Groucho's Fact Hunt

[Eggs]

Some dubious 'facts' there, first one I googled :

Do ants sleep? | Notes and Queries | guardian.co.uk

www.theguardian.com

Can't find any reference to the Guinness book of records fact.

Cba looking at the others.

…I’ve been unsuccessfully trying to lick my elbow all morning.

 

[Eggs]

 

[degsy]

Why;
are small electric lights called Fairy Lights.

Because short version;
They were literally very small (battery powered) lights on Fairies...or Faeries

Because Long Version;

Dating back 135 years, it was at the Savoy Theatre in London that the term ‘fairy lights’ was first coined.
Opened in 1881, the Savoy was the first public building in the world to be lit entirely by electricity, fitted out with 1,200 incandescent light bulbs created by North East inventor Sir Joseph Swan.
A year later, Swan was commissioned by the theatre’s owner - Richard D'Oyly Carte - to create miniature lights to adorn the dresses of the lead fairies on the opening night of Gilbert and Sullivan’s Iolanthe.
The show opened to critical acclaim and led to dresses adorned with lights powered by small battery packs hidden beneath the folds of the cloth becoming the must-have fashion accessory of high society ladies.
And a year later Edward Johnson, a colleague of Swan’s US rival Sir Thomas Edison, became the first person to put them on a Christmas Tree.​

 

[davep]

That's cheating @Eggs!

 

[DualityNSNO]

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The tennis one has a sly dig at Americans which I am a fan of, but (naturally) the game came to Britain first. Also not a known quantity if it's that or other roots - the egg theory is prominent as it was also used for cricket's duck obviously, but it's largely a fan theory. Others such theories are that when you're at 0 you're playing for the love of the game (which does sound like a French things to say) and similar, and it just remained for the start (as when you start it means you're also loving the game...?). French are weird as always.

The cloud 9 thing isn't true - first off there's 10 levels, not 9, and the original is "on cloud 7", similar to "seventh heaven". It's a relatively new idiom/phenomenon that it's cloud 9.

 

[Eggs]

….Nicholas Monsarrat, author of The Cruel Sea was born in Rodney St, Liverpool;

 

[Eggs]

….1931, a vending machine that sold a lit cigarette for 1 penny;

 

[degsy]

….1931, a vending machine that sold a lit cigarette for 1 penny;

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A penny loose was still a thing in the 60s

 

[Eggs]

A penny loose was still a thing in the 60s

…yep, I remember folk asking for a ‘loosey’ in the newsagents.

 

[kev]

A penny loose was still a thing in the 60s

Definitely!
I've never seen lit cigs for sale though.

 

[Eggs]

 

[Eggs]

 

[Eggs]

 

[Eggs]

 

[NeilMorepies]