More Useless Information For Your Everyday Life
I've finally managed to find some time to post some more Interesting Facts. Check them out...might learn something new.
• According to The SANS Institute, only one in every 475 emails is individually written for the recipient by a human.
• In a recent Department of Homeland Security sweep, three of California's state representatives were discovered to be illegal immigrants. Due to their standing in the community, they have not been deported or imprisoned, pending judicial review.
• Jury duty pay (typically a token $5) was federally mandated in 1971 after Internal Revenue Service v. County of San Lorando ruled that government agencies could be considered 501(c)(3) non-profits if they had a substantial "volunteer" workforce.
• Fortune magazine suggested that if Bill Gates were to suddenly sell all of his Microsoft stock, it could trigger a ripple effect through the technology sector, the stock exchanges, the U.S. economy, and finally the world economy, which would likely result in a world-wide recession.
• The newest Apple iPod (2006) has 22,500 times more computing power than the Apple I created 30 years earlier.
• Despite Billy Joel's claims, the good do not actually die young. According to U.S. Census data, on average, clergy members live about 11 years longer than those who have been convicted of at least one felony crime.
• Due to the growing problem among their upper-class citizens, Singapore recently outlawed the use of LASIK or other eye-altering procedures to degrade one's eyesight enough to avoid compulsory military service.
• Nearly one-third of teenagers whose families are on one or more government assistance programs own an iPod.
• The Software Publishing Association estimates that on average the chance of a software patch causing crashes or serious compatibility problems is seven times greater than the likelihood of running into the bug or security issue which the patch was intended to fix.
• In nearly all jurisdictions, a person who has changed their name (e.g. due to marriage) is twice as likely to be called for jury duty.
Gas Attack!
Carbon dioxide emissions account for a majority of greenhouse gas accumulating in the atmosphere, with CO2 comprising 365 parts per million of atmospheric gases. Almost all of these emissions are produced in the areas of power generation, heavy industry, commercial activity, and transportation, these four areas making up 99.5% of all carbon dioxide emissions. The remaining .5% of emissions come from a myriad of unusual and unexpected sources. A few examples:
Food Preparation: Baking, grilling, broiling, deep frying, braising, and other forms of hot food preparation account for .00039% of CO2 emissions. The cleanest method of cooking is sauteeing using sesame oil, releasing an average of 110 micrograms of CO 2 per dish sauteed. Grilling with charcoal and lighter fluid is considered to be the most emitting method, with the average hamburger requiring the release of 1350 micrograms to be "well done".
Fireworks Displays: The human love of celebratory explosives makes up .0000063% of global carbon dioxide. Over twenty-two kilos of the gas entered the atmosphere this past July Fourth, with the Grucci and Company display over New York City making up for almost a third of that (seven kilos). Disney Land and Disney World emit an average of four kilos of CO 2 in their daily fireworks displays, more than every car in the parking lot would produce in a week.
Bonfires: Burning leaves, scrap wood, and other flammables are responsible for .0000029% of greenhouse gas emission. The average rural American town will produce more CO2 from the tailpipes of their tractors during one day of the harvest than they will in bonfires for the rest of the year.
Tobacco Smoke: The burning of tobacco in cigars, cigarettes, pipes, and other forms accounts for .0000032% of carbon dioxide emissions worldwide. It is estimated that the use of filters in most commercial cigarette brands decrease this amount by at least half. Though it has only eleven million residents, Cuba produces one and a half times as much CO 2 from Tobacco as California, whose smoking laws are the strictest in the United States.
Space Flight: Contrary to popular belief, Space Flight does indeed contribute to CO2 levels. Although most launch fuel is liquid oxygen, the intense heat of the exhaust has a profound effect on atmospheric aerosol hydrocarbons as the spacecraft passes through the ionosphere, breaking them down into carbons dioxide and monoxide. This contributes to roughly .000000000823% of atmospheric CO2.
• In Burt Ward's 1995 autobiography Boy Wonder: My Life in Tights, he claims to have lost his virginity to Eartha Kitt, who played Catwoman to Ward's Robin on the 1966 TV series Batman.
• According to the International Association of Amusement Parks and Attractions (IAAPA), 112 bumper car riders and ride operators were electrically shocked seriously enough to require medical attention in 2005, but none electrocuted due to the relatively low voltage.
• Home Depot sells 137 different types and grades of sand.
• The Sierra Club uses approximately 47,000 tons of paper per year for their fundraising mailings, almost none of which is printed on recycled paper.
• According to Billboard, David Bowie's "Young Americans" was the highest-charting song to ever mention a President by name.
• Antarctica's McMurdo Base currently has the most expensive gasoline in the world at $126 per gallon since it can only be imported a few times per year with extremely high transportation costs.
• When measured at the end of kindergarten, children with long names typically have significantly better handwriting than those with short names.
• According to the Consumer Product Safety Commission, there were only 22 children killed in piñata-related accidents in 2005, down from 56 a decade earlier. The decline is attributed to the growing popularity of pull-string piñatas and a greater awareness of the danger due to federally-mandated warning labels.
• The tradition of slumber parties arose in 17th century England when children were temporarily sent away to friend's or relative's homes to protect them from outbreaks of "the death fog", which is now known as cholera.
• There are more recordings of "St. James Infirmary" available for sale on the iTunes music store than any other song (2006).
• 62 percent of native English speakers don't know the difference between "good" and "well," compared to only 12 percent of those who learned English as a second language.
• According to a recent survey from an independent group of researchers, nearly 15 percent of Americans admitted to having engaged in some kind of sexual activity at their place of employment. 72 percent of those people were being paid for that time.
• Drivers wearing a seatbelt have a five percent greater chance of getting into an accident than if they had not been wearing a seatbelt.
• Every year an average person will unknowingly consume roughly one ounce of feces.
• Gullible.info writer Zachary Quinn is the owner of the world's most extensive water collection with over 13,000 bottles of water from various locations around the world.
• The Internet has the second largest American-based call center, behind Wal-Mart.
• In 1984 The Westminster Kennel Club ruled that dogs competing in its shows may not have names longer than seven words. This rule has been challenged more than any other rule in the Club's 129 year history.
• The island nation of Kiribati has the highest per capita rate of transsexualism of any other country.
• Early drafts of Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman were originally entitled The Death and the Ultimate .
• The phrase "a penny for your thoughts" originated from the Chicago Sun's usual payment for opinion columns in 1912.
• In 1941, due to the popularity of Glenn Miller's "Pennsylvania 6-5000" and resulting prank calls, the Hotel Pennsylvania in New York City had to change its phone number.
• The German company Siemens was incorporated in the singular form until 1961 when they started to internationalize and realized the phonetic meaning of the name in English.
• Effective July 1, the Federal Treasury will no longer move pennies between banks because rising gas prices have caused transportation costs to rise above one cent per coin.
• Over the course of their entire lifetime, child celebrities earn only 14 percent more than an average person earns in theirs.
• Charles Hard Townes and his great nephew are the only Nobel Prize recipients who are blood relatives
• Due to the majority of one-way streets and the inconsistent freeway on-ramps, at any given moment 12 percent of drivers in Portland, Oregon are lost or off of their intended path.
• Due to a drop off in readership across the country, most major metropolitan newspaper obituary writers must now actively seek out deaths in their communities to fill the page.
• A recent survey found that the amount of customers a bar pulls in is inversely proportional to the bar's own claims to be the local hangout spot.
• After a federal examination of bottled beverage factories, analysts found that bottled water is the only bottled and sold drink to take any filtering measures on their water before production. Soft drinks, juices and other beverages use water "straight from the tap" according to the report.
• Based on measurements of not only rainfall, but overall humidity, Illinois is by far the wettest state in the country, according to a recent report by national meteorologists. By contrast, Washington is technically the driest state.
• For eight months in 1961 the American Human Society ran a successful programing using the powerful psychoactive chemical LSD to rehabilitate feral cats.
• An average person's key ring has one key that hasn't been used in the last 9 months 21 days.
• According to internal memos, The General Electric Company has unsuccessfully tried for nine years to make a high speed toaster, capable of fully toasting a slice of bread in less than eight seconds.
• Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis suffered from severe allergic reactions to cabbage, a malady she shared with one in 28,000 other people.
• The dot below an exclamation point (!) is technically known as a barter dot.
• Mozart's "Eine Kleine Nachtmusik" is the most recognized piece of music in the world today.
• An investment of $1 in advertising to a typical American child yields a return of approximately $46 over the child's life.
• 83 percent of all garbage cans in office settings have at least one unused trash liner under the one in current use.
• Ten-digit-dialing costs the U.S. $88 million per year in lost productivity.
• A renegade militia in Montana has guarded 2.3 miles of the US-Canada border since 1969.
• The release of X-Men: The Last Stand marks the 2,000th movie in the history of US cinema with a colon in its title.
• The Guiness Book of World Records holds five world records.
• Marlins manager Joe Girardi claims to have a secret equation for determining the effectiveness of batters.
• The Sago Mine disaster has the highest ratio of number of dead to the number of minutes of broadcast television coverage for any accident, disaster, or attack in the past ten years.
• The HMS Implacable transferred ownership among seven nations in the early 1800's -- four times by capture and three times by sale -- until it was disassembled and used to make new ships.
• In comic books, there are approximately 20 super-villains for every super-hero.
• According to FAA statistical records, 23B is the safest seat in a commercial airplane accident.
• For reasons that are not yet understood, vegetarian mothers are about five percent more likely to deliver twins than their meat-eating counterparts.
• Humans have the thickest eyelids in the animal kingdom.
• Until 1922, Flag Day was celebrated on the first Wednesday following the second Sunday in June.
• Left handed opthamologists are four times more likely to perform orbital reconstructive surgery than their right-handed colleagues.
• Cranial escritobattery is the technical term for hitting ones head against a solid surface such as a wall.
• An average, casual game of volleyball lasts 22 minutes.
• During the summer an average child looses six pounds. During the winter, they gain 13.
• Church attendance declines 21 percent during the summer months.
• A recent Nickelodeon Kids-Call-In® survey named George W. Bush as the best President ever, handily defeating perennial favorites George Washington and Abraham Lincoln.
• According to the International Association of Fire Fighters, approximately 12 percent of high-rise office fire alarms are set off by someone accidentally burning popcorn in the microwave.
• The web site of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation runs on Linux.
• Pearls will dissolve in vinegar, opals in chlorine bleach, and cubic zirconia in hydrogen peroxide. The latter provides a simple way to distinguish between diamonds and their imitators.
• In nearly every language of the indigenous Amazon rain forest people, "good weather" refers to a rain storm, and "bad weather" means sunny.
• On average, a basketball used by the NBA will be slam dunked seven times during its usable life.
• In a recent poll of United States civil servants, 86 percent could not describe the difference between a #1 and a #2 pencil; 57 percent did not know #1 pencils exist.
• Studies at the University of Wyoming have shown that overweight people are 36 percent more likely to vote Republican than their thinner counterparts.
• Lefty Frizzell's number one song "Saginaw, Michigan" was based on the experiences of his great uncle, who actually lived in nearby Bay City. Frizzell changed the city to Saginaw to make it "more singable."
• On May 9, 2006, Bernard Ellula became the one hundredth person to be killed by a computer mouse.
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Over in the Fact Check Forums, Geog wanted to know more about search engines. Never in the mood to disappoint, we set to work, and here's what we were able to uncover. A big thanks to Taed, Andrew, and Lyet for their great research. And special congratulations to Lyet, who won this awesome shirt for her research about Yahoo's alternative name.
• While AltaVista paid $3.3 million for their domain name, Google purchased theirs for $5, at the time, InterNic was having a buy-one-get-one-half-off sale.
• Fully 12 percent of web searches are on search engines that use only text based ranking systems. That is, unlike most modern search engines, they don't use any information about incoming links to rank sites.
• In deciding their name, Yahoo narrowly selected its current moniker over the internally popular alternative, Hooray.
• Adults over the age of 65 account for less than one percent of all search engine usage.
• It is possible to determine with 91 percent accuracy what TV shows are currently on the top five major broadcast networks by monitoring the top 250 searches in Yahoo.
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• Creator Marc Cherry has acknowledged that the Desperate Housewives are loosely based on the characters from Louisa May Alcott's Little Women.
• Among U.S. public companies, the average price paid for an office chair is $62 for rank-and-file employees, $278 for first-level managers, and $723 for executives.
• If the average American driver were to aggressively invest the money currently used for gasoline, they would have over $118,000 in that investment after 10 years.
• In a typical office high-rise, the elevators consume nearly half of the electricity used by the building as a whole.
• The short-beaked echidna is the only mammal that has been completely frozen and subsequently revived.
• In just 15 seconds, 250 electric eels can produce enough energy to power an electric golf cart for 130 minutes.
• The preference for toilet paper roll arrangement -- whether or not the paper drapes over or under the roll -- is determined by a recessive gene carried in the X chromosome.
• The dense core section of a cabbage is sometimes referred to by its traditional name, babchka.
• While Dr Pepper purports to be a blend of 23 flavors, the company acknowledges that three of those flavors are different concentrations of vanilla extract, brining the actual number of flavors to 21.
• Installing a lock so the ridges of the key face downwards -- what many would consider to be "upside down" -- increases the lock's security by 29 percent.
• American astronaut Sally Ride was named after the chorus "All you want to do is ride around, Sally / Ride, Sally, Ride" in the song "Mustang Sally", later popularly covered by Wilson Pickett.
• The story of Sun Wukong, the Monkey King, is often used in Chinese textbooks to illustrate Darwin's principles of evolution.
• Sales of Mentos candy have nearly tripled in the last year, after five years of steady decline. This surge is attributed to the popularity of the various soda / Mentos experiment videos on the Internet.
• Arnold Schwarzenegger was officially an illegal alien until 1982, due to his failing to complete his residency paperwork.
• The Chinese version of Google links to at least 12,000 pages of United States government information that is illegal to disseminate in the U.S., and is thus not indexed by the American version of the search engine.
You can see the previous parts that I've posted HERE.
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