Useless Information For Your Everyday Life...

[billysgirl5]

Here are some more interesting facts...

• The term "wingman" stems from the short story "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet" by Richard Matheson which was later adapted to an episode of "The Twilight Zone" by the same author.

• In the two weeks following Mardi Gras, over 3.4 million tons of beads will be collected and recycled.

• 82 percent of the cost of a modern computer pays for less than one percent of its total mass.

• A study conducted by the Wrigley Chewing Gum Company concluded that most people will spit out a stick of gum within ten minutes of chewing, regardless of long-lasting flavor.

• The first recorded use of a blog dates back to 1774, when Samuel Adams detailed his account of the Boston Tea Party in a little known journal which he titled "The Boston Log." Amongst friends and colleagues he would refer to it as his "blog." 

• The average website is made up of 3.3 pages and contains about 2000 words.

• In traditional typesetting terminology, the minus sign (-) was also called an "r-dash", because it is the same width as the lowercase letter r.

• A 20 foot oak tree produces about enough oxygen to sustain a moderately active house cat.

• Every minute, the human brain processes about 17GB of visual input, 5GB of audio input 20MB of tactile input, 350kB of olfactory input, and 100 kB of gustatory input.

• Insect and rodent poisons are the leading cause of death for pets worldwide.
 
• Worldwide, more college students fail organic chemistry than any other class.

• Alder trees are able to slowly "creep," moving up to five inches in a year.

• The most common New Year's resolution is to begin an exercise regiment.

• Oxen are the most frequently mentioned animals in the bible.

• A recent national survey found more people regret stopping playing a musical instrument than any other regret.
 
• There is a one in six chance that it will be raining in a randomly selected location in the world.

• More than 300 people die every year from the sport of "bear wrestling."

• Wallpaper was invented in the 13th century.

• Walter Chalmers, who died in 1982, fluently spoke 68 different languages, more than anyone else in recorded history.
 
• New evidence suggests that a dog's sense of smell is sensitive to the pheromone produced by humans in a state of fear, giving some credence to the adage that dogs can smell fear.

• The Haida Indians, located in the Pacific Northwest, were the only native American tribe with paper currency.

• One in 12 people are immune to the irritants of stinging nettle.

• The Dalai Lama is the world's most highly sought after college graduation speaker.
 
• One in 13 American homes currently have a wall decoration that says "home sweet home" hanging somewhere.

• Saint Raymond of Barbastro is the patron saint of Star Trek fans.

• Police dogs have been used since the early 1800s.

• A tourist from New York City unsuccessfully attempted to plead not guilty recently to a murder he committed in Las Vegas, citing the advertising slogan: "what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas" as his defense.

• A hermit crab can live up to three weeks without food or water.

• The strongest earthquake in recorded history took place in 241 BC off the coast of China. It is estimated to have been at least magnitude 9.4.

• Kites were invented as a siege weapon, but were relatively ineffective. It was another 30 years before they were first made as toys.

• Only one in 20 debit card users change their PIN, but of those that do, 12 percent choose 1234, and 7 percent chose one digit repeated four times.

• The book, "The Very Hungry Caterpillar" is banned in 41 school districts.

• One out of 19 American families routinely use paper plates instead of reusable options.

• CDs now outsell cassette tapes by a 250 to one margin.

• One in four people has made an attempt to learn the guitar at some point in their life.
 
• One in nine Europeans sleep nude.

• The world record for spitting watermelon seeds is just over 81 feet.

• 22 percent of all Google searches contain one or more misspelled words.

• An average sized carrot contains more vitamin C than a large orange.

• Two of five children born in the U.S. were not the result of planned pregnancies.
 
• 62 percent of women find snowboarders more attractive than skiers.

• The 12 layers on the pyramid of a one dollar bill were intended to signify the twelve apostles.

• The laser in a CD burner is powerful enough to ignite paper.

• Several species of chimpanzee determine group leadership by a nonviolent majority vote.
 
• Two out of five office desks have a coffee mug filled with pencils or pens sitting on it.

• The corndog was first sold at the 1893 World's fair.

• 21 percent of men will never wear a tuxedo at an occasion other than a wedding.

• One in six children have a rock collection at one point or another.

• Baby pictures are the most commonly framed pictures. 32 percent of all frames sold worldwide are used to display pictures of these tiny subjects.
 
• One in ten Americans have ever canned their own food.

• FCC statistics indicate there are 55 million cellular phones in the United States.
 
• When bottled water was first sold in the 1870's, it cost three times more than beer.

• By volume, Kleenex brand tissues can absorb more blood than water.

• Epidemiologists say the common cold did not begin spreading until the 1330s, while two-thirds of the world was dying of the bubonic plague.

• A patent application submitted in 1954 described, in detail, all the technologies needed to create a cellphone.

• Over 500 people die a year from fatal injuries incurred during a game of darts.
 
• Last year, the US national debt exceeded the number of one dollar bills in circulation for the first time ever.

• In three out of four tennis games where a score is kept, it is kept incorrectly.

• January is National Cheese Month, National Amputee Awareness Month and National Flood Preparedness Month, among 93 other National Months. This is more Months than any other month of the year.

• In order to read all US legislation currently in effect within an average lifetime, one would need to read 17 pages per minute, 24 hours per day, from the day they were born until the day they died.

• The average person overestimates their IQ by 21 points.
 
• More cocaine was consumed during the Reagan administration than any other period in history.

• The former game giant Sega takes its name from a variation of the Japanese word for "onion."

• Bottle caps cost more to make than most bottles.

• The average television remote control emits every type of electromagnetic radiation except visible light.

• The very first Roman calendar had 16 months, each containing three eight-day weeks.
 
• 81 percent of American households currently have at least one can of chicken noodle soup.

• More money is spent on diet programs than over the counter medication.

• The average pen could draw a line 1.5 miles long before running out of ink.

• One in five Harvard graduates will be a millionaire before they turn 35.

• Driving in the rain triples your risk of getting in a collision.
 
• Pound for pound, the average American eats more bread than anything else.

• The average person showers 16 times for every one bath they take.

• Sydney, Australia has the highest percentage of classical music lovers of any city in the world.

• At its present rate of depletion, it would take 210 years to cut down five percent of the Amazon forest.

• The man with the world's largest hands can reach 18 inches from the tip of his thumb to the tip of his pinky.
 
• There are currently about 11,000 phones tapped by the government in the United States.

• More Germans speak French as a second language than English.

• A blue whale's death cry is the loudest noise any animal can make.

• There are more varieties of cheddar cheese than are residents of Cheddar, UK.

• More accidental suicides occur on St. Patrick's Day than any other day of the year.
 
• The inventor of "Krazy Glue" was found to be clinically insane shortly after he debuted his invention.

• Two-thirds of Americans think the government should be able to read private email without a warrant.

• Cat dander is the most common allergy in the world.

• For every 10-year-old who can't correctly identify Ronald McDonald, there are 15 who can't correctly identify the president.

• Mountain Dew executives have donated over one million dollars in relief funds for those in East Asia, more than executives of any other company.

• A species of snail has evolved in the Midwestern United States that is immune to the usual effects of salt.

• In 1985, a man custom-built a car that had a body completely made of Mountain Dew cans, a year after it was finished he was killed when he crashed it.

• One out of every 220 cans is crushed on the drinker's forehead.

• A number of tribes in East Africa consider the heart shape to be a symbol of evil.
 
• There is a Sumerian character with 103 cuneiform strokes, more strokes than any other character in all the world's languages. It means "the smallest daily ration of water on which a traveler can survive while traveling with haste."

• The limiting factor in the shelf life of SPAM how long the steel cans it is stored in last before rusting away.

• 17 people have died trying to break the current world land speed record.

• Army ants can kill a panther if they catch it sleeping.
 
• 36 percent of criminals currently serving time in jail maintain their own innocence.

• Egg drop soup is the most commonly consumed soup worldwide.

• The inauguration ceremonies, which took place yesterday (1/20/05), were more expensive than all the other inauguration ceremonies of all the other presidents combined.

• The average European sleeps 1.6 hours less than the average American.

• It costs approximately $4,000 to care for a cat over the course of its life.
 
• A large percentage of hemophiliacs are incapable of contracting the flu.

• About two percent of people do not have a sense of smell; about half of that two percent also have an extremely weak sense of taste.

• Drivers in South Africa drive on the left in the western part of the country, and on the right in the eastern end.

• Because of slow mutations in the human genome, it is believed that the six-fingered humans will outnumber their five-fingered brothers by 2412.

• For every cubic foot of hail that falls in the midwest, 160 inches of snow and 75 inches of rain fall.
 
• 85 percent of the letters used in all English words combined are from the first half of the alphabet.

• One out of three people in the US carries a wallet worth more than the money inside of it.

• If taken back in time twenty years, the value of one of today's desktop computers would be well into the billions of dollars.

• Within two years of its inception, the internet contained more words than every book ever written combined.

• Despite what commercials would leave one to believe, over 70 percent of those in Kellogg's product testing line thought "Apple Jacks" tasted like apples.
 
• One third of all radio stations now broadcast on the web.

• DVD's now outsell videos at a ratio of 250 to 1.

• Solar powered calculators will eventually degenerate after long periods away from the natural light of the sun.

• Tomato soup originated in India, but was brought to western civilization during the time of Christopher Columbus.

• The color yellow is in actuality a retinal processing error of colors that our rod receptors cannot distinguish.
 
• Consuming a moderate amount of cane sugar each day can help prevent Alzheimer's disease.

• Every year, $1.2 million worth of pennies are thrown away.

• Emails make up 73 percent of all traffic over the internet.

• Toasters are the most commonly given wedding gift.

• The average pen is used for two weeks before it is either lost or thrown away.
 
• Only one in 328 bills introduced in Congress will be passed each session.

• 21 percent of food dishes are named after the region in which they were invented.

• The average person will pay over $92.14 to public libraries in late fees over the course of their life.

• One in 36 Americans will never attend a basketball game.

• William Howard Taft was the only president to have never held a public office before being elected president of the United States.
 
• For every fork in the world, there are 3 spoons and 10 knives.

• 92 percent of fire extinguishers are considered under-pressurized.

• Because of the extended darkness in the winter, Sweden has more cases of Seasonal Affective Disorder than any other country, despite its relatively small population.

• One in three Google image searches results in a pornographic picture on the first page.

• Uzbekistan leads the world in soap consumption per person.
 
• According to a University of Chicago study, the average person who describe themselves as "very interested in anime" showers once every three days.

• Traditional Turkmenistan weddings are presided over by an Ox.

• The average new swimsuit has been tried on by five people.

• 19 percent of all newspaper articles contain at least one factual error.

• As a joke, an AT&T employee set up the number 666 to forward calls to George W. Bush's campaign headquarters last October. It was in place for three weeks before it was discovered.
 
• Swiss cheese is the most popular cheese worldwide.

• One in 25 eggs contain Salmonella.

• At any given time, the average temperature in the world is 51° F.

• Tomatoes contain more vitamins relative to their mass than any other vegetable or fruit.

• Iodized salt has been shown to cause brain cancer in laboratory animals.
 
• The number of toothpicks in a box is only accurately reported 71 percent of the time.

• The most expensive block of cheese ever sold weighed 10 pounds, and sold for $21,400.

• 38 percent of offices have casual Fridays.

• The American Civil Liberties Union has sued three separate library systems, attempting to force them to move the Bible into the fiction section.
 
• Coca-Cola was one of the first companies to sell its product at a loss to generate initial interest.

• Germans spend a larger percentage of their collective income on alcohol than any other country.

• The Mayans believed eating earwax would bring fertility.

• A higher percentage of Americans know the words to their national anthem than Canadians who know the words to theirs.

• Penguins are almost completely deaf.