TodayILearned
#TodayILearned that the first known use of the word ‘celebrity’ was by Geoffrey Chaucer, translating someone I didn’t catch the name of 🎙️
This isn’t perfect, in that it doesn’t cope with the ‘nd’ in ‘2nd’, bit it’s good enough
A vim mapping to insert the day and date as a header for notes, journals etc
map <Leader>m :put =strftime('%A %dth %B %Y')<cr>:s/ 0/ /<cr>kJi## <Esc>
#TodayILearned that to comment out the currently selected text in VS Code you can do Ctrl + /
#TodayILearned that the first Beatle’s concert in the United States was at Boneyard Bocce Ball Club in Benton, Illinois.
The first Beatles concert in the US was somewhere else
Harry Houdini and the Barrel of Tetley's
#TodayILearned that, when he was in Leeds, Houdini was sponsored by Tetley’s Bitter to perform his ‘escaping from a locked milk churn full of water’ trick with the milk churn instead filled with beer
The trick depended on air being trapped in the domed lid of the churn, and in that instance the air was largely replaced with CO2 and alcohol fumes
The escape failed and Houdini was rescued by his assistant
Timewatch, 2000-2001: The Houdini Myth: www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m001xqqn via @bbciplayer
Also www.yorkshirepost.co.uk/news/opin…
#TodayILearned that the Galway Girl in Steve Earle’s song, but not in Ed Sheeran’s song, is called Joyce Redmond, and she plays the bodhrán on the Steve Earle one 🎵
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galway_Girl_(Steve_Earle_song)
#TodayILearned that:
Initialisms are made from the first letter (or letters) of a string of words, but can’t be pronounced as words themselves (e.g. FBI, CIA). Acronyms are made from the first letter (or letters) of a string of words but are pronounced as if they were words themselves (e.g. NASA, hazmat). What I Learned: The Phoenix Project Audiobook - IT Revolution
Personally, I’m not sure that this is a very useful distinction, but it’s interesting
I guess ‘SQL’ is an initialism to those who pronounce it ‘S.Q.L’ and and acronym for those who say ‘sequel’.
How to set default parameters for other people's Powershell cmdlets
Not exactly #TodayILearned because I vaguely remember learning that you can do this, but had never got around to doing so.
This is how you can set a default parameter in Powershell. As far as I know, it works with any cmdlet. I’m using it here to set the default for Pester to show me all the results of all the tests….because I love seeing that sea of green :)
$PSDefaultParameterValues += @{ 'Invoke-Pester:Output' = 'Detailed' }
#Powershell
#TodayILearned that a ‘wolf tone’ is “an undesirable phenomenon that occurs in some bowed-string instruments…. It happens when the pitch of the played note is close to a particularly strong natural resonant frequency of the body of the musical instrument.”
I’ve listened to them for about 30 years….but I never realised that the name of the band had two meanings
#TodayILearned that the lyric is
“You don’t have to say you love me Just be close at hand”
…not
”You don’t have to say you love me Just because of him"
#TodayILearned that Charlie, Ronnie and Reggie Kray got £255,000 from the 1990 film 📺📽️🎙️
The selling of the Krays: how two mediocre criminals created their own legend – podcast
Being an Elvis nerd of many years standing, in the normal run of the things I don’t often come across any new Presley trivia….but #TodayILearned that Colonel Tom was born on Boxing Day. 🎵
#TodayILearned that the word ‘cockamamie’ is possibly related to ‘decalcomania’ which has to do with ‘decals’ - stick on decorations, or tattoos.
#TodayILearned that the passengers in the ‘Miracle on the Hudson’ got $5,000 compensation for lost luggage, a refund for the price of their ticket, and a letter of apology
BBC Witness History - Miracle on the Hudson
#TodayILearned that the 1967 Beatles Christmas record was produced by Kenny Everett
Danny Baker - tracing the Beatles through their Christmas record
#TodayILearned that Cinderella’s slippers may have been squirrel fur (‘vair’) rather than glass (‘verre’)
CINDERELLA’S SLIPPERS: GLASS OR SQUIRREL FUR?
#TodayILearned the phrase "cheese it-the cops!"
#TodayILearned the phrase cheese it-the cops!
“A warning that the police were coming. “Cheese” might be a variant of “cease.” It might also come from the cheese course coming at the end of dinner; in the sense that with nothing else ahead, it’s time to leave. In either event, “cheese it—the cops!” was a staple of mid-20th-century crime novels and films, as well as such movies as The Dead End Kids and The Bowery Boys.”
#TodayILearned that one way of getting a list of data available from Microsoft Graph API is to type ‘graph.microsoft.com/v1.0/user… into Graph Explorer, and see what show’s up in the Dropdown
#TodayILearned that in 1929, the USSR replaced the 7 day week with a 5 day week, with a fifth of the workforce resting on any given day
This was a good episode to listen to in Leap Week :) 🎙️
#TodayILearned that Lloyd Cole, of the Commotions, and Perfect Skin, is Chelsea 🎵⚽