Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2024/03/04/escape-from-a-medieval-bathroom-with-a-cotton-swab-and-eyeliner.html
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Historians can get themselves out of a paper bag, Huh.
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Homicidal bathroom aside, that is a friggin’ awesome place to live!
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Sounds like a cool moon logic puzzle worth of a Sierra Adventure game.
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I got locked in my own bathroom in a rented apartment once because the lock failed. After taking an inventory of everything in the bathroom and finding nothing that I could use, I ended up ripping the door apart with my bare hands. This was less impressive than it sounds because the door was one of those super-cheap ones made of two thin pieces of preformed plywood on a wooden frame.
The really remarkable thing was that my landlord didn’t charge me for replacing the door. Either they figured that I couldn’t be held responsible for the failure of their shitty lock, or they just didn’t want to mess with someone who could tear a door to pieces bare-handed.
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Sounds like a shitty experience
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Holy shit. Talk about patience and persistence. I’m not sure I could have done that. Persistence I have, but not patience.
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University of Cambridge art historian Krisztina Ilko lives in a medieval tower
As one does.
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Obligs:
Same, but it’s not like she had anything else to keep herself busy.
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Always nice when a life-threatening experience turns into “hey, free escape room!”, though I imagine it must have been harrowing having to work with such fragile, bendy tools. I’ve done some improvised lockpicking myself and I was worried enough about breaking things like paper clips and a steak knife. I’m assuming this was an old-timey lock to match the location, or her tools probably would have been too big to fit in the keyhole. If not, she’s even more of a MacGuyver than the article gives her credit for!
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Still kind of blows my mind that Cambridge University predates the Inca and Aztec empires by over a century. Who did their anthropology department even steal stuff from?
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The University of Bologna was founded when there were still Vikings around and was over a century old when Cambridge finally caught up
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Founded by scholars leaving Oxford after a dispute caused by the execution of three scholars in 1209.
If heard about “publish or perish”, but this seems ridiculously excessive.
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Anyway, from a strictly Western viewpoint with its definition of university and limited to unis still up and running:
There are seats of learning all over the world that go a lot further back.
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When I was a fairly tiny 5’4" and 110 lbs, I once ripped a staff bathroom door off the hinges, which really impressed the facilities people who came to repair it. Spoiler alert; it had been held open with a wedge at the hinge side, which I hadn’t seen, so although I didn’t shift the moon with the lever, I did manage to damage the door.
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It was a Town vs Gown thing. Things didn’t improve here after they moved to Cambridge.
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I have a small server room next to my office, the door is over 7 feet tall, 102 years old and thick mahogany. One Friday I was working alone and had to futz with a patch.
I go in and the handle lock was engaged from the outside (push & turn). Door closed and I couldn’t get out.
My cell was outside on my desk, there was no way to communicate with the outside world (had a few computers but no working monitor). I was starting to panic somewhat.
Fortunately, the door swung into the room so I had exposed hinges - whipped out my Leatherman tool and was able to pop all four hinge pins out.
Door weighs a friggen ton but was able to lift it out and to the side.
End result was we revised our working-alone policies and the door handle got swapped for one without a lock.
If it wasn’t for my trusty pocket tool, I would have been so hooped. Walls are 4-ft thick brick, cleaners not back for 3 days.
Don’t know why people pay for an escape room experience, knowing useless trivia doesn’t help IRL.
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I hear if you just unplug everything in the server room someone will usually show up within a couple hours.
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