I don’t know about anyone else, but I love learning interesting, bizarre, and straight-up weird facts about anything and everything. (In fact, it’s quite a conversation starter.) That said, here are some wacky, intriguing, strange, and somewhat funny facts that sound somewhat fake but are entirely true:
1.
In the 1960s, the CIA launched “Operation Acoustic Kitty,” an effort to train cats to become foreign spies by implanting microphones in their ears and radio transmitters at the base of their skulls. The hope was to train the cats to sit near foreign officials to capture any private conversations. The operation came to a halt when they realized that cats aren’t really trainable and will do whatever the heck they want.
2.
In ancient Rome, they used human and animal urine as laundry detergent.
3.
Despite being super popular overseas, Elvis Presley never performed outside of North America.
4.
Germany has more castles than there are McDonald’s in the United States. Yep, you heard that right. Germany is estimated to have 25,000 castles, and there are around 13,000 McDonald’s locations in America.
5.
In Washington state, there’s a real-life law stating it’s illegal to kill Bigfoot and other sasquatch-like creatures. And you know what? Good for them.
6.
Dogs are one of the three deadliest animals in the UK. The other two are bees and cows.
7.
Sloths are slow in everything they do — including digestion. Because they digest foods so slowly, they basically have to breathe out their farts because they can’t *actually* fart.
8.
There are caves in Missouri that store 1.4 billion pounds of government-owned cheese. Located deep in the Ozark Mountains in limestone-converted mines, the caves are kept at a perfect 36ºF. As someone who’s lactose intolerant, my stomach is in knots just thinking about it.
9.
This one actually made me do a double-take: Cornflakes were invented to suppress sexual impulses and desires.
10.
Cockroach dust plays a part in why so many inner-city children have asthma.
11.
A single cloud can weigh about 550 tons or more.
12.
Believe it or not, Canadians eat more Kraft macaroni and cheese than Americans. Like, 55% more.
13.
Giraffes in the wild only sleep for around five minutes at a time. Because of the dangers they face in the wild, not only do they sleep while standing, but they also sleep intermittently so that they’re prepared to run at any given moment. If keeping watch for a giraffe as they slept was a job, I’d apply in a heartbeat.
14.
Snoop Dogg’s government name is Calvin Cordozar Broadus Jr.
15.
Despite being four inches long, the mantis shrimp throws the fastest punch in the world.
16.
In Switzerland, owning only one guinea pig or parrot is illegal.
17.
If you’re drunk or violent in Japan, police will take a plastic sheet and roll you up like a burrito.
18.
If they wanted to, clownfish could change their sex, including reproductive organs, through an irreversible process.
19.
No one commits to the bit better than Toni Collete. When she was a teen, she faked having appendicitis to get out of going to school so well that she actually got her appendix taken out.
20.
There’s a rare neurological disorder called Alice in Wonderland Syndrome, which is a condition related to how you perceive your body, the world around you, or both.
21.
A grizzly bear’s bite is strong enough to crush a bowling ball, but that won’t stop my first instinct from being, “Aww, look how cute!”
22.
Twice a month, the Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport brings in miniature horses to help calm the nerves of people with flying anxiety.
24.
Miss Piggy’s original name was going to be Piggy Lee.
25.
If you say you’re not afraid of anything, I have some news for you: Humans are innately born with the fear of falling and loud noises. Whatever other fears one may have are shaped or learned with experience.
26.
Considering gelatin is made up of animal skin and bones, gummy worms technically have more bones than actual worms (since worms don’t have any).
28.
To protect themselves from their super-strong pecks, woodpeckers wrap their tongues around their brains. What a cool party trick.
30.
Pound cake is called that because the original recipe used one pound of each ingredient.
31.
In the Great Barrier Reef, there’s a coral reef that’s taller than the Empire State Building.
32.
Male giraffes will taste a female giraffe’s urine to see if she is ready to mate. Even in the animal kingdom, men cannot mind their business.
33.
On average, lightning strikes Earth 100 times per second.
34.
It saddens me to report that Winnie the Pooh was banned from a Polish playground because the honey-obsessed bear doesn’t wear pants. As if it’s his fault!
36.
Blue whales are the baddies of the ocean (sorry, orcas), and if I were a sea creature, I would never, ever tussle with one, especially considering a blue whale’s tongue alone can weigh more than an elephant.
37.
Due to their genes, redheads may need about 20% more anesthesia than non-redheads.
38.
I literally never thought about Barbie being called anything other than Barbie, but her full name is Barbara Millicent Roberts.
40.
The warty comb jellyfish doesn’t have an anus, so when it needs to poop, its gut fuses with an outer layer of its “skin” to create a hole in its body. After the deed is done, the hole closes right back up.
41.
In Thailand, there’s an annual Monkey Buffet Festival where residents of Lopburi leave 4.5 tons of fruit, veggies, and other treats to honor the approximately 3,000 monkeys that live near the Phra Prang Sam Yot temple. Way better than Coachella, IMO.
42.
I was pleased to find out that a buttload is an actual unit of measurement! One buttload is equivalent to 126 gallons of wine.
43.
Back in the day, Victorians ate arsenic to get a paler complexion.
45.
Sharks were roaming the planet before Saturn’s rings formed. With this information, this is a shark’s world, and we’re all just living in it.
48.
Crocodiles can gallop like horses do.
49.
If you’re afraid to go into the ocean because of sharks, you might want to avoid hotel hallways and break rooms, because vending machines are twice as likely to kill you.
50.
Though dead bones are dry and brittle, living bones are wet and a bit soft. In order to absorb pressure, bones are also slightly flexible. Up to one-third of a living bone’s weight is water.
51.
“Gnurr” is the term used to describe the lint that collects at the bottom of your pockets.
53.
The closest US state to Africa is Maine.
54.
If you sneeze uncontrollably after being suddenly exposed to bright light or intense sunlight, you might have inherited a genetic trait called Achoo Syndrome.
57.
The short-horned lizard squirts blood out of its eyes — at a distance of up to three feet — to confuse predators. However, the blood contains a chemical that makes dogs, wolves, and coyotes noxious. Love that.
58.
A rainbow on Venus is called a “glory.”
59.
Frogs use their eyes to help them swallow their meals. When a frog swallows food, its eyes pull down to the roof of their mouth to help push the food down its throat.
60.
Human brains are constantly eating themselves. To “cleanse” the system, cells will smother and consume smaller cells or molecules in a process called phagocytosis.
62.
Ants don’t have lungs. Instead, they breathe through tiny holes on the sides of their bodies called spiracles.
63.
When lightning strikes, the air it passes through can reach up to 50,000ºF — five times hotter than the sun’s surface.
64.
Due to thermal expansion, the Eiffel Tower can “grow” up to six inches in the summer.
65.
Tigers don’t just have striped fur but skin, too! If you were to shave a tiger, you’d find identical striped markings as if they were tattoos.
66.
If you go to the sky deck of the Willis Tower in Chicago on a clear day, you can see four other US states: Illinois, Michigan, Indiana, and Wisconsin.
68.
Sloths can hold their breath longer than dolphins. Dolphins must come to the surface almost every 10 minutes, but sloths can hold their breath for 20 minutes or more by slowing down their heart rates.
69.
Before toiler paper, corn cobs were used as a method of wiping.
70.
This one might unsettle you, but snails have teeth. Snails can have up to 1,000 to 12,000 teeth. I don’t know what they need those for, but good for them! I hope they have snail dentists, then.
71.
While she was a teenager during World War II, Queen Elizabeth II became a junior officer in the Auxiliary Territorial Service and became a trained mechanic.
73.
Due to the anatomy of their neck muscles and spine, pigs cannot look up to the sky. Imagine being a pig and never knowing that there is a whole world above you. BRB, gonna cry for a sec.
74.
For most people, it’s impossible to lick their elbows. (Go ahead, try it.)
75.
A French general gave John Quincy Adams an alligator as a gift. The gator was kept in one of the White House’s bathtubs.
78.
Like fingerprints, human tongues also have unique tongueprints.
79.
If you’ve ever wondered what to call that blob of toothpaste you squeeze onto your toothbrush, it’s called a nurdle.
80.
Animals process time differently depending on their size. Research suggests that smaller animals like mice and lizards process time faster than larger animals like elephants and giraffes. This is also true about animals that fly and marine predators. Due to fast-paced lifestyles, these animals have visual systems that take in changes at higher and faster rates.
81.
Competitive art was considered a sport for the first four decades of the modern Olympics. Artists could earn medals for painting, architecture, sculpting, and music.
82.
From 1924–1954, stop signs used to be yellow. At the time, red dyes faded after a while, so the American Association of State Highway Officials went with yellow dye, which didn’t fade. It wasn’t until the 1950s that sign makers began using fade-resistant enamel.
83.
If you thought Abraham Lincoln wasn’t fascinating enough, the dude is honored in the Wrestling Hall of Fame. He often competed in wrestling matches when he was younger and rarely lost. In 1992, the National Wrestling Hall of Fame formally inducted the former president as an “Outstanding American.” There’s even a mural of Lincoln inside the Hall of Fame museum in Stillwater, Oklahoma.
84.
If you’ve ever used a reindeer and a caribou in the same sentence, thinking you were referencing different animals (I’m definitely guilty), I’m sorry to announce that they’re the same species.
85.
Among the world’s five ocean basins, the Atlantic Ocean takes the cake as the saltiest.
86.
The inside of a Kit Kat is made up of a small amount of other Kit Kats, usually ones that cannot be sold.
87.
Unfortunately, George Washington died not knowing dinosaurs existed. The first and former president died in 1799, while the first official description of dinosaurs happened in 1842. Sad.
88.
Humans don’t always see their noses because our brains filter out “useless” things to better grasp our surroundings.
89.
A polar bear’s fur isn’t actually white; it’s translucent. It only appears white because it reflects visible light.
90.
It’s certainly possible to use sign language with an accent.
91.
Australia is wider than the moon. The moon’s diameter is around 2,112 miles, while Australia’s is 2,485 miles.
92.
The fastest-moving muscle in the human body is the eyes. It’s called the orbicularis oculi, and we have one in each eye.
93.
The Olympic rings were first produced in 1913, and they were designed to include all participating nations. The rings’ colors, along with the white background, reflect the colors found on all of the countries’ flags. How wholesome!
94.
There was once a French king who believed he was made of glass. King Charles IV had a psychiatric disorder called “Glass Delusion” and thought that he would shatter if anyone touched him.
95.
Beer was banned in Iceland until 1989.
96.
Oscar the Grouch from Sesame Steet was originally orange instead of green. In the show’s first season, Oscar was orange partly due to some limitations of colorized TV at the time. It wasn’t until season 2 that he turned green.
97.
If you ever wondered where the term “honeymoon” came from, it originated in the Middle Ages. When there was a newly married couple, they’d be supplied enough honey wine to last the first month of their marriage.
98.
Due to increased blood flow to the fingertips, human fingernails grow faster during summertime.
100.
A housefly’s feet are 10 million times more sensitive than a human tongue.
101.
California experiences over 100,000 earthquakes a year. Thankfully, though, many of them are minor or are barely felt at all!
102.
Every year, Norway gifts London a huge Christmas tree, which is then decorated and displayed in Trafalgar Square. The tree serves as a thank-you gift for all the help the UK gave Norway during WWII.
103.
Owls sometimes swallow their food whole.
104.
The average Swiss person consumes about 48 pounds of cheese per year.
105.
Lastly: Walt Disney made it a rule for Disneyland not to sell chewing gum to keep the park clean.
Wow, my brain is sweating from absorbing all that info. Instead of sending a “good morning” text, I’m just going to send one of these facts every day without any context. Do you know any interesting and fascinating facts? Let me know in the comments!