So why doesn’t Thursday get all the love it deserves? It probably because it’s just that…Thursday. There are rarely interesting happenings that take place on Thursdays, so it tends to fall to the wayside and almost go unnoticed among the other exciting days of the week.

What do you say? Think we should show it some more love?

Here are some interesting facts about Thursdays:

In countries that use the Sunday-first convention, Thursday is defined as the fifth day of the week.

The name is derived from Old English Þūnresdæg and Middle English Thuresday meaning “Thor’s Day.”

The astrological and astronomical sign of the planet Jupiter is sometimes used to represent Thursday.

In the Christian tradition, Maundy Thursday or Holy Thursday is the Thursday before Easter — the day on which the Last Supper occurred. Also known as Sheer Thursday in the United Kingdom, it is traditionally a day of cleaning and giving out Maundy money there.

In the Eastern Orthodox Church, Thursdays are dedicated to the Apostles and Saint Nicholas.

In Buddhist Thailand Thursday is considered the “Teacher’s Day”, and it is believed that one should begin one’s education on this auspicious day. Thai students still pay homages to their teachers in specific ceremony always held on a selected Thursday. And graduation day in Thai universities, which can vary depending on each university, almost always will be held on a Thursday.

In the Thai solar calendar, the colour associated with Thursday is orange.

In the USSR of the 1970s and 1980s Thursday was the “Fish Day”, when the nation’s foodservice establishments were supposed to serve fish (rather than meat) dishes.

In some high schools in the United States during the 1950s and the 1960s, it was believed that if someone wore green on Thursdays, it meant that he or she was gay.

source: tipsywriter.com

We’re obviously still battling against several issues today, but seeing the things my mother and grandmother were forced to endure has really opened my eyes. I mean, I always knew things were different back in the day, but I can’t believe how long it took for a wife to not be legally classified as “subordinate” to her husband — much less, how difficult it was for a single gal to get her own bank account and credit card.

Some of these setbacks were cleared up in the 1970s and ’80s, but a few of these restrictions were still in place recently.

1. Open A Bank Account

At least, not without their husband or a male relative’s permission until the Equal Credit Opportunity Act of 1974.

2. Serve Jury Duty

Slowly, states separately allowed women to sit in the jury box over the years until Mississippi finally became the last state to legalize it in 1968.

3. Practice Law

Even if they had gone through all the years of school and passed every test, women could still be denied the right to plead a client’s case until 1971.

4. Take Birth Control Pills

The contraceptive was approved in 1960, but it was still banned in several states for the next few years.

5. Go On Maternity Leave

If they were able to have a job, they most often lost it when they became pregnant until the Pregnancy Discrimination Act of 1978.

6. Breastfeed In Public

Public areas were still able to prohibit mothers from breastfeeding until a bill was finally passed by Congress, making this discrimination illegal.

7. Attend An Ivy League University

Harvard would not allow women applicants until 1977, but Yale and Princeton were only slightly ahead by admitting their first female students in 1969.

8. Attend A Military Academy

The first female students at West Point Academy were not accepted until 1976.

9. Run The Boston Marathon

The legendary marathon was an all-male event until 1972.

10. Serve In Combat

Despite all of the hard work women have put into the military for decades, they weren’t allowed on the front lines until very recently in 2013.

11. Become An Astronaut

NASA denied women until Sally Ride broke the mold in 1978.

source: littlethings.com

What’s missing from the expressions? Can you fill in the gaps?

1. the …… of the iceberg

2. to …… a client’s case

3. birth …… pills

4. …… to vote

5. suffrage ……

6. to sit in the …… box

7. to go on maternity ……

Key

1. tip

2. plead

3. control

4. right

5. movement

6. jury

7. leave

2. London was called Londonium, Ludenwic, and Ludenburg in the past.

3. French was the official language for about 300 years.

4. The shortest war against England was with Zanzibar in 1896. Zanzibar surrendered after 38 minutes.

5. There is nowhere in Britain that is more than 74.5 miles from the sea.

6. The first telephone directory published in England contained 25 names.

7. While the Great Fire of London was largely destructive, the casualty rate was just 8.

8. The first hot chocolate store opened in London.

9. There are over 300 languages spoken in British schools.

10. The English drink more tea than any other nation in the world.

11. In the Medieval Times, animals could be put on trial for crimes (and be sentenced to death!)

12. The music of “The Star Spangled Banner” (the American national anthem) was created by an Englishman.

13. “Pygg” used to mean “clay” in olden day English. People kept their coins in clay jars that were called “pygg jars”, which have evolved into what we currently call piggy banks.

14. Buckingham Palace has its own police station.

15. Chickens outnumber humans in England, three to one.

source: ukingdom.co.uk

2. Beetles taste like apples,wasps like pine nuts, and worms like fried bacon.

3. Of all the words in the English language, the word ‘set’ has the most definitions.

4. What is called a “French kiss” in the English speaking world is known as an “English kiss” in France.

5. “Almost” is the longest word in the English language with all the letters in alphabetical order.

6. “Rhythm” is the longest English word without a vowel.

7.  In 1386, a pig in France was executed by public hanging for the murder of a child.

8. A cockroach can live several weeks with its head cut off.

9. Human thigh bones are stronger than concrete.

10. You can’t kill yourself by holding your breath.

11. There is a city called Rome on every continent.

12. Your heart beats over 100,000 times a day.

13. Horatio Nelson, one of England’s most illustrious admirals was throughout his life, never able to find a cure for his sea-sickness.

14. Right handed people live, on average, nine years longer than left-handed people

15. Your ribs move about 5 million times a year, every time you breathe.

16. The elephant is the only mammal that can’t jump.

17. One quarter of the bones in your body, are in your feet.

18. Like fingerprints, everyone’s tongue print is different.

19. The first known transfusion of blood was performed as early as 1667, when Jean-Baptiste, transfused two pints of blood from a sheep to a young man

20. Fingernails grow nearly 4 times faster than toenails.

21. Most dust particles in your house are made from dead skin.

22. The present population of 5 billion plus people of the world is predicted to become 15 billion by 2080.

23. Women blink nearly twice as much as men.

24. Honey is the only food that does not spoil. Honey found in the tombs of Egyptian pharaohs has been tasted by archaeologists and found edible.

25. Months that begin on a Sunday will always have a “Friday the 13th.”

source: worldenglish.org

Words, words, words…. Which word is it? Do you remember?

1. It has the same pronunciation even if you remove its four last letters.

2. It has the most definitions in English.

3. It’s the longest word in English with all its letters in alphabetical order.

4. It’s is the longest English word without a vowel.

Key

1. queue

2. set

3. almost

4. rhythm

And what about animals?

1. They taste like apples.

2. They taste like pine nuts.

3. They taste like fried bacon.

4. A …… was executed by public hanging for the murder of a child.

5. It can live for weeks with its head cut off.

6. It’s the only mammal that can’t jump.

Key

1. beetles

2. wasps

3. worms

4. pig

5. a cockroach

6. elephant

1. ANGELINA JOLIE

After Angelina Jolie planted a kiss on her brother and made the world wrinkle their noses, she went onstage and collected a Best Supporting Actress Oscar for her role as Lisa in Girl, Interrupted. She later presented the trophy to her mother, Marcheline Bertrand. The statuette may have been boxed up and put into storage with the rest of Marcheline’s belongings when she died in 2007, but it hasn’t yet surfaced. “I didn’t actually lose it,” said Jolie, “but nobody knows where it is at the moment.”

2. WHOOPI GOLDBERG

In 2002, Whoopi Goldberg sent her Ghost Best Supporting Actress Oscar back to the Academy to have it cleaned and detailed, because apparently you can do that. The Academy then sent the Oscar on to R.S. Owens Co. of Chicago, the company that manufactures the trophies. When it arrived in the Windy City, however, the package was empty. It appeared that someone had opened the UPS package, removed the Oscar, then neatly sealed it all back up and sent it on its way. It was later found in a trash can at an airport in Ontario, California. The Oscar was returned to the Academy, who returned it to Whoopi without cleaning it. “Oscar will never leave my house again,” she said.

3. OLYMPIA DUKAKIS

When Olympia Dukakis’ Moonstruck Oscar was stolen from her home in 1989, she called the Academy to see if it could be replaced. “For $78,” they said, and she agreed that it seemed like a fair price. It was the only thing taken from the house.

4. MARLON BRANDO

“I don’t know what happened to the Oscar they gave me for On the Waterfront,” Marlon Brando wrote in his autobiography. “Somewhere in the passage of time it disappeared.” He also doesn’t know what happened to the Oscar that he had Sacheen Littlefeather accept for him in 1973. “The Motion Picture Academy may have sent it to me, but if it did, I don’t know where it is now.”

5. JEFF BRIDGES

Jeff Bridges had just won his Oscar in 2010 for his portrayal of alcoholic country singer Bad Blake in Crazy Heart, but it was already missing by the next year’s ceremony, where he was up for another one. He lost to Colin Firth for The King’s Speech. “It’s been in a few places since last year but I haven’t seen it for a while now,” he admitted. “I’m hoping it will turn up, especially now that I haven’t won a spare! But Colin deserves it. I just hope he looks after it better.” Which brings us to…

6. COLIN FIRTH

Perhaps Jeff Bridges secretly cursed the British actor as he said those words, because Firth nearly left his new trophy on a toilet tank the very night he received it. After a night of cocktails at the Oscar after-parties in 2011, Firth allegedly had to be chased down by a bathroom attendant, who had found the eight-pound statuette in the bathroom stall. Notice we said allegedly: Shortly after those reports surfaced, Firth’s rep issued a statement saying the “story is completely untrue. Though it did give us a good laugh.”

7. MATT DAMON

When newbie writers Matt Damon and Ben Affleck took home Oscars for writing Good Will Hunting in 1998, it was one of those amazing Academy Award moments. Now, though, Matt Damon isn’t sure where his award went. “I know it ended up at my apartment in New York, but unfortunately, we had a flood when one of the sprinklers went off when my wife and I were out of town and that was the last I saw of it,” said Damon.

8. MARGARET O’BRIEN

In 1945, seven-year-old Margaret O’Brien was presented with a Juvenile Academy Award for being the outstanding child actress of the year. About 10 years later, the O’Briens’ maid took the award home to polish, as she had done before, but never came back to work. The missing Oscar was forgotten about when O’Brien’s mother died shortly thereafter, and when Margaret finally remembered to call the maid, the number had been disconnected. She ended up receiving a replacement from the Academy.

There’s a happy ending to this story, though. In 1995, a couple of guys were picking their way through a flea market when they happened across the Oscar. They put it up for auction, which is when word got back to the Academy that the missing trophy had resurfaced. The guys who found the Oscar pulled it from auction and presented it, in person, to Margaret O’Brien. “I’ll never give it to anyone to polish again,” she said.

9. BING CROSBY

For years, Bing Crosby’s Oscar for 1944’s Going My Way had been on display at his alma mater, Gonzaga University. In 1972, students walked into the school’s library to find that the 13-inch statue had been replaced with a three-inch Mickey Mouse figurine instead. A week later, the award was found, unharmed, in the university chapel. “I wanted to make people laugh,” the anonymous thief later told the school newspaper.

10. HATTIE MCDANIEL

Hattie McDaniel, famous for her Supporting Actress win as Mammy in Gone with the Wind, donated her Best Actress Oscar to Howard University. It was displayed in the fine arts complex for a time, but went missing sometime in the 1960s. No one seems to know exactly when or how, but there are rumors that the Oscar was unceremoniously dumped into the Potomac by students angered by racial stereotypes such as the one she portrayed in the film.

source: mentalfloss

Can you match the Oscar winners and the facts or quotations?

Key:

1. e

2. i.

3. a.

4. j.

5. g.

6. b.

7. h.

8. c.

9. d.

10. f.

Some people truly have a gift for moving to the music, but even many of them may have a tough time keeping up with these creatures.

Here are 10 animals that could own the dance floor.

Number 10. Cockatoos. A bird named Snowball rose to Internet fame when video of him keeping time with The Backstreet Boys went viral. Scientists did some further studies and learned that he can switch up his rhythm depending upon what’s playing.

Number 9. Peacock Spiders. These fuzzy little arachnids put on quite a show, and they do it in the name of love. As part of their mating ritual the males dance around and flourish their elaborately colored tail-flaps in hopes of getting some female attention. It’s a lot of effort, but getting the girl is pretty important. Failure comes with the risk of being eaten by the very lady they’re trying towoo.

Number 8. Laysan Albatrosses. Dancing with a partner can be tough, particularly when up to 25 unique moves are involved, but these birds have risen to the challenge. At some point in time they even added a segment where they click their bills together.

Number 7. Dung Beetles. Through the use of props, these insects have turned what would otherwise be a modest jig into the equivalent of a Broadway-level production. Upon gathering a big ball of excrement to take home and feed to their young, a beetle will climb on top of it and move about as a means of getting their bearings.

Number 6. Bees. Honeybees were experts in the art of interpretive dance before that was even a thing. Workers who have found a food source alert the rest of their hive to the bounty by shaking their bodies. The order and number of wiggles let the others know where to go looking for their next meal.

Number 5.Manakins. Michael Jackson may have made the moonwalk famous, but males of this bird species have been doing it a lot longer. They have also perfected using their bodies as musical instruments, such as a guitar, meaning they never need a backup band or a music track.

Number 4. Frogs. There are 14 species of them in particular, all of which live in India, that display a particular gift for strong, extended leg movements. Their neighborhoods tend to be filled with the sounds of rushing streams, so it’s believed they developed their chorus line-like skills as a means of communicating without having to yell over the noise.

Number 3. Sea Lions. One who has shown a particular natural talent for getting down is Ronan, a female who lives at the University of California, Santa Cruz. She seems to prefer to groove along to disco and boy bands, but in a pinch will make do with nothing but a metronome.

Number 2. Gorillas. Some animals are naturals. Take Zola, a nine-year-old who once lived at the Calgary Zoo. Most dancers need a rhythm to grab onto, but not this one. He choreographed and performed his break-dancing routine sans accompaniment – the music was added later.

Number 1. Birds-Of-Paradise. Instruction will only get one so far. To achieve greatness, practice and determination are required, and that is something these birds truly understand. Young males inherit the basic steps from their fathers, but spend years refining their performances. Ultimately, they determine what the next generation will learn.

Which animals do you think are the best dancers?

A collection of incredible facts that even the most dedicated visitor to the Hundred Acre Wood might not know.

1. THE SILLY OLD BEAR WAS BASED ON A REAL, YOUNG ONE.

During World War I, a Canadian soldier named Harry Colebourn made a pet of a black bear cub he bought from a hunter for $20. Named Winnipeg—or “Winnie” for short—the bear became his troop’s mascot and later a resident of the London Zoological Gardens. There, she was an adored attraction, especially to a little boy named Christopher Robin Milne, son of author A.A. Milne. In fact, the boy loved Winnie so much that he named his own teddy after her.

2. CHRISTOPHER ROBIN INSPIRED HIS FATHER’S GREATEST WORKS.

In the 1920s, A.A. Milne began writing collections of stories and poems that became the books When We Were Very Young (which introduced a bear named Edward and a swan named Pooh), The House at Pooh Corner, Now We Are Six, and Winnie-The-Pooh. It was these stories where Christopher Robin’s adored toy animals Pooh, Tigger, Piglet, Eeyore, Kanga, and Roo made their literary debuts. Most of the original toys can be seen on display at the New York Public Library—except for Roo, who went missing in an apple orchard in the 1930s. The likes of Owl and Rabbit were included to loop in some of the fauna that frolicked outside the Milne family home.

3. ILLUSTRATOR E.H. SHEPARD AMBUSHED MILNE FOR THE JOB OF DRAWING POOH.

Shepard and Milne shared a mutual colleague in English humourist E.V. Lucas, who believed the former would be perfect for the tricky task of bringing Milne’s fantasy world to life in delicate drawings. But Milne was reluctant to hire a political cartoonist, so Shepard took the initiative. As recounted by Milne’s old neighbour, Laurence Irving, Shepard wandered Ashdown Forest, the inspiration for Milne’s mythical woods, and created a portfolio of sketches. Then he turned up unannounced at Milne’s home, where he handed over his portfolio to Milne and won his approval.

4. A.A. MILNE WAS A SOLDIER AND A PLAYWRIGHT BEFORE POOH DOMINATED HIS LEGACY.

In World War I, he served in the Royal Warwickshire Regiment before being conscripted to Military Intelligence as a propagandist. His experiences inspired Peace With Honour, which denounced the war. He was an assistant editor at the magazine Punch, which is how he came to get involved with Shepard and Lucas. And between 1903 and 1925, Milne published 18 plays and three novels, all before publishing a word on Winnie the Pooh.

5. WINNIE’S LATIN TRANSLATION IS THE ONLY LATIN BOOK TO EVER CRACK THE NEW YORK TIMES BEST SELLER LIST.

Titled Winnie Ille Pu, the 1960 release translated by Dr. Alexander Lenard (Lénárd Sándor, in his original Hungarian name) stayed on the coveted list for 20 weeks, and ultimately demanded 21 printings, selling 125,000 copies. This accomplishment spoke in part to the book itself, which the Times called ”the greatest book a dead language has ever known.” But it’s also evidence of Pooh’s popularity. The adventures of this honey-loving bear have been translated into more than 50 languages, including Afrikaans, Czech, Finnish, and Yiddish.

6. THE REAL CHRISTOPHER ROBIN RESENTED HIS FATHER—AND POOH.

Being forever the tender little boy in Hundred Acre Wood didn’t suit Christopher Robin Milne. Like his father before him, he became a writer, but wrote memoirs of his own life, like The Enchanted Places, Beyond the World of Pooh, and The Hollow On The Hill. In these, he asserted, “It seemed to me almost that my father had got where he was by climbing on my infant shoulders, that he had filched from me my good name and left me nothing but empty fame.” Ouch.

7. BEFORE HE WAS BOUGHT BY DISNEY, POOH WAS PURCHASED BY STEPHEN SLESINGER.

For nearly 30 years before Walt Disney began animating the bear, the American producer Stephen Slesinger acquired Pooh’s merchandising rights for the U.S. and Canada. The red t-shirt that is now a Pooh signature was drawn in 1932 for an RCA Victor picture record. By the ’40s, plush dolls donning the red top were being produced. When his widow, Shirley Slesinger Lasswell, licensed Pooh merchandising to Disney in 1961, the animators decided to keep the look.

8. POOH HAS BECOME ONE OF DISNEY’S MOST POPULAR PROPERTIES.

In 1961, Walt Disney also purchased the motion picture rights from A.A. Milne’s widow Daphne, and so began a brand that continues to thrive for his company. A series of Winnie the Pooh shorts were released in movie theatres starting in the late 1960s. In 1977, a trio of these made up Pooh’s first theatrical release The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh. The 1980s brought two television shows, Welcome to Pooh Corner and The New Adventures of Winnie The Pooh. Then the 2000s offered The Tigger Movie, Piglet’s Big Movie, Pooh’s Heffalump Movie and the CGI series My Friends Tigger & Pooh. There have also been straight-to-DVD releases. All this leads to merchandizing profits that are said to rival Mickey Mouse’s.

9. POOH ISN’T JUST FOR KIDS—HE’S FOR ACADEMICS TOO!

Scholars and philosophers have been pulling from Pooh for inspiration. American author Benjamin Hoff wrote both The Tao of Pooh and The Te of Piglet to explain principles of the Chinese philosophical school of Taoism. Scholar John Tyerman Williams responded with the long but self-explanatorily titled Pooh and the Philosophies: In Which It Is Shown That All of Western Philosophy Is Merely a Preamble to Winnie-The-Pooh and Pooh and the Psychologists. And English professor and author Frederick Crews penned The Pooh Perplex and Postmodern Pooh, which satirized academic trends in case studies.

10. WINNIE THE POOH HAS HIS OWN DAY

January 18th marks not only the birthday of celebrated English author A.A. Milne, but also—by no coincidence—Winnie The Pooh Day, a holiday intended to celebrate the eponymous bear and his creator.

source: mentalfloss

Fill in the gaps in the sentences with words from the text.

A. A. Milne was a (1)……… before he wrote Winnie the Pooh which made him famous.  Winnie was a real (2)………. and Christopher Robin’s teddy bear was named after her. Christopher Robin – the writer’s son – (3)……….. the Winnie the Pooh stories. The characters of the Winnie the Pooh stories live in the (4)………….  . The illustrator of the book E. H. Shephard was so keen on illustrating the book that he turned up (5)…………… at Milne’s home to show the writer his portfolio. The (6)……… translation of Winnie the Pooh cracked The New York Times best seller list. The real Christopher Robin (7)…………. his father and Pooh for (8)………… his good name from him and leaving him only empty fame instead. The (9)………….. of Winnie the Pooh is the red T-shirt. January 18th marks (10)………… and A. A. Milne’s birthday at the same time.

Key

1. playwright

2. bear cub 

3. inspired

4. Hundred Acres Wood

5. unannounced

6. Latin

7. resented

8. filching

9. signature

10. Winnie The Pooh Day