1. The longest time
between two twins being born is
87 days.
2. The world's deepest
postbox is in Susami Bay in Japan. Its 10 metres underwater.
3. In 2007, an
American man named Corey Taylor tried to fake his own death in order to get out of his cell phone
contract without paying a fee. It didn't work.
4. The oldest condoms
ever found date back to the 1640s (they were found in a cesspit at Dudley
Castle), and were made from animal and fish intestines.
5. In 1923, jockey
Frank Hayes won a race at Belmont Park in New York despite being dead — he suffered a heart attack mid-race,
but his body stayed in the saddle until his horse crossed the line for a 20–1
outsider victory.
6. Everyone has
a unique tongue print, just like fingerprints.
7. Most Muppets are
left-handed. (Because most Muppeteers are right-handed, so they operate the head
with their favoured hand.)
8. Female
kangaroos have three vaginas.
9. It costs the U.S.
Mint almost twice as much to mint each penny and nickel as the coins are
actually worth. Taxpayers lost over $100 million in 2013 just through the coins
being made.
10. Light doesn't
necessarily travel at the speed of light. The slowest we've ever recorded light
moving at is 38 mph.
11. Casu marzu is
a Sardinian cheese that contains live maggots. The maggots can jump up to five inches
out of cheese while you're eating it, so it's a good idea to shield it with
your hand to stop them jumping into your eyes.
12. The loneliest
creature on Earth is a whale who has been calling out for a mate for over two
decades — but whose high-pitched voice is so different to other whales
that they never respond.
13. The spikes on the
end of a stegosaurus' tail are known among paleontologists as the "thagomizer"
— a term coined by cartoonist Gary Larson in a 1982 Far Side drawing.
14. During World War
II, the crew of the British submarine HMS Trident kept a fully grown reindeer called Pollyanna aboard their vessel
for six weeks (it was a gift from the Russians).
15. The northern
leopard frog swallows its prey using its eyes — it uses them to help push food down its
throat by retracting them into its head.
16. The first man to
urinate on the moon was Buzz Aldrin, shortly after stepping onto the lunar surface.
17. Some fruit flies
are genetically resistant to getting drunk — but only if they have an inactive
version of a gene scientists have named "happyhour".
18. Experiments show
that male rhesus macaque monkeys will pay to look at pictures of female rhesus macaques'
bottoms.
19. In 1567, the man
said to have the longest beard in the world died after he tripped over his beard running away from a fire.
20. The Dance Fever of
1518 was a month-long plague of inexplicable dancing in Strasbourg, in which hundreds of people
danced for about a month for no apparent reason. Several of them danced
themselves to death.
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