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Random Friday Fact Day
bigmarty58
Posts: 1,998 ✭✭✭✭✭
In honor of Random picture thread for Friday that many of us enjoy I thought we could try a random Friday fact day.
To start us off here is a random fact about Fort Knox. The gold in the depository is in the form of standard U.S. Mint bars of almost pure gold, or coin bars resulting from the melting of gold coins. 
Enthusiastic collector of British pre-decimal and Canadian decimal circulation coins.
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Comments
There are 3 categories of gold bars:
Sterling bars and sovereigns, roosters, Napoleons and other foreign gold coins are mostly at the New York vault, along with earmarked bars, and bars made from mixed deposits.
It is wasteful to further consolidate this material due to losses in melting, refining, and even in simple handling. After Fort Knox Bullion Depository was opened for transfers, the Treasury recovered over 400 T oz. of pure gold from gloves, carts, bags and other handling/packaging materials. They likely lost at least as much during melting at the Mints and NYAO.
"Treasury recovered over 400 T oz. of pure gold from gloves, carts, bags and other handling/packaging materials."
Huh? Please explain...
So non of the Ft Knox gold was mined? Pardon the ignorant!
The cacao pod, from which we harvest cacao beans... e.g. the main ingredient of chocolate, has a white membrane that encases the beans. The membrane actually has a citrus taste.
U.S. Type Set
A pair of Great horned owls is giving me a free concert tonight.
Hopefully they will bag some squirrels.
Most caned Pumpkin Pie Filling isn't Pumpkin. It's one or more types of squash (butternut, Hubbard, Boston Marrow, and Golden Delicious). These squash varieties can be less stringy and richer in sweetness and color than pumpkin.
@Kudbegud if you believe Snopes that may not be true.
https://snopes.com/fact-check/canned-pumpkin-isnt-actually-pumpkin/
This random fact I posted was more as a silly fact. I agree there is some controversy which raises passions on both sides. Checking with epicurious, a well respected food information source, the quibble is over a vague difference between various species in the same family. The FDA doesn't make distinct differences which only clouds the issue. Have fun with this fact at your next family get together where Pumpkin Pie is served. It is sure to result in lively conversation. Well, maybe.
https://epicurious.com/ingredients/what-is-in-canned-pumpkin-article
The total weight of ants in the world equals the total weight of people in the world.
Drunner
One man survived BOTH atomic bombs. Tsutomu Yamaguchi was sent to Hiroshima on business and got burns from the first blast, then went home to Nagasaki and was in a tunnel being treated for the burns when the second blast hit above him.
Drunner
There are 2000 active serial killers in the USA right now. (Scientific algorithm based on history and current population.)
Drunner
Gold is very soft and every time you put it in a bag and jingle it together, a little bit of dust is going to come of the main body of medal. That metal can be recovered. in the form of dust. I'm amazed that it came to 400 Troy Ounces, but they did handle a lot of gold.
One way for crooks to make money years ago was to put a bunch of gold coins in a bag and shake them up. After the shacking the bag was cut apart and the gold dust was taken from it. The coins could be passed for their full face value. This process was called "sweating."
That was the reason gold coins were weighed during some transactions. Legally an underweight gold coin was less than its face value. That's why the treasury depart made an effort to those coins out of circulation. Some of the really marked up gold coins that have survived today were sweated.
The medical name for butt crack is 'intergluteal cleft". Cheers, RickO
Lots of real Christmas trees are spray painted green before being sold. Just look closely at the trunks🙂
Pro baseball has used women players routinely. One, Jackie Mitchell, at age 17 struck out Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig in a regulation game.
Drunner
MAUI NUI ~ The Greater Maui
1.2 million yrs ago, Maui Nui was 14,600 squre kilometer (5,600 square miles), 40% larger than the present-day Islands of Hawaii.
Sea levels were lower than today's due to distant GLACIATION locking up the Earth's water during the Ice Ages, thus exposing more land.
As the Volcanoes slowly settled by subsidence, due to the weight of the shield volcanoes & erosion,
the saddles between them slowly flooded forming 4 Islands, Maui, Lana'i, Molokai and Kaho'olawe by about 200.000 yrs ago.
"Ma" is abbreviation for mega-anna, millions of yrs ago
Another former volcanic island lying West of Molokai was completely submerged, and it is now known as Penguin Bank
Penguin Bank
On the present-day as we know it
"One way for crooks to make money years ago was to put a bunch of gold coins in a bag and shake them up. After the shacking the bag was cut apart and the gold dust was taken from it. The coins could be passed for their full face value. This process was called "sweating.""
Thanks @BillJones for this answer. Begs the question of "shacking the bag". Sounds like something from Austin Powers...or was that Shagging the Bag?
Fascinating geology of Hawaii!! Thanks @Paradisefound !
Don't forget Lōihi Seamount (also known as Lōʻihi) is an active submarine volcano about 35 km (22 mi) off the southeast coast of the island of Hawaii. The top of the seamount is about 975 m (3,000 ft) below sea level. This seamount is on the flank of Mauna Loa, the largest shield volcano on Earth. Mauna Loa is actually the TALLEST MOUNTAIN IN THE WORLD if measured from sea bottom level.
I've got a pack of coyotes that give me a free concert every morning at 4:30 a.m. Mrs. Hydrant puts out just enough scraps at dusk to keep them around and hungry enough so that they WILL bag some squirrels.....For dessert. I love the sound of those coyotes. Nothing like it. Nothing.
Rod Serling was 5 foot 4 inches tall.
His show, Twilight Zone, was cancelled three times!
Lo'ihi
Yes ..... his preview 200,000 yrs from now and ..... We would have been reincarnated thousands times over to see it
Humans eat more bananas than monkeys.
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We never really developed a taste for monkeys.
Great transactions with oih82w8, JasonGaming, Moose1913.
WooHoo! Can't wait to hit those virgin beaches that will (hopefully) be parks that we can frolic!!
I have them too
The first American Silver Dollar was the 8 Reale. As money was scarce, coins were actually cut into half, fourths and eights The pirate phrase " Pieces Of Eight " were actually a reference to that. An eighth of a Reale was called a BIT , 2 BITS were a quarter Reale which found it's way into our language. 2 bits became slang for a quarter. Thus the phrasing, " 2 bits, 4 bits, 6 bits, a dollar.
Bob Sr CEO Fieldtechs
This is incorrect. Mauna Kea is taller.
Both tv series, Leave it to Beaver, and Marcus Welby, MD, used the same house on the Universal Studios lot
I guess imitation is the best form of flattery as I had a random fact Saturday thread going a few eeeks ago😁
Saudi Arabia imports camels from Australia.
Drunner
The world record distance for a person thrown from a car in a crash is 118'. The subject survived.
Drunner
Shaq made only one three pointer in his entire career (Feb 1996 against the Bucks).
Drunner
As captured in my photos, Northwestern's Jared McGee set a new Holiday Bowl record this New Year's Eve when he took a Gaziano stripped ball the distance for an 82 yard fumble return.
I Just started hearing a new barn owl every night this month.
We hear coyotes almost nightly. We have five cats that would make a great dinner. Trying to keep them in a night is a chore. One is a night owl and probably fights off the coyotes. We have lost many cats to coyotes.
Raccoons live on our property. Sometimes they get aggressive. That's the time to be loud and chase them. I saw one of my cats chase and tree a raccoon the other day. Super funny.
Smelled a skunk this AM. Harvest is over so it was an animal.
Opossums occasionally and Southern Ca is overrun with Rats.
Flocks of 100 -200 wild parrots fly over the house many, many times during the course of the year.
I believe I have seen 7 species of snakes on the property, none of with was a rattlesnake
Random Fact:
My feet hurt,,,,,,,
Men who tinkle on the seat haven't learned to urineat.
There are depths in the ocean that reach 36,000 feet. That is about the cruising altitude of most commercial airliners.
MY GOLD TYPE SET https://pcgs.com/setregistry/type-sets/complete-type-sets/gold-type-set-12-piece-circulation-strikes-1839-1933/publishedset/321940
A wet bird never flies at night!
That sounds like the password to a speakeasy.
Survived yes. But I never was the same after that.
You don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows.
Robin Yount was already an ever day major leaguer at the age of 18. He won an MVP at shortstop(1982) and later as a center fielder(1989). He played for 20 years and had over 3000 hits. And somehow when he was first eligible for the baseball Hall of Fame, 112 voters did not vote for him.
"Look up, old boy, and see what you get." -William Bonney.
Actually, it is a line from a Jackie Vernon comedy routine.
It's raining in Greatneck.
(Geezer sh*t)
His name was Rick O'Shea.
Wild fire in South Maui but please don't start the GoFund yet
Maui? Wowie!
Maui? Wowie!
Famous Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Edition Cover
I knew it would happen.
Macadamia roasting gone awry?
...and then there's little ole Molokini...