Archive for the ‘useless information’ Tag
I guess it’s time for another trivia challenge for all of you trivia maniacs out there. Today’s 10 questions should be categorized as miscellaneous. They are a mixed bag of facts that might just interest you a little. I took this quiz myself as I put it together but I’m not admitting how badly I did. Let’s just say I scored higher than one and less than four. I’m so ashamed.
As always the correct answers will be posted tomorrow. If you score anything higher than a four your doing really well and should be proud. Good luck!
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1. What was the original name of the Girl Scouts?
2. In 1937, sewing machine heiress Daisy singer Alexander put her will in a model and tossed it into the Thames River near London. Where and when did it wash up?
3. What day is the middle day of the year in a non-leap year?
4. For what magazine did Hugh Hefner serve as circulation manager while he was raising money to launch Playboy?
5. What did Lizzie Borden, Napoleon, and Titian have in common?
6. By what name was Nobel Peace Prize winner Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu better known?
7. What do the letters stand for in the acronym CARE, the name of the relief organization established in 1945?
8. What is the telephone area code for a cruise ship in the Atlantic Ocean?
9. What unusual twosome spoke at ventriloquist Edgar Bergen’s funeral in 1979?
10. Why is the phrase "the quick brown fox jumps over lazy dog" used to check typewriters?
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There you have it. Now before I finish this posting I’ll throw in another filthy yet funny limerick. You can never ever have enough limericks, dirty or otherwise. If you’re offended by this off-color humor, too bad.
There once was a woman named Jill
Who swallowed an exploding pill
They found her vagina
In North Carolina
And her tits in a tree in Brazil.
I’ve always been intrigued by strange and unusual facts, synchronicity, and coincidences. Common sense tells me that they’re just random happenstances that mean nothing and have not been caused by anything paranormal or magical. If you research as many of them as I have it can easily seem that something unearthly is causing the occurrences.
I’ve collected reference material from wherever I could find it and I’m still occasionally stunned and amazed by what I’ve found. Let me pass on to you a few facts that are true and bizarre. Feel free to make your own decision as to what causes things like this to happen. I certainly have no answers. Maybe it’s just luck, if you believe in that.
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Angel Santana, of New York City, escaped unharmed when a robber’s bullet bounced off his pants zipper.
In 1942, Lieut. I. M. Chisov, a Russian pilot, fell 21,980 feet from his fighter plane and survived (his chute failed to open).
Sgt. Joseph Charles was in a fox hole in New Guinea during World War II when the mail boys called him to come out for a letter from home. He crawled out approximately 10 feet when a Japanese plane flew over and dropped a bomb that completely destroyed the foxhole he’d just left.
Lieut. Cmdr. Robert W. Goehring was swept off the Coast Guard cutter U.S.S. Duane by a gigantic wave during a storm. The ship then turned around to rescue him, when suddenly another huge wave tossed him back on board to safety.
An ambulance in Nykroppa, Sweden, sent to pick up Lars Elam, a patient with a high fever, returned to the hospital with the patient driving it and the regular driver lying dead in the back from a heart attack.
Actor Sean Connery, who played the film character James Bond was once stopped for a traffic offense by a policeman named Sgt. James Bond.
Two automobiles that collided in Ajax, Ontario, on a slippery winter day were owned by motorists named Snow and Blizzard.
A bottle of prescription pills was swept out of the bedroom of Mrs. Lena McCovey when a flood destroyed her home on the Klamath River. It was found 200 miles away at Coos Bay, Oregon, by Mrs. McCovey’s sister.
Abraham Lincoln was the second member of his family to die by an assassin’s bullet. The other was his grandfather. Both victims were named Abraham, both had wives named Mary, and both had a son named Thomas. The name Abraham has never again been given to any member of the family.
In Bermuda, brothers Erskin L. Ebbin and Neville Ebbin both died one year apart after being struck by the same taxi, driven by the same driver, and carrying the same passenger.
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What do you think now? As I read through these kinds of facts there are just times when I can’t wrap my head around what I’m reading. Does it mean I believe there’s more at work here than meets the eye? There are times when I do think that but then the cynic and pragmatic part of me began screaming, “Are you effing crazy?”. Maybe I am.
Let’s start this week off with a few more tidbits of useless information to brighten your day. These items were collected from hither and yon and are interesting and yes even stupid.
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The term "the whole 9 yards" came from W.W.II fighter pilots in the Pacific. When arming their airplanes on the ground, the .50 caliber machine gun ammo belts measured exactly 27 feet, before being loaded into the fuselage. If the pilots fired all their ammo at a target, it got "the whole 9 yards."
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The name Jeep came from the abbreviation used in the army for the General Purpose" vehicle, GP.
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The first toilet ever seen on television was on "Leave It To Beaver."
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Thirty-five percent of the people who use personal ads for dating are already married.
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The world’s termites outweigh the world’s humans 10 to 1.
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On average, 100 people choke to death on ball point pens every year.
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No word in the English language rhymes with month, orange, silver or purple.
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There are only four words in the English language which end in "-dous": tremendous, horrendous, stupendous, and hazardous.
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Typing the word typewriter uses only letters from the top row of your keyboard.
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A 10 foot tall emu was spotted walking the streets of New York in 1973, it had accidently escaped from a circus that specialized in large exotic birds. When police questioned the circus owners they responded saying "George was constipated, so we thought a run around the grounds may help him feel better" Police fined the circus 25 dollars, and 5 months later a bi-law was passed stating that all emus within New York City must be on a leash.
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65% of statistics are made up.
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More people are killed annually by donkeys than in airplane crashes.
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A duck’s quack does echo, despite rumors to the contrary.
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Camels milk doesn’t curdle.
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Murphy’s oil soap is a chemical commonly used to wash elephants.
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Porcupines float in water.
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"Dreamt" is the only English word that ends in the letters "mt".
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The average person’s left hand does 56% of the typing.
I’s good to remember these factoids. Case in point, if you’re ever required to wash a freaking elephant you’ll know exactly the kind of soap to buy. Also, if you’re ever in NYC with your emu, you’ll know the law and buy a big assed leash. Who else but me would take time out of my busy day to let you known these things. Again, you’re welcome.
As much as I dislike writing about politicians and politics, I do love reading information from noteworthy individuals who were either famous or infamous. When I see good quotations I squirrel them away for later use on this blog. With a beautiful weekend looming I’ve decided to keep things light and to pass a few of them along for your amusement. In these quotations attempts have been made to explain exactly what a politician is all about. My answer for that question is much harsher than theirs and quite possibly harsher than yours. I hope you enjoy these as much as I did because they seem to have the right idea explained in a more pleasing fashion.
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“Successful . . . politicians are insecure and intimidated men. They advance politically only as they placate, appease, bribe, seduce, bamboozle or otherwise manage to manipulate the demanding and threatening elements in their constituencies.”
Walter Lippman, The Public Philosophy, 1955
“A politician is . . . trained in the art of inexactitude. His words tend to be blunt or rounded, because if they have a cutting edge they may later return to wound him.”
Edward R. Morrow, Address, London Guildhall, 10/19/59
“A politician thinks of the next election; a statesman thinks of the new generation.”
James Freeman Clark, Sermon, 1888
“The “press conference” is a politician’s way of being informative without saying anything. Should he accidentally say something, he has at his side a “press officer” who immediately explains it away by “clarifying” it.”
Emery Kelen, Platypus at Large, 1960
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Does any of this remind you of anyone currently holding office. I’ll just bet it does. As much as each generation thinks that everything it does or says is groundbreaking and earth shattering, they’re wrong. It’s all been done many times before but called something else by the more imaginative politicians and their speechwriters.
KNOW YOUR PAST
Today is a very special day here at Every Useless Thing. I’m officially opening the doors to the E.U.T. University of totally useless knowledge. You’ll learn through our detailed courses of study many of the things that have puzzled mankind for centuries. We have the answers but only you permanent students will be permitted to share that information with us. I know it’s a great honor and you should consider yourself very fortunate.
Todays lessons concern two things which are generally known to us but the true facts aren’t readily available. Thanks to EUTU you are about to be properly informed.
Lesson #1 – How did the word "shit” originate?
It’s been claimed by some that the word ‘shit” originated in the 16th century, when manure was transported by ship. The dry manure weighed little and was stowed below deck. When mixed with water, however, it gained in weight and began to ferment, producing methane gas, which, when exposed to a naked flame, would ignite, causing explosions and fire. Because of these accidents, crates of manure were labeled “Ship High In Transit’ to indicate that the crates were to be stowed above the deck, so that any water that the ship took on would not come into contact with them.
Unfortunately, this explanation is totally false and we here at EUTU through years of detailed research have discovered the real truth. Take good notes on this lesson because this “shit’” information will be included on your first POoP quiz.
The word “shit” is from the middle English word “shitten”, which in turn derived from the old English word “scitan”, from “besciten”, which meant “to be covered with excrement” and is in turn thought to originate from the Indo-European root “skei”. The word “shite”, meanwhile, is a variant form of the word as found in some dialects in Ireland and Scotland, as well as in colloquial English.
There you have the truth of the matter.
Lesson #2 – Why do men often shiver after urinating?
I’m not entirely sure our women students will be all that interested in this phenomenon but since it is an official part of the curriculum and will most certainly be included in future tests please pay close attention ladies.
After a man has finished urinating, it’s common for him to experience a shiver over his entire body. It is technically called post-micturition convulsion syndrome, and scientists are not exactly sure why it occurs. One theory is that urination results in heat loss after the warm urine has been expelled from the body, or through exposing the penis to the air, causing the body to shiver.
Meanwhile another theory suggests that the urination reflex is relayed through the autonomic nervous system, which is responsible for both contracting the urethra to hold in the urine and relaxing it to allow the urine to flow out. Also, as urine is released there is often a change in blood pressure, which might also explain the shivering. Shivering is most common in men and some actually find the experience pleasurable or even mildly erotic.
I can verify these statements because I’ve been experiencing that “shiver” myself for decades. I only pass that information along to you students because I’m a responsible educator with a passion for the truth.
That’s the final lesson for today. Break into study groups and ”bone up” on this important information. It seems that if two or more students can study together the results are much more satisfying.
CLASS DISMISSED
I seem to have centered all of my attention in recent days to male and female issues to the exclusion of all else. It’s time to get back to what this blog is all about, Totally Useless Information. There seems to be a never ending supply of useless facts and stupid information to keep me and this blog going for many years to come. I’ve already turned myself into a huge steaming pile of trivia which may come in handy some day playing Trivial Pursuit but not for much else. Maybe if I spread the information around a little it will make room in my skull for other new and useless things I may stumble upon. These factoids were collected from hither and yon and have no reason to exist other than to humor us. Here goes nothing.
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More than ten people a year are killed by vending machines.
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President George W. Bush was once a cheerleader.
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The average person spends three years of his or her life on the toilet.
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Pilgrims ate popcorn at the first Thanksgiving dinner.
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Iceland consumes more Coca-Cola per capita than any other nation.
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More Monopoly money is printed in a year, than real money printed throughout the world.
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There is a village in Ireland called Muff, and they have their own diving club.
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Seven percent of Americans eat at McDonalds every day.
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The only First Lady to ever carry a loaded revolver was Eleanor Roosevelt.
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Polar bears are left-handed.
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McDonald’s did away with its spoon-shaped coffee stirrers because people were using them to snort cocaine.
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Men who kiss their wives in the morning live five years longer than those who don’t.
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Outside of the bedroom, the most common place for adults in the U.S. to have sex is in a car.
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At any given hour there are an average of 61,000 people airborne over the United States.
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Seven pitches is the average life span of a Major League Baseball.
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Twenty nine percent of women spend more time shopping for shoes than they do looking for a life long mate.
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According to statistics, Australian women are most likely to have sex on the first date.
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It’s impossible to sneeze and keep your eyes open.
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The giant squid has the largest eyes in the world.
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The U.S. Government spent $277,000 on pickle research in 1993.
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American Airlines saved $440,000 in 1987 by eliminating one olive from each first-class salad.
I hope that’ll ease the withdrawal pains caused by your useless crap addiction. I’m afraid I’m too far gone to be helped so I’ll just keep on collecting this stuff and shovel it off to you. As always, your welcome.
I started out today writing a post on political polling. Upon completion I reread it and found myself bored to actual tears. I may post it in the future but every time I write about politics or politicians I feel kinda dirty. Someday soon when I’m having one of those “I hate politicians” days I’ll post it. Today I feel like passing along a few more items of totally useless information to help make your lives richer and fuller. Here we go.
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Too much coffee can kill you. A lethal dose for an average adult is around 10 grams. That’s the equivalent of drinking between fifty and two hundred cups in rapid succession.
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Malaria mosquitos are attracted to ripe Limburger cheese and smelly feet.
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Members of the U.S. Congress are the highest paid legislators in the world.
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Toilet paper was invented by the Chinese. In 1391 they produced 720,000 sheets a year for exclusive use of the emperor. Each sheet measured 2 feet by three feet.
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Disney World in Orlando covers 30,400 acres or 46 square miles. That’s twice the size of Manhattan.
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A cockroaches brain is spread throughout it’s body., If you chop off the head, it can still live up to a week. It finally dies because it can’t eat.
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You can get cooties. Cooties are lice.
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Mosquito repellant does not repel mosquitos. It blocks their sensors so they don’t know your there.
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Poison ivy is a member of the cashew family of plants that supplies us with cashews and pistachio nuts.
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Charlie Chaplin once lost a Charlie Chaplin look-alike contest. He didn’t even make it to the finals.
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Artists have more sexual partners.
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The Puritan’s bought beer to America.
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Antarctica is the only continent without owls.
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A ten gallon hat only holds three-quarters of a gallon.
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The first film version of Frankenstein was a fifteen minute silent produced by Thomas Edison.
Well there you have it. I saved you all from a boring political rant and offered up this collection of incredible information at the same time. We do live in miraculous times, don’t we? I’m out the door and on my way in five minutes so ending this right now is necessary. Consider it ended.
It’s time again for another installment of totally useless information. If you remember all of these tidbits after reading this blog for a year you’ll be declared an Unofficial Trivial Pursuit Expert. Even that game doesn’t include some of the strange and useless stuff found here.
My search will continue to find as many of these stupid and useless facts as possible and forward them along for your amusement. We humans are a strange folk as reflected by the following:
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Did you know you share your birthday with at least 9 other million people in the world?
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Americans on the average eat 18 acres of pizza every day.
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Every time you lick a stamp, you’re consuming 1/10 of a calorie.
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Babies are born without knee caps. They don’t appear until the child reaches 2-6 years of age.
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In every episode of Seinfeld there is a Superman somewhere.
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If Barbie were life-size her measurements would be 39-23-33. She would stand seven feet, two inches tall and have a neck twice the length of a normal human’s neck.
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The Pentagon, in Arlington, Virginia, has twice as many bathrooms as is necessary.
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During your lifetime, you’ll eat about 60,000 pounds of food, that’s the weight of about 6 elephants.
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There are more plastic flamingos in the U.S, than real ones.
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More people use blue toothbrushes, than red ones.
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Lightning strikes about 6,000 times per minute on this planet.
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The average American/Canadian drinks about 600 sodas a year.
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Humans blink over 10,000,000 times a year.
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In the year 2000, Pope John Paul II was named an "Honorary Harlem Globetrotter”.
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Every second, Americans collectively eat one hundred pounds of chocolate.
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A person uses approximately fifty-seven sheets of toilet paper each day.
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In 32 years. there are about 1 billion seconds.
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Baby robins eat 14 feet of earthworms every day.
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Michael Jordan makes more money from Nike annually than all of the Nike factory workers in Malaysia combined.
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If you fart consistently for 6 years and 9 months, enough gas is produced to create the energy of an atomic bomb.
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Men are 6 times more likely to be struck by lightning than women.
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A toothpick is the object most often choked on by Americans.
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Every 45 seconds, a house catches on fire in the United States.
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The average ice berg weighs 20,000,000 tons.
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A lump of pure gold the size of a matchbox can be flattened into a sheet the size of a tennis court.
I think my favorite from this list is Pope John Paul II becoming an honorary Harlem Globetrotter. It’s funny on a number of levels and I can just picture him, robes flapping, doing a Michael Jordan flight to the basket for a truly holy dunk.
You are disgusting! I wish I had a dollar for ever time someone has said that to me. Normally it’s a women who has been raised and brainwashed into believing that all men are the most crude and disgusting animals on the planet. I understand their feelings to a point but I hate people who broad brush groups with facts that may or may not be true.
I don’t find myself any more or any less disgusting than most women. As human beings our entire everyday existence is disgusting. I’m about to lay some facts on you that you’ve probably never heard. You women out there who insist that men are more disgusting than women, pay attention. We get out of bed every morning just like you and go about our life doing all the little normal things that you do. We brush our hair, we sleep in a bed, we go to the bathroom, and a thousand other things that all of us humans pay little or no attention to. If you’re one of those obsessive/compulsive folks with issues about germs and dirt you might want to stop reading now. This is sure to upset you more than just a little. And ladies, after reading the following list you may have to rethink calling us men disgusting. All human beings are disgusting in one way or another including yourselves.
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An average person’s yearly fast food intake will contain 12 pubic hairs.
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Most of the dust underneath your bed is actually your own dead skin.
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A hard working adult sweats up to 4 gallons per day.
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A toothbrush within 6 feet of a toilet can get airborne bacteria from flushing.
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According to U.S. FDA standards, 1 cup of orange juice is allowed to contain 10 fruit fly eggs, but only 2 maggots.
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An average adult produces about half a liter of flatulent gas per day, resulting in an average of about fourteen occurrences of flatulence a day.
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Every day, the average person swallows about a quart of mucous.
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More than 40,000 parasites and 250 types of bacteria are exchanged during a typical French kiss.
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One in three motorists pick their nose while driving.
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The average office desk has 400 times more bacteria than a toilet.
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There are more bacteria in your mouth than there are people in the world.
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You inhale about 700,000 of your own skin flakes each day.
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On a daily average you will inhale 1 liter of others anal gasses.
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An average person will consume 12 pubic hairs in their fast food annually.
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If you swim one hour in a public pool you will intake 1/12 liters of urine.
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Diarrhea induced E.Coli was found on 10% of coffee mugs in the U.S.
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Annually you will shake hands with 6 men who have recently masturbated and did not wash their hands.
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Through contact with door knobs, counter tops, and other daily objects your hand will come in contact with 15 penises a day.
I think I’ve made my point in as a disgusting way as I can. Everyone now stand up near your computer, laptop, tablet, or smart phone and repeat after me. WE ARE ALL DISGUSTING! Thank you for your attention.
It’s time once again for this blog to live up to it’s name. Another installment of totally useless information collected during a global search for just about anything that’s even a little bit interesting. I feel that everyone should have a few trivia items that aren’t commonly known to help amaze their friends and possibly win a bar bet or two. Spring is arriving and we need to lighten things up a little so here we go.
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The average housewife walks 10 miles a day around the house doing chores. She walks 4 miles and spends 25 hours a year making beds.
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President James Garfield could write Latin with one hand and Greek with the other—simultaneously! Leonardo da Vinci could draw with one hand and write with the other, also simultaneously.
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Attila the Hun was a dwarf. Pepin the Short, Aesop, Gregory of Tours, Charles III of Naples, and the Pasha Hussain were all less than 3 and a half feet tall.
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Edgar Allan Poe and James Abbott McNeill Whistler both went to West Point.
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The Amazon River discharges 4.2 million cubic feet of water per second in the Atlantic Ocean.
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A rat can go without water longer than a camel can.
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Mr. Potato Head was the first toy advertised on television.
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An elephant may consume 500 pounds of hay and 60 gallons of water in a single day.
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Malaria mosquitos are attracted to ripe Limburger cheese and smelly feet.
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A fetus acquires fingerprints by the end of the first trimester.
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One million stray dogs and 500,000 stray cats live in New York City metropolitan area. There are about 100 million dogs and cats in the United States. Americans spend more than 5.5 billion on their pets each year. Every hour, 12,500 puppies are born in the US.
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In 2003, the personal fortune of writer J. K. Rowling of Harry Potter fame, surpassed that of the Queen of England.
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A 2005 survey by CareerBuilder.com, 43% of Americans called in sick when there was nothing wrong with them.
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The venom of the king cobra is so deadly that one gram of it can kill 150 people. Just to handle the substance can put one in coma.
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A whale’s heart beats only nine times a minute.
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A good milking cow will give nearly 6,000 quarts of milk every year.
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Under the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act, leeches and maggots are categorized as medical devices.
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Male moose have antlers 7 feet across. The antlers often weigh 60 pounds.
You should be feeling extra smart right about now. Knowing these fact puts you in a category all your own. I didn’t say it was a good category but you’re definitely in it. You’re now an official trivia nerd and I guess congratulations are in order.
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