What's the last thing that surprised you?

[. . .]

What's the last thing that surprised you?

For me it was this:

71! :shocked:

 

[CJinherPJs]

I wanted to watch "24 Hours in A&E" but after I saw the first episode I wished that I hadn't. I've seen real life hospital programmes before but I was surprised at my reaction to this one. I felt physically sick and was shaking from just watching it, so I can't even begin to imagine the kind of terror and horrendous pain that poor guy must have been through. He made it though, which I was pleased about.

 

[. . .]

I was surprised to learn that dogs are very closely related to seals. Very interesting.

I now think of seals as being sea dogs.

 

[King_Oni]

I was surprised to learn that dogs are very closely related to seals. Very interesting.

I now think of seals as being sea dogs.

And the funniest thing is, in Holland we call them "zeehond" which translates as "sea dog"... sometimes I wonder why words in certain languages actually "beat around the bush" that much and not just call it, what it actually is.

 

[kasmanaft08]

Government immigration and visa laws always surprise me.

If I can't save enough money to cover school costs at the end of the year, I'm considering getting another job like I have now, except in a different country. Maybe, if possible, study at the same time.

I have plenty of time (a year, at least) to figure this out, but I've been casually researching it lately. Holland won't allow anyone over the age of 25 (and will only allow you to take the job once), so that's out...but every country is different. And the more I research it, the weirder and more hypocritical they seem. I'd love to go somewhere like Japan, but I think at the moment I want to stay in Europe, so I've been looking into various countries here...

What surprised me is that it seems the UK won't take Americans for those jobs, but will take countries like Romania and Poland. I'm not sure why that surprised me, but it just did. I looked briefly into a UK passport, which has it's own string of weird and confusing rules and vague guidelines, but with family there (and my parents moving there soon) it might be worth looking into. Regardless, if a job is hard to come by or I can't do school, living with my parents is sort of my only option.

 

[King_Oni]

Government immigration and visa laws always surprise me.

If I can't save enough money to cover school costs at the end of the year, I'm considering getting another job like I have now, except in a different country. Maybe, if possible, study at the same time.

I have plenty of time (a year, at least) to figure this out, but I've been casually researching it lately. Holland won't allow anyone over the age of 25 (and will only allow you to take the job once), so that's out...but every country is different. And the more I research it, the weirder and more hypocritical they seem. I'd love to go somewhere like Japan, but I think at the moment I want to stay in Europe, so I've been looking into various countries here...

What surprised me is that it seems the UK won't take Americans for those jobs, but will take countries like Romania and Poland. I'm not sure why that surprised me, but it just did. I looked briefly into a UK passport, which has it's own string of weird and confusing rules and vague guidelines, but with family there (and my parents moving there soon) it might be worth looking into. Regardless, if a job is hard to come by or I can't do school, living with my parents is sort of my only option.

It seems like a really, really weird catch 22 deal. Is it even possible for you to save up enough money to cover those kinda of costs? Schools aren't that expensive in Holland (as opposed to other countries I guess) but still... I don't know anyone who can pay it out of their own pocket.

 

[kasmanaft08]

It seems like a really, really weird catch 22 deal. Is it even possible for you to save up enough money to cover those kinda of costs? Schools aren't that expensive in Holland (as opposed to other countries I guess) but still... I don't know anyone who can pay it out of their own pocket.

Yeah, it kind of is...

I can do the school out of my pocket, so long as it's the citizen's cost. I can't do it out of pocket if it's an international student cost, since that's even more than the American schools...the only exception would be if I could only pay for a class or semester at first, and then figure out how to get a job- which is really my main issue. But I can't without some sort of visa/permit/citizenship. I have no expenses here, really, so saving up money in a little over a year wouldn't be so bad, even if I can only cover, say, half. But if I can work, it's not so bad.

The Dutch visa was already a massive pain because they didn't undertand my birth certificate (another thing that suprised me, heh). The only way I have a real chance at citizenship through Holland would be to get married, which is a no, or get another work visa and just ride that for 10-15 or so years, another no. That's not even gaurenteed, either, there's apparently a large string of hoops you have to jump through beyond that. I guess its obvious that they're making immigration increasingly more difficult.

But my mother/family is English and holds a British passport and owns a home there. So it's a much better and easier chance, I've been told. But I'm still weary at how easy that is, so I'm giving it obsessive research and thought.

Paperwork is such a *****. -_-

 

[Droopy]

What surprised me is that it seems the UK won't take Americans for those jobs, but will take countries like Romania and Poland. I'm not sure why that surprised me, but it just did.

Yeah, the Polish seem to be the first choice for employers now. I gather that it is due to them willing to work for lower wages and being easy to employ (less hassle and will take almost any job available).

I looked briefly into a UK passport, which has it's own string of weird and confusing rules and vague guidelines, but with family there (and my parents moving there soon) it might be worth looking into. Regardless, if a job is hard to come by or I can't do school, living with my parents is sort of my only option.

If you have family living in the UK then you should be able to get a UK passport. Especially if part of your family is already British.

 

[kasmanaft08]

That my profile page on here has 617 visits. I just now noticed it. Can't be that interesting, heh.

 

[Geordie]

That my profile page on here has 617 visits. I just now noticed it. Can't be that interesting, heh.

It's interesting to know how much we AC users love to see each other's profile pages.

 

[. . .]

Me learning that the paper in my Hiroshige artbook isn't typical paper; it's rice paper.

I knew there was something strange about the paper in the book. It has a strange texture and scent to it.

 

[kasmanaft08]

Me learning that the paper in my Hiroshige artbook isn't typical paper; it's rice paper.

I knew there was something strange about the paper in the book. It has a strange texture and scent to it.

That's really awesome, actually. What book is it again?

 

[. . .]

Me learning that the mixture of aspirin and acetaminophen, which is the combination of drugs Excedrin in the U.S.A. has, is in fact illegal in Canada:

C.09.010. No manufacturer or importer shall, after June 30, 1986, sell a drug for analgesia that contains a combination of

(a) a salt or derivative of salicylic acid with another salt or derivative of salicylic acid or with salicylamide; or

(b) acetaminophen with a salt or derivative of salicylic acid or with salicylamide.

Makes me wonder if one could get in trouble for using American Excedrin in Canada . . .

 

[2010Dolby]

The amount of snow my town got last night :|

Firebirds are sexy cars... but they dont like snow haha

 

[Droopy]

The last thing that surprised me was when I was at a friends (well more of an associate than close friend) birthday party last week. Another friend (friend B) who was also at the party came over to me and said some guy wanted to talk to me. To my surprise I knew this guy from high school. He wasn't friendly with me back in high school as a lot of the people that he hung around with were enemies of mine so it was a bit awkward. Anyway, he seemed alright when talking to me, he asked what I was doing in life since we last met and he was friendly with me, which was a surprise. Maybe it was the drink talking? We started to chat for a while and asked each other how we knew the guy who's birthday it was. Turns out he used to date the cousin of the birthday guy - who is now also friendly/associated with me, through friend B. It's a small world.

 

[. . .]

I noticed that someone on a site was from Chicago and messaged them telling them that I like Wilco, a band that comes from that city. What did they tell me? "I'm going to see Wilco tomorrow night!!"

Initially I thought maybe they were bullshitting but I looked at Wilco's tour dates and sure enough, they're playing in Chicago tonight. Really weirded me out.

 

[. . .]

I was surprised about receiving Carl Sagan's The Demon-Haunted World, a book I ordered more than a month ago, today. Both me and the seller who sold me the book were confident that the book was lost and they gave me a full refund. I received the refund just a few hours before receiving the book. lol

If I'd have received the right edition, I probably would've given the seller their money back. But they sent the wrong edition. I always request a refund when receiving a wrong edition. In a way, I don't dislike receiving wrong editions as it saves me money. I buy from reputable book-sellers and when they send me something that has an ISBN that doesn't match the ISBN of the edition I ordered, I get the book for free.

 

[2010Dolby]

Im completely blown away and speechless about the weather all day today. We recieved RAIN. Not snow... rain. In Nebraska during December its essentially a fact that temperatures all month will be below freezing, which means snow. Im fairly certain that this so called "winter" will go down in Nebraska record books...

 

[. . .]

Two things about Louis Wain (the artist of the cat drawings/paintings I've been posting here and have been using as avatars, profile pics, etc.)

I was surprised upon learning that some people dispute the claim that Louis Wain had schizophrenia, thinking that he may have actually had Asperger's:

Dr. Michael Fitzgerald disputes the claim of schizophrenia, indicating Wain more than likely had Asperger's Syndrome (AS). Of particular note, Fitzgerald indicates that while Wain's art took on a more abstract nature as he grew older, his technique and skill as a painter did not diminish, as one would expect from a schizophrenic. Moreover, elements of visual agnosia are demonstrated in his painting, a key element in some cases of AS. If Wain had visual agnosia, it might have manifested itself merely as an extreme attention to detail.

I was also surprised upon learning that H. G. Wells, a famous science fiction author, was a major fan of Louis Wain's art and was the main person responsible for allowing Wain to transfer over to more pleasant mental institutions than the one he was previously staying at:

H. G. Wells said of him, "He has made the cat his own. He invented a cat style, a cat society, a whole cat world. English cats that do not look and live like Louis Wain cats are ashamed of themselves."

When his sisters could no longer cope with his erratic and occasionally violent behavior, he was finally committed, in 1924, to a pauper ward of Springfield Mental Hospital in Tooting. A year later, he was discovered there and his circumstances were widely publicized, leading to appeals from such figures as H. G. Wells and the personal intervention of the Prime Minister. Wain was transferred to the Bethlem Royal Hospital in Southwark, and again in 1930 to Napsbury Hospital near St Albans in Hertfordshire, north of London. This hospital was relatively pleasant, with a garden and colony of cats, and he spent his final 15 years there in peace. While he became increasingly deluded, his erratic mood swings subsided, and he continued drawing for pleasure. His work from this period is marked by bright colours, flowers, and intricate and abstract patterns, though his primary subject remained the same.

 

[. . .]

I was surprised to learn that there used to be elephant-sized(!) sloths:

Megatherium was one of the largest mammals known, weighing up to eight tons, about as much as an African bull elephant. Although it was primarily a quadruped, its footprints show that it was capable of assuming a bipedal stance. When it stood on its hind legs it was about twenty feet (6 m) tall, twice the height of an elephant. This sloth, like a modern anteater, walked on the sides of its feet because its claws prevented it from putting them flat on the ground. Megatherium species were members of the abundant Pleistocene megafauna, large mammals that lived during the Pleistocene epoch.

Megatherium had a robust skeleton with a large pelvic girdle and a broad muscular tail. Its large size enabled it to feed at heights unreachable by other contemporary herbivores. Rising on its powerful hind legs and using its tail to form a tripod, Megatherium could support its massive body weight while using the curved claws on its long forelegs to pull down branches with the choicest leaves. Its jaw is believed to have housed a long tongue, which it would then use to pull leaves into its mouth, similar to the modern tree sloth.

Some recent morpho-functional analysis indicates that M. americanum was adapted for strong vertical biting. The teeth are hypsodont and bilophodont, and the sagittal section of each loph is triangular with a sharp edge. This suggests the teeth were used for cutting, rather than grinding, and that hard fibrous food was not the primary dietary component.

Richard Fari?a and Ernesto Blanco of the Universidad de la Rep?blica in Montevideo have analysed a fossil skeleton of M. americanum and discovered that its olecranon - the part of the elbow to which the triceps muscle attaches - was very short. This adaptation is found in carnivores and optimises speed rather than strength. The researchers say this would have enabled M. americanum to use its claws like daggers. They suggest that to add nutrients to its diet, Megatherium may have taken over the kills of Smilodon. Based on the estimated strength and mechanical advantage of its biceps, it has been proposed that Megatherium could have overturned adult glyptodonts (large, armored xenarthrans, related to armadillos) as a means of scavenging or hunting these animals. However, other zoologists have described this proposal as "fanciful".

The giant ground sloth lived mostly in groups, but it may have lived singly in caves. While mostly vegeterian, it has been suggested that it may have used its size and strength to take over the kills of sabre-toothed cat Smilodon and to scavenge or hunt large, armored glyptodonts. For millions of years, the sloth had no enemies to bother it, so it was probably a diurnal animal.

That's the coolest **** I've come across on Wikipedia in a long time.