An interesting thing I didn't know until today

[Simon G]

I also thought he was drafted - wasn't it like National Service?

An interesting thing I learned today - when the creator of Pringles died he requested that his ashes be placed into an Original flavour tube of Pringles (presumably empty).

[ursus arctos]

It was complicated

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mili..._Elvis_Presley

[The Awesome Berbaslug!!!]

Like Shannon the only reason for its continued existence is to serve as a cog in the military industrial complex, and shore up votes for local gom politicians.

Shannon has heading for 2 million passengers a year, and is a major training hub for pilots and aircraft renovation. There's all sorts of industrial estates there connected to the airport, and the assorted development zones. It exists because it makes plenty of money, and serves the west coast of ireland. It's actually pretty impressive that they managed to turn it around after the stopover went. The military thing wasn't that lucrative, or widescale, and I doubt it had much of an impact on shannon staying open. The airport itself is only part of a much bigger thing.

[Satchmo Distel]

He was drafted but the Colonel and top brass both rejected the soft options such as just having him tour the bases. So my post should have said "assigned" or "allocated" to his position.

And we know from other examples that getting soft options did happen to other celebs.

[Satchmo Distel]

Bill Bixby is in the dire Clambake, as is Robert Redford.

[Gangster Octopus]

Clambake was on London Live this lunchtime.

Shannon, the birth place of Irish Coffee, is alright, but I want Galway airport to be reopened.

[Satchmo Distel]

Elvis death details (warning: could be distressing):

Elvis had 14 different drugs in his body when he died. I'm wondering if this a record for an accidental OD. The initial death reports had said heart attack, brought about by a blocked colon, causing straining at stool, but it really was the drug cocktail. Several of the drugs were in sufficient quantities to be fatal by themselves.

Technically he wasn't still on the toilet when he passed out. He seems to have crawled several feet.

Final song he sang that day at the piano: Blue Eyes Crying In The Rain by Willie Nelson.

I think he only had sex with a smallish proportion of women he went to bed with in the 70s at least. He couldn't sleep alone and needed cuddles constantly.

[The Awesome Berbaslug!!!]

That must have made his spell in the army quite challenging.

[Satchmo Distel]

He had a lot of procurers in Germany. Priscilla was through an army contact. And girlfriends were flown over from Memphis.

[ursus arctos]

It always astounded me that Nichopoulos kept his medical licence for as long as he did.

[Various Artist]

An interesting thing I learned today - when the creator of Pringles died he requested that his ashes be placed into an Original flavour tube of Pringles (presumably empty).

I read that all ready for the sentence to end with "... and shot into space", so have to consider the full stop slightly disappointing.

[Satchmo Distel]

I assume you are going to go to the top of Mauna Kea? The Subaru telescope uses sonar to adjust the mirrors for air movement, which means that if you stand next to it, you can hear tones raising and falling in a pattern. It's the oddest thing.

We went today but only got as far as the Visitor Centre because our car rental does not cover 4WD to the top. It was still an awesome drive, though.

The road across the Big Island has mountain goats and sheep.

The mountain road from Waimea to the northern coast is great.

Big Island has around 10 microclimates and you know straight away that you're crossing into a new one because the grass changes, as do the grazing animals (goats, cows or horses).

We are doing the volcano tomorrow - overnight stay. Then back to Maui.

[WOM]

We went today but only got as far as the Visitor Centre because our car rental does not cover 4WD to the top. It was still an awesome drive, though.

Subaru's ad agency is missing a trick here.

[Nocturnal Submission]

I was watching a programme last night about the activities of the brutal 2nd SS Panzer Division Das Reich during WWII. I had a vague idea as to the nature of the atrocities which German troops committed during the invasion of the Soviet Union, but perhaps not the scale and callousness.

As well as it's activities in the East, this company was also responsible for the Oradour-sur-Glane Massacre, which I was aware of, and the Tulle Massacre, which I wasn't.

I knew about the former because the event, along with Sir Laurence Olivier's sombre tones, was referred to movingly during an episode of The World At War, with the ruined remains left as a permanent memorial to those who lost their lives there. But what I didn't know until a few minutes ago is that a new village has grown up right next to the old, which seems a little odd. I mean, it's good that the community has been re-established but normally such sites of horror are left in semi-isolation, I thought.

[Satchmo Distel]

There's a documentary on the Einsatzgruppen that's as grim as it gets, matched only by one on Nanking. The depravity of which humans are capable when their leaders dehumanize the enemy never ceases to be distressing.

[elguapo4]

Most of Das Reich were killed in the Falaise pocket a couple of weeks later. No consolation to anyone, but also no comfortable retirement for the cunts.

[Patrick Thistle]

One can visit a cavern in Derbyshire known as the Devil's Arse.

[Capybara]

One can visit a cavern in Derbyshire known as the Devil's Arse.

I thought this was reported on here a couple of months ago:

https://www.examinerlive.co.uk/news/...evils-24021646

[Toby Gymshorts]

One can visit a cavern in Derbyshire known as the Devil's Arse.

Wonder how hot it is.

[Various Artist]

One can visit a cavern in Derbyshire known as the Devil's Arse.

I read that as 'caravan' at first, which created an even more vivid mental image I now can't get out of my head.

[Satchmo Distel]

I noticed that NYPL has free digital scans of the 1947 and 1956 Negro Motorists' Green Book* - places where it was safe for black people to stay. This will be a great research tool for me because you can identify the black entertainment spots of any city and know that these were the options open to, say, Ray Charles when he toured.

*Can't link from this phone. Green refers to its author Victor Hugo Green.

[Benjm]

I discovered on Tuesday that Karl Bartos believes that the drum pattern on Kraftwerk's Numbers was his subconscious channelling of Cliff Richard's version of Do You Wanna Dance, which KB's sister owned and he was very fond of as a boy.

[ursus arctos]

On the Green Books

Introductory Essay
https://publicdomain.nypl.org/greenbook-map/

Digitised cooies
https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/...tab=navigation

Smithsonian collection
https://transcription.si.edu/project/7955

[Evariste Euler Gauss]

Well, same here, as with loads of colloquial expressions. Does “gee gees” have an interesting origin?

oh ffs it’s that thing again where I thought I was responding to the last post but it’s from pages ago because of how the software opens the thread at wherever I last looked at it instead of where it is now.

[elguapo4]

While checking something else, I discovered that Mae West only appeared on screen 14 times. Her career basically covered 10 films between 1932 and 1943. For someone so well known, that's a tiny career.