Page 2 - Best of the Month

An executive beat Bill Gates at a game 35/37 times. When they met again, Gates had studied the game and beat him every single time!

From Microsoft's founding in 1975 until 2006, Gates had primary responsibility for the company's product strategy. He aggressively broadened the company's range of products, and wherever Microsoft achieved a dominant position he vigorously defended it.

He gained a reputation for being distant to others; as early as 1981 an industry executive complained in public that "Gates is notorious for not being reachable by phone and for not returning phone calls."

Another executive recalled that after he showed Gates a video game and defeated him 35 of 37 times. When they met again a month later Gates "won or tied every game. He had studied the game until he solved it. That is a competitor."

(Source)

British soldiers executed Indian rebels by tying them to the mouth of a canon, then firing it!

Blowing from a gun is a method of execution in which the victim is typically tied to the mouth of a cannon and the cannon is fired. Blowing from a gun as a method of execution was used, perhaps most well known, by British troops during the Indian Rebellion of 1857.

The British, however, had a long tradition prior to the 1857 rebellion to execute Indian soldiers found guilty of mutiny or desertion in this manner. According to one historian, the British tradition began in 1760, when the government examined the modes of capital punishments in use. In the district of the 24 Perganas, it was found that the common military mode of capital punishment was flogging to death.

Regarding blowing from a gun as an old Mogul punishment, the Government opted for this technique, as being, relative to death by flogging, more deterrent, more public and more humane. Already in 1761, orders were given in Lakhipur "to fire off at the mouth of a cannon the leader of the thieves who was made prisoner, that others may be deterred".

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Brienne of Game of Thrones doesn't know how old she is!

Gwendoline Christie is having a breakout season playing Brienne of Tarth in the popular TV show Game of Thrones. She grew up in southern England and was trained as a semi-professional gymnast as a child until a spine injury derailed her career, and she took up acting.

Her height has made her ‘pretty genderless’ at times, according to her. The 6ft 3in actress got a recurring role in season 2 of Game of Thrones, and a much more expanded role this current season. During an interview promoting the show, she stated that neither she nor her mom are aware of what her birthday or her age really is!

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Almost 100% of people older than 60 are diagnosed with eye herpes at their autopsy!

Herpetic simplex keratitis is a form of keratitis caused by recurrent herpes simplex virus in cornea. Herpes simplex virus or HSV infection is very common in humans. Nearly 100 percent of those older than 60 years of age harbor HSV in their trigeminal ganglia at autopsy. It has been estimated that one third of the world population suffers from recurrent infection.

Keratitis caused by HSV is the most common cause of cornea-derived blindness in developed nations Therefore, HSV infections are a large and worldwide public health problem. The global incidence (rate of new disease) of Herpes keratitis is roughly 1.5 million, including 40,000 new cases of severe monocular visual impairment or blindness each year. Primary infection most commonly manifests as blepharoconjunctivitis I.e. Infection of lids and conjunctiva that heals without scarring.

Lid vesicles and conjunctivitis are seen in primary infection. Corneal involvement is rarely seen in primary infection. Recurrent herpes of the eye is caused by reactivation of the virus in a latently infected sensory ganglion, transport of the virus down the nerve axon to sensory nerve endings, and subsequent infection of the ocular surface.

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Astronauts have to sleep near fans or they could die in their sleep!

In a complete opposite of the South Korean fan death myth, it turns out astronauts actually NEED to sleep next to a ventilator fan while they're in weightless orbit. Why? If they don't, they might suffocate in their sleep.

The reason is because warm air doesn't naturally rise when there's no gravity. If you don't have a way of circulating air, then the carbon dioxide you expel when you breathe can form a bubble around your nose. Eventually, the air available to you wouldn’t have enough oxygen and you would die.

Learn more about what astronauts have to go through to sleep at the source.

(Source)