a day after you give most of your money away to the big businesses.

Paradise tree snake

Did you even know these things existed? They fucking glide in the air!

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Thatcher effect

The Thatcher effect is "a phenomenon where it becomes difficult to detect local feature changes in an upside down face, despite identical changes being obvious in an upright face."

Daniella Tobar

In January 2000, a 21 year-old Chilean actress by the name of Daniella Tobar decided to prove an artistic point, or something, and live in a 20 ft. by 7 ft. glass house right in the middle of Santiago. The best moments were when she stood naked in the shower.

Video.

"Pet peeve" origin

The first usage of the term pet peeve was around 1919. The word peeve is a back-formation of the word peevish, which means "ill-tempered." Pet, in this case, means "favorite" (as in a teacher's pet).

Armoire

An armoire is a standing closet used for storing clothes.

The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

What exactly is that? I've been hearing it a lot the past several days, sort of like a Baader-Meinhof phenomenon. HHGTTG is a science fiction comedy series from England that originally came out on radio in 1978. It later got adapted to books, TV, computer games, comic books, and the big screen.

King George VI

King George VI of the United Kingdom, who reigned during WWII, suffered from a speech impediment for which he began seeing a speech therapist in 1925 (when he was Duke of York, before ascending to the throne). In 1939, at the start of the war, he made a speech to the British people. Despite some pauses he managed to finish it without stuttering.

The relationship between the king and his speech therapist is being brought to life in the new movie The King's Speech.

Ex gratia

Ex gratia means "as a favor or gesture of goodwill, rather than from any legal requirement."

How do people in wheelchairs take showers?

With shower wheelchairs.

What's a pick 6?

This is pretty embarrassing for me to admit because I've been watching football my whole life. A pick 6 is an interception returned for a touchdown.

But what's not embarrassing is Dimitri Patterson's pick 6 in tonight's Monday Night Football game. As well as the general ass whooping that Philly put on Washington.

Project Titan?

Why didn't I hear about this earlier? Maybe because I just recently joined Facebook. Facebook is coming out with this thing called Project Titan, which is supposed to kill Gmail, because Facebook will give us a personal @facebook.com email address. Will this be the beginning of the end of traditional email?

Firefoxes are actual animals

They're also known as the red panda. They're found mostly in the Himalayan region, and the species is classified as vulnerable in its conservation status.

See more pictures here.

What the hell's a forensic musicologist?

Someone who listens to music really, really closely.

Leonardo da Vinci syndrome

"When a highly creative person gets new ideas and visions faster than they can implement them, or even possibly fully record/describe them, leading to a state where someone is constantly starting new projects without finishing the old ones."

Kwanzaa

I always thought that Kwanzaa was an old African holiday celebrated by Africans. Nope. Turns out that it was invented in the 1960s by an American black nationalist.

Overwhelming exception

An overwhelming exception is a "generalization that is accurate, but comes with one or more qualifications that eliminate so many cases that what remains is much less impressive than the initial statement might have led one to assume."

Here are some examples:

"All right, but apart from the sanitation, the medicine, education, wine, public order, irrigation, roads, a fresh water system, and public health, what have the Romans ever done for us?"
- From Monty Python's Life of Brian

"Other than that, how was the play, Mrs. Lincoln?"
- What an idiot would ask Mrs. Lincoln after her husband gets assassinated in the theater

Mocap suit

A mocap suit is a suit used for motion capture (hence, the name). It's those things you see actors wear on TV for video games and stuff.

Blue Book value for cars

It's what car insurance companies refer to when someone gets involved in an accident, as I did today when the woman admitted that it was her fault for ramming into me. The cop said the cost of damage to my car will probably exceed the vehicle's price, which means the insurance company will just pay me the few thousand dollars the car's worth. There are a couple of companies that give blue book estimates, but the one I've been researching is Kelley Blue Book.

Stressed...

...is desserts spelled backwards. Heard it on a Sonic Drive-In radio commercial.

Buttle

Buttle means "to do a butler's work."

Gojira

The word Gojira is the Man'yogana version of the word Godzilla (Man'yogana is an ancient writing system that employs Chinese characters to represent the Japanese language). It's a combination of gorira, which means "gorilla," and kujira, which means "whale."

Doc Powers

In 1909, Doc Powers was the first major league baseball player to die as a result of an on-field injury. (The only other one was Ray Chapman in 1920.) On April 12, Powers chased a foul pop-up and crashed into the wall. He had to get three intestinal surgeries to try to repair the internal injuries, but died of complications two weeks after the game.

Johnny Campbell

On this day in 1898, Johnny Campbell became the world's first cheerleader. He was a student at the University of Minnesota, and directed a crowd by cheering "Rah, Rah, Rah! Ski-u-mah, Hoo-Rah! Hoo-Rah! Varsity! Varsity! Varsity, Minn-e-So-Tah!" Actually, cheerleading started as an all guys thing. Females didn't start taking part until 1923, when the fellas were being drafted for war.

Comminate

Comminate means "to threaten with divine punishment; to curse."