Every so often, I fall down a rabbit hole of random facts. I cannot help it. I find the world to be such an interesting place.
So today, I decided to visit the grab bag of quirky items. The little facts that are a little absurd or a little astonishing. Sometimes they can even be oddly beautiful.
Take Triboulet, the royal jester who annoyed both the King and Queen of France. King Louis XII and his wife Anne of Brittany. Triboulet irritated them so thoroughly that he earned himself a death sentence. The fateful day came and he was asked to choose his method of execution. That bold jester said, “I ask to die of old age.” And would you believe it? King Louis agreed. He banished Triboulet instead. Sometimes wit can go a long long way.
Speaking of survival. I just learned a bit about silk moths. They have been domesticated a very long time. About 5,000 years. And this has turned them into moths that cannot fly anymore. They lost their camouflage too. And they no longer fear their predators. Good heavens. They cannot even find mates without human help. We have to take care of silk moths now. But do they really make silk? (Answer below.)
On to the next fact. How about the coastline paradox? This is a scientific quirk that says the more precisely we measure a coastline, the longer it becomes. With a small enough measuring stick, those coastlines keep getting longer and longer. This might be a good reminder that some things only get more complicated the closer we look.
And then there is the unpredictable. Animals can be that way. Take this incident in Turkey in 2005. A flock of sheep gathered together and suddenly one sheep leapt off a cliff. For whatever reason, 1,500 more sheep followed. One right after the next. Thankfully, only the first 450 died. The rest survived by landing on a growing woolly cushion. Apparently, nature enjoys slapstick comedy now and then.
Here is one more. A strange one about a giant. When Andre the Giant died, he had to be flown to the United States because France did not have a crematorium large enough to fit him. He was cremated in North Carolina on February 11, 1993. His ashes, reportedly weighing about 17 pounds, were scattered on his ranch property in Ellerbe, North Carolina, according to his wishes.
Finally, to the moon, Alice. To the moon. Only one photo exists of Neil Armstrong on the moon, because he spent the entire time taking pictures of Buzz Aldrin. Take it from a photographer. We are rarely in the pictures.
So, as we think about all of this, may we always remember that life is a little weird at times. But wonderful too. It can also be endlessly surprising. And that is probably why these little fact gems interest me so very much.
Silkworm Answer:
Yes, silk moths do produce silk, but it comes from the caterpillar stage, not the adult moth. The domesticated silkworm, Bombyx mori, spins a single long thread to form its cocoon, sometimes stretching up to 3,000 feet. Humans harvest the cocoon, soften it, and unwind the thread to create silk fibers, which are then twisted and woven into fabric.
“””””””
“There is no such thing as an uninteresting subject. The only thing that can exist is an uninterested person.”
— G.K. Chesterton
“””””””
“Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known.”
— Carl Sagan
“””””””
“The more I learn, the more I realize how much I don’t know.”
— Albert Einstein
“””””””
“Knowledge is knowing a tomato is a fruit. Wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad.”
— Miles Kington
“””””””
