I thought I’d try something a little different today. I usually have lists of trivia facts about all sorts of topics and at times they can be interesting, funny, and every so often downright weird. Today’s trivia is a little more on the darker side but still interesting. Here are ten bits of trivia that’ll make you think and possibly shudder a little.
Howard Hughes at times wore empty tissue boxes as shoes. He also blew his nose in his socks.
Napoleon Bonaparte was afraid of cats, but he wasn’t alone: other ailurophobe’s included Adolf Hitler, Benito Mussolini, and Julius Caesar.
Actress Cybill Shepherd dated Elvis Presley in the early 1970s and once hinted on the Oprah Winfrey show that she had to teach the singer how to perform cunnilingus.
And here are two Osbourne family tidbits. Kelly Osbourne once expressed interest in posing nude for Playboy, but said that her breasts would need “some airbrushing.” Playboy founder Hugh Hefner later replied, “We don’t airbrush to that extent.”
Sharon Osbourne, wife of the late great Ozzy Osbourne, once admitted to sending her own excrement wrapped in Tiffany boxes to several people who criticized her family. When a journalist criticized her teenage children, Jack and Kelly, Ms. Osborne sent a box of excrement with a note that read, “I heard you got an eating disorder. Eat this.“
After his death in 1955, Elbert Einstein’s brain was removed and kept in a jar by Thomas Stoltz Harvey, the pathologist who conducted Einstein’s autopsy. Harvey was later fired from his job at Princeton Hospital for refusing to relinquish the organ.
Once upon a time an Italian stripper suffocated to death after waiting an hour to jump out of a sealed cake at a bachelor party.
The Cannibal Killer, Dorangel Vargas, The Hannibal Lector of the Andes, told the press that he preferred the taste of men to women, and never ate hands, feet, or testicles. “I have standards, you know”, said Vargas.
The FBI estimates that more than half a million pedophiles are online every day.
Television remote controls are the worst carriers of bacteria in hospital rooms; they spread antibiotic resistant Staphylococcus, which contributes to the 90,000 annual deaths from infection acquired in hospitals.
Everyone loves music of one sort or another and I’m no different. Unfortunately I think 50% of the music being made today is garbage. I may be considered a music snob but I only like GOOD MUSIC. I like some Heavy Metal, some R&B, some Opera, some Disco, and even some Rap, as long as it’s good. Today’s post will add to your trivia knowledge of the music business. If you’re just a casual music fan you may not be aware of a lot of the facts I’m going to list but that’s what’s so great about music, it’s all about personal preferences.
It is estimated that the “Happy Birthday to You” song earns Warner Music up to $5000 in royalties per day.
The bass player and co-lead singer of the band Kiss was named Chaim Witz.
John Denver’s real name was Henry John Deutschendorf Jr.
Leo Fender, inventor of the Telecaster, Stratocaster, and Precision Bass guitars, could not play the guitar.
Rolling Stone magazine twice listed Jimi Hendrix as the number one greatest guitar player of all time.
QUEEN
Brian May, lead guitarist for the band Queen, also had a PhD in astrophysics.
The song “Le Freak” by the band Chic, was the first song to hit number one on the US Billboard Hot 100 chart three separate times.
Madonna, with 38 singles, followed by Elvis Presley, The Beatles, and Michael Jackson, had the most top 10 singles on the Billboard Hot 100 chart.
Mike Nesmith the famous member of the made-for-television band The Monkees also invented Liquid Paper the popular correction fluid.
The Village People once advertised for members with a personal ad requesting: Wanted: Macho Types, Must Dance and Have a Mustache.
The childhood nickname for advice columnist Ann Landers was “Eppie”.
The name of the Weasley owl in the Harry Potter series of books by J.K. Rowling was “Errol”.
The letters FTD originally stood for Florists Transworld Delivery.
The word Pennsylvania is misspelled on the Liberty Bell as “Pensylvania”
The 19 1/2 foot tall statue that stands atop the U.S. Capitol building in Washington D.C. was designed by Thomas Crawford, installed on December 2, 1863, and is named the Statue of Freedom.
The letters TCB of the gold pendant often worn by Elvis Presley, stood for “Taking care of business.”
Tokyo Tsushin Denki was the original name of the Sony Corporation.
Woolworth is a term in bowling for a 5-10 split.
“For breakfast it’s dandy, for snacks it’s quite handy, or eat it like candy.” was the original advertising slogan for Post Sugar Crisp Cereal.
Eric Clapton’s last name was actually “Clapp”.
And finally something interesting from Maine.
A 15-year-old resident of Farmington Maine who invented earmuffs in 1873 was Chester Greenwood.
I hear people talking all the time about how a certain song takes them back. I’ve had that experience on many occasions myself and it’s enjoyable and comforting for just an instant. Music can be a trigger to the past for some but I find that my sense of smell works better for me. A certain smell can capture me and move me to a different time and place. It can be so vivid to a specific incident that I can close my eyes and see the exact spot, smell the exact smells, and see the people who were there. It’s an amazing transition and it usually happens when I least expect it.
If I pick up a baseball glove in Walmart, the smell of the leather sends me back in 1955 as I was driving with my father to my first Little League practice. Interestingly enough Elvis Pressley was singing Heartbreak Hotel on the radio at the time.
Over the years I’ve frequently spent time on shooting ranges to stay proficient with my pistol. On certain wet and rainy days coupled with the smell of gunpowder, takes me immediately back to the summer of 1968 and my time in the Korean DMZ for the Army. I still break out in a cold sweat because it seems so damn real.
There’s one other memory I’d like to recall but I do so cautiously. My father was something of a farting professional. He enjoyed nothing better than to take me food shopping with him which was always a bit embarrassing for me. He was a phantom farter who would leave SBD’s in an aisle and then walk to an adjacent aisle to enjoy the reactions. I can’t tell you on how many occasions I was blamed for being the culprit as he hid laughing hilariously nearby. Still after all these years if I smell a fart in any food store I automatically think of my Dad.
How about the smell of Jean Nate. My first real tongue-on-tongue kiss was done to the smell of Jean Nate. It was 1961 and we were at the Friday night dance at St. Ladislaus Church. We kissed briefly in the alley behind the church and believe me it was memorable. Unfortunately for me my mother came to love Jean Nate a year of so later which created a lot of confusion for me. That smell still takes me back to that alley for that incredible kiss but I keep thinking my mother’s sneaking around somewhere and will unexpectedly show up. It’s a little disconcerting and a major distraction to a wonderful memory. By the way Kathy G., it still remains a wonderful kiss.
So for those of you who are moved by music, and those of us who are moved by smell, we’re the lucky ones. I fear there are many people out there who aren’t moved by much of anything. Links to their past are either too painful to relive and they’ve blocked them or they just don’t care at all.
We do a lot of trivia on this site which usually consists of total useless information about totally useless things and people. Today will be a miscellaneous mish-mash of things I’ve discovered recently. First is something called the Manner of Death statistics. It’s a list created by some group somewhere telling us all how we are dying in descending order of frequency. Enjoy!
That’s enough to send a cold chill up anyone’s back. The perfect way to start your day. Next is a list of injury types, hospital data, and a whole lot more.
Number of medically attended injury and poisoning episodes in the population: 39.5 million
Episodes per 1,000 population: 126.3
Number of visits (to physician offices, hospital outpatient and emergency departments) for injuries: 80.1 million (includes visits for adverse effects of drug, medicinal or biological substance)
Number of emergency department visits for injuries: 43.0 million (includes visits for adverse effects of medical treatment)
Number of discharges for fractures (all sites): 1.1 million
Number of discharges for poisonings: 260,000
Number of discharges for certain complications of surgical and medical care: 1.0 million
Mortality
Total number of deaths: 192,945
Deaths per 100,000 population: 60.2
Poisoning
Number of poisoning deaths: 48,545
Deaths per 100,000 population: 15.4
Traffic Deaths
Number of deaths: 33,804
Deaths per 100,000 population: 10.7
Firearm Deaths
Number of deaths: 33,636
Deaths per 100,000 population: 10.6
Are you feeling more secure now? Do you even want to leave the house? It appears that life in these United States is a real crap shoot. Roll the dice and hope for the best every time you leave the house.
I admit I’ve depressed myself with this posting so I’ll keep this last item short. On this day in history many people have passed on. Here are two that died on this day that I thought might interest you.
1948 Babe Ruth, Baseball legend (NY Yankees), dies in NY at 53
1977 Elvis Presley, American musician, dies at Graceland at 42. Official cause of death is cardiac arrhythmia
I feel the need today to once again fill your heads with more of my useless information. These factoids were chosen at random and are in no particular order or category.
Thomas Jefferson invented the swivel chair.
The philosopher Daniel Dennett introduced the Frisbee to Britain.
Isaac Newton invented the cat door.
The longest length of time from invention to production was for the ballpoint pen at 58 years. The zipper took only 32 years.
Windshield wipers, laser printers, and bullet-proof vests were invented by women.
I’m amazed at some of the facts I’ve been finding and the longer I look the crazier they seem to get. Lets continue.
In India, 127 million people were vaccinated in a single day in 1997.
There are nearly as many American Indians in California now as there were in the eighteenth century.
By 2007, the cost of a coffin in Bagdad was 50-75 dollars, up from 5-10 before the Iraq war.
In Britain, 93% of young people can master a computer game while only 38% can bake a potato.
Jack Bauer, the lead character from the series 24, personally killed 112 people in the first five seasons of the show.
Re your eyes getting tired? Are you bored yet? No! I’ll just keep going until you’re asleep.
There are no legal public cinema’s in Saudi Arabia.
One in every 3400 Americans is an Elvis impersonator.
There are approximately twenty families with the name Obama in the US, compared with more than 11,000 Clintons and 60,000 Bushes.
In the year 1377, 35% of all English men were named John.
There are more people named Chang in China than there are people in Germany.
That’s just about it for today but I have one more tidbit I especially liked:
“In the urban West, one of every three women has blond hair; only one in 20 is a natural blond.”
Someone has the best job ever. He spends all day checking to see if the rugs match the drapes.
According to Socrates “an unexamined life is not worth living”. I agree with that to a point because there are times when looking back has truly restorative value. It clears the mind by allowing us to revisit simpler and sometimes happier times. The post that follows is me looking back and remembering how different things were not so long ago. I’m not saying they were always better but in some cases they definitely were. Read on and enjoy a short but detailed visit to my early childhood.
Way back…
I’m talking about hide and seek at dusk, sitting on the porch. Hot bread and butter, eating’ a super-dooper sandwich (Dagwood), Red light, Green light, 1 2 3.
Chocolate milk, lunch tickets, penny candy in a brown paper bag. Hopscotch, butterscotch, Double-Dutch, jacks, kickball, and dodge ball. Mother, May I? Hula Hoops, Sunflower Seeds, jawbreakers, blow pops, Mary Janes, and running through the sprinklers. The smell of the sun and licking salty lips.
Wait……
Watching lightening bugs in a jar, playing slingshot and Red Rover. When around the corner seemed far away, and going downtown seemed like going somewhere.
Bedtime, Climbing trees. A million mosquito bites and sticky fingers. Cops and Robbers, Cowboys and Indians, sitting on the curb, jumping down the steps, jumping on the bed, and pillow fights.
Being tickled to death, running till you were out of breath. Laughing so hard that your stomach hurt. Being tired from playing …. Remember that?
I’m not finished just yet…
What about the girl that had the big bubbly hand writing? Licking the beaters when your mother made a cake. When there were two types of sneakers for girls and boys (Keds & PF Flyers), and the only time you wore them at school, was for “gym.”
When nobody owned a purebred dog. When a quarter was a decent allowance, and another quarter a huge bonus. When you’d reach into a muddy gutter for a penny. When girls neither dated nor kissed until late high school, if then. When your mom wore nylons that came in two pieces.
When you got your windshield cleaned, oil checked, and gas pumped, without asking, for free. And you didn’t pay for air, and, you got trading stamps to boot! When laundry detergent had free glasses, dishes or towels hidden inside the box.
When any parent could discipline any kid, or feed him or use him to carry groceries, and nobody, not even the kid, thought a thing of it. When it was considered a great privilege to be taken out to dinner at a real restaurant with your parents.
Not done yet . . .
When all of your male teachers wore neckties and female teachers had their hair done, everyday. When they threatened to keep kids back a grade if they failed…and did! When being sent to the principal’s office was nothing compared to the fate that awaited a misbehaving student at home. Having a weapon in school, meant being caught with a slingshot. When nearly everyone’s mom was at home when the kids got there.
Basically, we were in fear for our lives but it wasn’t because of drive-by shootings, drugs, gangs, etc. Disapproval of our parents and grandparents was a much bigger threat!
Decisions were made by going “eeny-meeny-miney-mo.” Mistakes were corrected by simply exclaiming, “do over!” “Race issue” meant arguing about who ran the fastest. Money issues were handled by whoever was the banker in “Monopoly.”
Catching fireflies could happily occupy an entire evening. It wasn’t odd to have two or three “best” friends. Being old, referred to anyone over 20. The net on a tennis court was the perfect height to play volleyball and rules didn’t matter. It was unbelievable that dodge ball wasn’t an Olympic event.
The worst thing you could catch from the opposite sex was cooties. It was magic when dad would “remove” his thumb. Scrapes and bruises were kissed and made better.
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