Popular Post Chindie Posted December 9, 2018 VT Supporter Popular Post Share Posted December 9, 2018 (edited) This creature, which looks like a bad photoshop of a fox, is a Maned Wolf. It's a weird and interesting being. Despite looking like a fox crossed with a deer, it isn't a fox. And despite its name, it isn't a wolf either. It's a completely unique creature, its closest living relative being the bushdog, which looks absolutely nothing like it. Why does it look like it was cobbled together from the leftovers of a bad taxidermist? It's believed, rather like one of the theories of how hominids came to walk upright, that the wolf's habitat of grasslands meant being tall and able to see over the tall grass was an advantage, and so evolution did it's bit. Presumably at some point it will also 'grow into' its legs, as at the moment it appears to be the canine version of a gangly teenager. Unlike many candids, it doesn't form packs or live in a community either. It hunts and lives alone, only encountering others during breeding season. It gets stranger though. The maned wolf often specifically shits on ant hills. The wolf is omnivorous, and heavily reliant on various fruits and vegetables in its diet. Leafcutter ants use the wolf's shit to fertilize underground fungus farms that they feed on (yeah ants can be farmers too), but they ditch the seeds in the shit (as having a tree growing in your house is a bad idea). In turn this means the seeds get distributed and ensure the wolf has food in the long term. It's piss is also bizarre. It smells like cannabis. It is suspected that the urine contains a chemical pyrazine, which is what makes weed smell like weed. The smell is so strong and similar that Rotterdam Zoo was once investigated by police who were alerted to suspicions of someone smoking pot there. The smell is believed to be helpful to the wolf in marking territory, as a solitary creature with wide roaming home areas, it benefits from having scent markings that are strong enough to last long after it's been somewhere. So there, the maned wolf. The canine world's Kate Moss, badly named, lonely with no close relatives and not liking company, with weird toilet habits and wee like a stoner's living room. Which probably explains the loner thing Edited December 9, 2018 by Chindie 9 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
VILLAMARV Posted December 10, 2018 Share Posted December 10, 2018 21 hours ago, Chindie said: it's piss is also bizarre. It smells like cannabis. It is suspected that the urine contains a chemical pyrazine, which is what makes weed smell like weed. The smell is so strong and similar that Rotterdam Zoo was once investigated by police who were alerted to suspicions of someone smoking pot there. The smell is believed to be helpful to the wolf in marking territory, as a solitary creature with wide roaming home areas, it benefits from having scent markings that are strong enough to last long after it's been somewhere. They have some at Paignton Zoo. The smell thing is very real. Watching people double taking and looking around the place is always good for a laugh when it comes to people watching. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The_Rev Posted December 26, 2018 Share Posted December 26, 2018 US Aircraft Carriers each have a postal address. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mjmooney Posted December 26, 2018 VT Supporter Share Posted December 26, 2018 7 minutes ago, The_Rev said: US Aircraft Carriers each have a postal address. Mr & Mrs Admiral Schultz, USN "The Poplars" 22b Acacia Crescent USS Nimitz Basingstoke BS19 3BD Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mandy Lifeboats Posted December 26, 2018 Share Posted December 26, 2018 All mammals, regardless of size, take an average of 21 seconds to empty a full bladder. Either your God created them that way, or its a trait that shows mammals evolved from a common ancestor. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post V01 Posted December 26, 2018 Popular Post Share Posted December 26, 2018 That So Solid Crew song makes sense now. 10 8 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NurembergVillan Posted December 26, 2018 Moderator Share Posted December 26, 2018 27 minutes ago, V01 said: That So Solid Crew song makes sense now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HanoiVillan Posted December 27, 2018 Share Posted December 27, 2018 26% of people living in the world today were born during or after the year 2004. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mark Albrighton Posted December 29, 2018 VT Supporter Share Posted December 29, 2018 This might be something that people just know, but it’s something I was completely unaware of. You don’t have leap years in years that are divisible by 100 but are not divisible by 400. So there was a leap year in 2000, but there won’t be one in 2100, there wasn’t one in 1900. The last one that occurred at the start of a century was 1600. These are “century leap years” and the next one will be in 2400 and as with all century leap years, 1st January will be a Saturday and 29th February will be a Tuesday. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stevo985 Posted January 10, 2019 VT Supporter Share Posted January 10, 2019 1 hour ago, AvfcRigo82 said: I wonder if the divorce papers will arrive in a stupidly oversized box full of needless packaging.. From the jokes thread but the point is relevant in here. I can't find anything from Amazon to verify this, but the story is that Amazon uses massive boxes sometimes because they have a complex algorithm that works out the size of boxes needed to perfectly fill a truck along with the other items. So you might get an SD card in a massive box because it needs to use up more space to make sure everything fits together perfectly and doesn't leave any space in the truck. It's like a massive game of tetris to efficiently use space and stop things sliding around. They claim it actually reduces waste. Can't verify that 100% like I said, but possible I guess. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stevo985 Posted February 25, 2019 VT Supporter Share Posted February 25, 2019 A licence to sell hot dogs from a stand outside the zoo in Central Park in New York for one year costs $289,500 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BOF Posted February 25, 2019 Moderator Share Posted February 25, 2019 29 minutes ago, Stevo985 said: A licence to sell hot dogs from a stand outside the zoo in Central Park in New York for one year costs $289,500 They've obviously done the maths, but I don't care if it makes sense. That's the kind of pressure I don't need in my life! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stevo985 Posted February 25, 2019 VT Supporter Share Posted February 25, 2019 2 minutes ago, BOF said: They've obviously done the maths, but I don't care if it makes sense. That's the kind of pressure I don't need in my life! It needs to generate around $425,000 a year in revenue to break even (It doesn't just sell hot dogs) Article here Quote The Six-Figure Price Tag for Selling a $2 Hot Dog Call it the half-million-dollar hot dog cart. Mohammad Mastafa of Astoria, Queens, has to sell almost that much in drinks and snacks annually to break even on the pushcart he owns at Fifth Avenue and East 62nd Street near the Central Park Zoo. He pays the city’s parks department $289,500 a year just for the right to operate his single cart there. More on link 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chrisp65 Posted February 25, 2019 Share Posted February 25, 2019 Last summer we were knocking around that London and bought 4 ice creams in Hyde Park. Once I'd paid I asked 'can we have four free flakes?' The guy just looked at me for a second and then said, yeah. Gave me 4 free flakes. The kids were convinced I did some sought of mind thing on him. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Xela Posted February 25, 2019 Share Posted February 25, 2019 1 hour ago, Stevo985 said: A licence to sell hot dogs from a stand outside the zoo in Central Park in New York for one year costs $289,500 Similar to this, the cost of a taxi licence in HK regularly tops over $5m - $7m Hong Kong Dollars (£486k - £681k GBP) on the market There are 18,163 licences and no new ones have been issued in 20 years. You can sell existing ones though to the highest bidder. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chindie Posted February 25, 2019 VT Supporter Share Posted February 25, 2019 40 minutes ago, Xela said: Similar to this, the cost of a taxi licence in HK regularly tops over $5m - $7m Hong Kong Dollars (£486k - £681k GBP) on the market There are 18,163 licences and no new ones have been issued in 20 years. You can sell existing ones though to the highest bidder. The New York City taxi 'medallion', the licence to operate basically, 5 years ago cost over $1m. It was so expensive it meant most taxis were basically run by a syndicate, people pooling finances to run a cab in essence. That and loans. Today it's caused another problem. The 'medallion' is now worth far less thanks to Uber and Lyft, so the guys who borrowed enormous amounts of cash to buy into the game in the last decade or so have been completely ****. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Xela Posted February 25, 2019 Share Posted February 25, 2019 8 minutes ago, Chindie said: The New York City taxi 'medallion', the licence to operate basically, 5 years ago cost over $1m. It was so expensive it meant most taxis were basically run by a syndicate, people pooling finances to run a cab in essence. That and loans. Today it's caused another problem. The 'medallion' is now worth far less thanks to Uber and Lyft, so the guys who borrowed enormous amounts of cash to buy into the game in the last decade or so have been completely ****. Same in HK. We used Uber a few times when Taxi's weren't available. I think one company owns 900 of the HK licences and then they lease a licence out to a driver on a 24 hour period. He then subleases it out for 12 ours within that 24 hour period The taxi and licence is basically used 24 hours a day. In a bustling city like HK that is do-able - it's always busy so you can always catch fares. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bickster Posted February 25, 2019 Moderator Share Posted February 25, 2019 3 hours ago, Xela said: Similar to this, the cost of a taxi licence in HK regularly tops over $5m - $7m Hong Kong Dollars (£486k - £681k GBP) on the market There are 18,163 licences and no new ones have been issued in 20 years. You can sell existing ones though to the highest bidder. 3 hours ago, Chindie said: The New York City taxi 'medallion', the licence to operate basically, 5 years ago cost over $1m. It was so expensive it meant most taxis were basically run by a syndicate, people pooling finances to run a cab in essence. That and loans. Today it's caused another problem. The 'medallion' is now worth far less thanks to Uber and Lyft, so the guys who borrowed enormous amounts of cash to buy into the game in the last decade or so have been completely ****. 2 hours ago, Xela said: Same in HK. We used Uber a few times when Taxi's weren't available. I think one company owns 900 of the HK licences and then they lease a licence out to a driver on a 24 hour period. He then subleases it out for 12 ours within that 24 hour period The taxi and licence is basically used 24 hours a day. In a bustling city like HK that is do-able - it's always busy so you can always catch fares. This is actually why Uber exists. The same problem exists in this country. Hackney Carriage Licences can be transferred between people and licence numbers are capped so they gain value on a semi-official black market. Councils could put a stop to this overnight by making the plates non-transferable and introduce a rule of one plate per person. The council would lose no income and there'd be almost enough plates for all the drivers. The costs would come down overnight. The only people that would lose out are the plate barons. But tbh, I've made a good living on the other side of the trade for over 2 decades so II don't care 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KenjiOgiwara Posted February 25, 2019 Share Posted February 25, 2019 Russia didn't acknowledge beer as alcoholic beverage until 2011. Anything below 10% alcohol was considered a food item. 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chindie Posted February 27, 2019 VT Supporter Share Posted February 27, 2019 Sega, the renowned Japanese games company most famous for the Mega Drive and their rivalry with Nintendo in the early 90s, has been out of the home console business for as long as they were in it. They released their their first console, the SG1000, in 1983, and dropped out of the console business in 2001 following the Dreamcast being a failure too far after one disaster after another from the Mega Drive on. Since then they've been a third party developer and publisher (and released an awful lot of shit, running their crown jewel titles through the dirt). Learning this made me feel **** old. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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