Things I didn’t know
There’s a lot of useless crap floating about in my brain and I regularly stumble through Wikipedia to expand that clutter. People have called me a know-it-all but that is hardly the truth. I just know a lot of random stuff. Sometimes I just make educated guesses and every now and then I make shit up right on the spot. I try and avoid that last practice as much as possible because it annoys the hell out of me when other people do it.
So here’s something I didn’t know: In 1967 – At Groote Schuur Hospital in Cape Town, South Africa, cardiac surgeon Christiaan Barnard performed the first successful human heart transplant on Louis Washkansky. That’s from the “On this day…” section of Wikipedia for today.
Now I happen to find this fascinating. First of all the fact that heart transplants did not exist prior to the birth of disco. I find that disturbing on many levels. Second that it happened in South Africa. In school in the States the only time you ever heard about anything historical about South Africa it was something bad. I had the distinct impression that South Africa was the seat of all evil in the continent of Africa when I was a schoolboy. Little did I know it was much farther north. They never taught us about sociopathic warlords in my little po-dunk school. We never learned anything interesting…. Although I did get to see the movie Shaka Zulu so I guess that was something.
Anyway…. Here’s another fun fact from “On this day…”: In 1904 – The Jovian moon Himalia was discovered by astronomer Charles Dillon Perrine at the Lick Observatory in San Jose, California, USA.
I have no idea what a Jovian moon is (and I refuse to click the link) but this is still odd. Did you know that not only did San Jose, California exist in 1904 but it had been around long enough to have an observatory? Me either! I was under the impression that nothing but mining/ghost towns, gold mines, indians, Emperors of the United States, cactus and petrified trees were the only thing in the western United States prior to Hollywood. Obviously my schooling (or possibly my attention span) was lacking during history classes. Whatever it was, it seems that there were other cities than San Francisco before the St. Louis World’s Fair (where ice cream cones and Dr. Pepper were introduced!).
History can be fun if you’re bored and have an Internet connection. It can also show you how little you really know about the world.
Don’t dis San Joser. Even though I grew up in Silicon Valley (side note: I think it’s funny that the city that was home to some of the key tech firms is almost unknown even in the Bay Area. I grew up in Santa Clara and always had to explain to people from East Bay or the Peninsula where exactly that was: next to San Jose) my recollection of CA history is pretty sparse. As I recall most of the mission system was in place by the early 1800’s and I vaguelly recall statehood coming in 1848 (not personally recall, obviously) though I am probably wrong about that too. I could look it up, yet I’m lazy.
Your our home state of California does have a bit of history.
Truthfully I have no idea where Silicon Valley is. I knew it was in California but I imagined it being this strange glass arcology in a valley in the middle of the desert. But my imagination is a little odd sometimes….
Yay, this is something I know… or perhaps I know… :-)
Well, the Jovian planets are the gas/ice balls, anything from Jupiter out to dwarf planet Pluto. So a Jovian moon must belong to one of them, though I’m not sure which one. We only really cover the “most popular” of each of the Jovians. I was reading my astronomy text today and learned about a moon that orbits Neptune called Galatea. I filed that away for a possible future animal name, as that sounds really pretty.