Astonishing Facts....

[Dr Jekyll]

Ayahuasca said:

Polar Bears, despite being fast, powerful and very aggressive predators, have never succeeded in catching and eating a penguin.

Somebody did try to introduce some penguins to the Arctic a few years back, wasn't successful, perhaps one or two did get eaten by Polar bears. No proof of course,

[langtounlad]

Did they eat the wrappers also?

[Frank7]

Dr Jekyll said:

Seti said:

Dr Jekyll said:

'Mortgage' is actually a French word meaning 'death wage'.

Surely it translates as ‘dead weight’?

Perhaps in new fangled French but in proper medieval French it's more like 'wage' or possibly 'promise' or 'pledge' in the monetary sense.

It's one of those French words that got turned into an English one by dropping the 'G' and sticking a 'W' on.

Like Guerre, or Guardian, or Guarantee.

My brain went into stutter mode at that last line, then I thought, guerre is war, so if you make it wuerre, it's close to war, guardian would perhaps become wuardain, or warden, and guarantee wuarantee, or warranty.
Dead weight translates literally to mort poids, poids being weight, poids-lourd is heavy weight, trucks or lorries are called poids-lourds in France, the French word for mortgage is hypothéque.

[gothatway]

Six Figs said:

Switzerland is one of the only countries in Europe ...

I've never been able to understand that construct. What on earth does it mean ?

[anonymous-user]

gothatway said:

I've never been able to understand that construct. What on earth does it mean ?

I know what it means, what is wrong with the construct?

To help you, only is not a number, the phrase is used,, as it is possible other countries may eat cat meat but not as widely publicised.

http://www.dictionary.com/browse/only

''adjective
5.
being the single one or the relatively few of the kind:
This is the only pencil I can find.''

Edited by Six Figs on Sunday 11th February 21:57

Edited by Six Figs on Sunday 11th February 22:00

[Pvapour]

Muntu said:

Ayahuasca said:

Polar Bears, despite being fast, powerful and very aggressive predators, have never succeeded in catching and eating a penguin.

Polar bears have black skin

And tongues, chow chow dogs share the same gene and also have black tongues

[glazbagun]

gothatway said:

Six Figs said:

Switzerland is one of the only countries in Europe ...

I've never been able to understand that construct. What on earth does it mean ?

The only countries in Europe to allow ABC are X, Y, Z and Switzerland. Thus Switzerland is one of the only countries in Europe to allow ABC.

[anonymous-user]

glazbagun said:

The only countries in Europe to allow ABC are X, Y, Z and Switzerland. Thus Switzerland is one of the only countries in Europe to allow ABC.

He's nitpicking with the grammatical phrasing, not the fact...

PH where trying to make people look small matters..

[RATATTAK]

Six Figs said:

glazbagun said:

The only countries in Europe to allow ABC are X, Y, Z and Switzerland. Thus Switzerland is one of the only countries in Europe to allow ABC.

He's nitpicking with the grammatical phrasing, not the fact...

PH where trying to make people look small matters..

And he's taken it to the 'Phrases that annoy you most" thread

[JagerT]

Muntu said:

Ayahuasca said:

Polar Bears, despite being fast, powerful and very aggressive predators, have never succeeded in catching and eating a penguin.

It may be unlikely but can't possibly be regarded as a fact.

[anonymous-user]

RATATTAK said:

And he's taken it to the 'Phrases that annoy you most" thread

This exceeding trifling witling, considering ranting criticizing concerning adopting fitting wording being exhibiting transcending learning, was displaying, notwithstanding ridiculing, surpassing boasting swelling reasoning, respecting correcting erring writing, and touching detecting deceiving arguing during debating.

[gothatway]

Six Figs said:

He's nitpicking with the grammatical phrasing, not the fact...

PH where trying to make people look small matters..

Hmm, need a mirror ?

[underwhelmist]

Whoopi Goldberg has no eyebrows.

[davhill]

Apropos the black-skinned polar bear, a shaved tiger is stripy. Nothing on QI about shaving a zebra though.

[C&C]

JagerT said:

Muntu said:

Ayahuasca said:

Polar Bears, despite being fast, powerful and very aggressive predators, have never succeeded in catching and eating a penguin.

It may be unlikely but can't possibly be regarded as a fact.

Maybe a whoosh parrot on the way, but I believe the point is that Polar Bears live in the Arctic, and there are no penguins living natively in the Arctic - they live (among other places) in the Antarctic.

[Dr Jekyll]

[quote=C&C]

Maybe a whoosh parrot on the way, but I believe the point is that Polar Bears live in the Arctic, and there are no penguins living natively in the Arctic - they live (among other places) in the Antarctic.
[/quote]

And there aren't any bears in the Antarctic, that's why it's called the Antarctic.

[Antony Moxey]

Six Figs said:

gothatway said:

I've never been able to understand that construct. What on earth does it mean ?

I know what it means, what is wrong with the construct?

To help you, only is not a number, the phrase is used,, as it is possible other countries may eat cat meat but not as widely publicised.

http://www.dictionary.com/browse/only

''adjective
5.
being the single one or the relatively few of the kind:
This is the only pencil I can find.''

Edited by Six Figs on Sunday 11th February 21:57

Edited by Six Figs on Sunday 11th February 22:00

Because it says "one of the only". That doesn't make sense. As has been said previously 'one of only a few' or 'one of only <insert number>' but not 'one of THE only'. It neither reads right or looks right.

[dudleybloke]

Dr Jekyll said:

[quote=C&C]

Maybe a whoosh parrot on the way, but I believe the point is that Polar Bears live in the Arctic, and there are no penguins living natively in the Arctic - they live (among other places) in the Antarctic.

And there aren't any bears in the Antarctic, that's why it's called the Antarctic.

They got eaten by the Ants.

[Ayahuasca]

Muntu said:

Ayahuasca said:

Polar Bears, despite being fast, powerful and very aggressive predators, have never succeeded in catching and eating a penguin.

Polar bears have black skin

Maybe they lived in Ancient Britain.

[TwigtheWonderkid]

dudleybloke said:

They got eaten by the Ants.

Is that why there are no headache tablets in Australia, because the parrots ate 'em all.