Things you were shockingly old when you learned

Things I haven't learned even though I'm shockingly old: how long to hold the barcode on the ticket scanner for so the gate will open while some fierce airport employee glares at me.

I went through some Digital ID security line last week at LGA. I didn't even have to show them the boarding pass, just gave them my ID and they scanned my face. Creepy, but it's not like they don't already know everything about me before getting on the plane anyway.

I have yet to transition to electronic boarding passes. I also have to print out the QR codes for Amazon returns. I get jittery thinking about having to find these files on my phone at a critical time even though I know there is probably a smart easy way to go about it that doesn't involve wasting paper.

the number of times I've lost a physical boarding pass between check-in and the gate is absurdly high

Same. Got paged once at JFK cause I lot one while looking at duty free makeup. Panicked when I heard my name over the loudspeaker obv. I like the digital scanning things at the gates. Very futuristic.

I'm not typically an app guy, but if your airline has one, it makes boarding passes a lot easier.

I learned recently that the lyrics to Buffalo by Stump are not just a random selection of phrases but a character sketch of a couple of American tourists in London.

that the word Benelux comes from the names Belgium, Netherlands, Luxembourg.
I mean, of course it does. obviously. so why didn't I notice before?

is anyone talking about benelux these days?

...also means "good light" in Latin.

the number of times I've lost a physical boarding pass between check-in and the gate is absurdly high

Happened to me once, I went to the gate, explained, dude instantly printed out a new boarding pass! So I think as long as it's before boarding there's nowt to fear.

is anyone talking about benelux these days?

Yesterday, because we were playing Twilight Struggle.

hate trying to open an app which will invariably want to update and hope internet service works in a boarding line. taking a screen shot of the code beforehand = the way imo.

1.print your boarding pass
2.take a photo of that on your phone
3.print that out
4.scan that in and save it to your phone
5.send it in a message to the internet
6.get it printed onto a tshirt on redbubble
7. simply board plane with ease

I only learnt today that Dirty Rotten Scoundrels was a remake of 1964 movie Bedtime Story with David Niven and Marlon Brando. I also did not realise that 'The Hustle' was a remake.

Seersucker:

The word originates from the Persian words شیر shîr and شکر shakar, literally meaning "milk and sugar", from the gritty texture ("sugar") on the otherwise smooth ("milk") cloth.

thank you. and now i learn where the word came from.

From Sanskrit (śarkarā), meaning "ground or candied sugar", came Persian shakar and Arabic sukkar. The Arabic word was borrowed in Medieval Latin as succarum, whence the 12th century French sucre and the English sugar. Sugar was introduced into Europe by the Arabs in Sicily and Spain.

the word sucre always reminded me of an arabic word. so, i was in the right ballpark.

i imagine shîr is also the origin of the word “sheer” to describe very thin fabric?

Sheer sounds distinctly Germanic to me.

hmm you’re right

schiere "thin, sparse" (c. 1400), a variant of skere, from late Old English scir "bright, clear, gleaming; translucent; pure, unmixed." The Middle English word might also be from or influenced by the Old Norse cognate scær "bright, clean, pure." Both of these are from Proto-Germanic *skeran (source also of Old Saxon skiri, Old Frisian skire, German schier, Gothic skeirs "clean, pure"), from PIE root *sker- (1) "to cut."

"mano a mano" means hand to hand, not man to man

A door blows open in your mind when you learn about the suffix -le, it explains so much. People used to add it to verbs to mean ‘more than once’ or continuously—so originally, to ramble is to ‘roam’ on, to jostle is to joust repeatedly, and to sparkle is to emit lots of sparks.

A door blows open in your mind when you learn about the suffix -le, it explains so much. People used to add it to verbs to mean ‘more than once’ or continuously—so originally, to ramble is to ‘roam’ on, to jostle is to joust repeatedly, and to sparkle is to emit lots of sparks. pic.twitter.com/85oefNHMfa

— Wylfċen (@wylfcen) April 10, 2024

I wouldn't call my reaction to this knowledge "shock" as much as "bitter amusement, and relief that two other people have been spared" but TIL that Ayaan Hirsi Ali and Niall Ferguson are married.

(xp) Awesome.

xxp I like that one

yes.

I've been known to ILXle.