Facts.

The human brain uses approximately as much energy as a 10 watt light bulb.

Fire causes $15 billion in damage each year in the US.

The Giant South African Earthworm (Microhaetus rappi) can grow up to 7 meters (22 feet) long and 2.5 cm (1 inch) in diameter.

Before prohibition, Shlitz brewery owned more land in Chicago than anyone else, except the Catholic Church.

Antarctica holds about 70% of the world's freshwater in its ice.

The combined internal surface area of a pair of human lungs is equal to about the area of a tennis court.

101 Dalmatians and Peter Pan are the only two Disney animated features in which both the parents are present and don't die throughout the movie.

Approximately 1 in 10,000 eggs has the Salmonella bacteria.

60% of the world's geysers are in Yellowstone National Park.

Americans consume approximately 6 gallons (23 liters) of ice cream per person per year.

The world's largest fruit are giant pumpkins. The world record is 1061lbs (481.3 kg)

In 1996 Americans bought $2.6 billion worth of gum.

There are twice as many Kangaroos in Australia as people.

Mary Shelly's Frankenstein is the most widely taught novel in America.

The lifespan of a tastebud is ten days.

There are more bacteria in your mouth than people on the earth.

Over the course of a lifetime the average man spends $3300 to remove their whiskers.

Beelzebub is Hebrew for "Lord of the Flies."

Alaskan citizens do not pay any state taxes; instead every person over the age of 6 months receives an oil dividend check of about $1000 per year.

The US Mint makes about 20 billion coins per year.

Each worker bee, in it's entire lifetime, produces only one twelfth (1/12) of one teaspoon (4.167 ml) of honey

The human heart creates enough pressure to squirt blood 10 meters (30 feet).

Only the US Mint produces money faster than the gambling industry in Las Vegas.

Non-dairy creamer is flammable.

80% of Publishers' Clearing House $10 million winners did not purchase any magazine subscriptions.

The warmest temperature ever recorded on Antarctica was 3 degrees F.

The bubbles in Guinness beer sink to the bottom - no one knows why

If all the ice on Antarctica were to melt the sea-level around the world would rise 67 meters (230 feet).

An oyster takes ten years to produce a pearl that is about the size of a pea.

During the average human lifetime a person's heart will beat about 2 billion times

Humans have about 100,000 hairs on their head; sea otters have this many on one square cm.

Frogs sometimes eat enough fireflies that they themselves glow.

The longest recorded flight of a chicken is thirteen seconds.

elephants can't jump, every other mammal can

When possums are playing possum they are not "playing", they actually pass out from sheer terror

the most sensitive finger is the forefinger

according to the federal center for substance abuse prevention "for kids under 21, there is no difference between alcohol and other drug use and abuse", incredibly, it makes no distinction between a self reliant 20 yr old toasting his love at their wedding reception with a sip of champagne and a drug-addicted 20 yr old doing crack cocaine!

the oil from hemp seeds has the highest percentage of essential fatty acids and the lowest percentage of saturated fats

a snail can sleep for 3 yrs

the only member of the band ZZ Top without a beard has the last name beard

if the population of china walked past you in single file, the line would never end because of the rate of reproduction

clans of long ago that wanted to get rid of their unwanted people without killing them used to burn their houses down - hence the expression "to get fired"

When you have a black eye, you have a bilateral periorbital hematoma.

There was only one pointer, the hour hand, on the first clocks made in the fourteenth century. The minute and seconds hands were added in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.

There are more television sets in the United States than there are people in Japan.

When a journalist asked her what she wore to bed, Marilyn Monroe replied "Chanel No. 5."

Experts have come to the conclusion that additional U.S. freeways does not automatically ease vehicle congestion. An example was shown in Springfield, Virginia, outside of Washington, D.C. The 8-year, $434 million freeway construction project resulted in commuters shaving only 30 seconds off of their drive time. The conclusion was that motorists lost more time in delays during construction than they could make up once the construction was complete.

Over 180 million Cadbury's Creme Eggs are sold between January and Easter each year — that's more than three Creme Eggs for every man, woman, and child in the U.S.

Crystals grow by reproducing themselves. The come the nearest to being "alive" of all members of the mineral kingdom.

Baskin-Robbins introduced the flavor "Lunar Cheesecake" to commemorate America's landing on the moon on July 20, 1969.

Irving Berlin never learned to read music or to write it. He hummed or sang his songs to a secretary, who wrote them down in musical notation.

Sylvan N. Goldman of Humpty Dumpty Stores and Standard Food Markets developed the shopping cart so that people could buy more in a single visit to the grocery store. He unveiled his creation in Oklahoma City on June 4, 1937.

In 1893, Chicago hired its first police woman. Her name was Marie Owens. While the city was progressive in its hiring practices, Chicago's female police officers were not allowed to wear uniforms until 1956.

By law, Bourbon must be produced in America, made from at least 51 percent corn, and made from a fermented sourmash of grains.

Pheasant hunting is believed to be Iowa's single biggest outdoor sporting event.

Miami Beach, Long Beach, Huntington Beach, Palm Beach, Pacific Beach, Hermosa Beach, Redondo Beach — there are scores of U.S. coastal cities and towns with "beach" in their names. Surprisingly, there's only one city in the United States named merely "Beach." It is found in North Dakota, which is a land-locked state.

The island nation of Cyprus is proudly reclaiming its ancient honor of being the birthplace of the Greek goddess of love and beauty, Aphrodite, and now offers a tasteful re-creation of her ancient rites for visitors and locals.

The Humane Society estimates that there are 800,000 dog bites that require medical attention every year. Dog bites rank second behind sexually transmitted diseases as the most costly health problem in the United States. Over 60 percent of those bitten are children, and 80 percent of the fatalities are also children.

The Humane Society estimates that there are 800,000 dog bites that require medical attention every year. Dog bites rank second behind sexually transmitted diseases as the most costly health problem in the United States. Over 60 percent of those bitten are children, and 80 percent of the fatalities are also children.

Migrating geese fly in a V-formation to save energy. A goose's wings churn the air and leave an air current behind. In the flying wedge, each bird is in position to get a lift from the current left by the bird ahead. It is easier going for all, except the leader. During a migration, geese are apt to take turns in the lead position.

In England, corn means wheat. In the Bible, corn means grain.

The eighteenth-century politician and playboy John Wiles was arguing with a fellow politician, Lord Sandwich, who exclaimed: "Sir, you will die either of the pox or on the gallows." To which Wilkes reportedly replied: "Depending on whether I embrace your mistress or your principles."

Eddie Arcaro, one of the greatest jockeys in horse race history, rode 250 losers before he won his first race. Ultimately, Arcaro won 4,779 races — including five Derby winners, six in the Preakness, and six in the Belmont Stakes, on such famous horses as Whirlaway, Citation, and Kelso.

California is the second-largest cheesemaking state after Wisconsin. It is the leader in producing Hispanic-style cheeses such as Monterey Jack.

According to the Detroit Free Press, 68 percent of professional hockey players have lost at least one tooth.In 1996, a Nevada panel designated the Las Vegas Strip a scenic byway, saying the glitzy neon lights and erupting volcano, sinking pirate ship, pyramid, castle, and other casino attractions are culturally enriching.

Every time it erupts, Old Faithful in Yellowstone National Park spurts up to 8,000 gallons of 199-degree water about 140 feet into the air.

At the turn of the century, most lightbulbs were handblown, and the cost of one was equivalent to half a day's pay for the average U.S. worker.

An average-size aardvark weighs about 150 pounds.

The coffee filter was invented by Melitta Bentz, in Germany in 1908. She pierced holes in a tin container, put a circular piece of absorbent paper in the bottom of it and put her creation over a coffee pot.

The grebe, an aquatic bird, has an effective means of escaping danger while protecting its young. At the first sign of danger, it will sink into the water until its back is level with the surface. This allows its offspring to swim over and quickly climb onto its back. The parent grebe then rises up to its swimming position and ferries the chicks across the water to safety.

Ancient Egyptians regarded the heart as the center of intelligence and emotion. They believed the brain to have no significance whatsoever, and in the important process of mummification, the brain was removed through the nose and discarded.

No one knows how many people live in the country of Bhutan. As of 1975, no census had ever been taken.

The Earth moves in its 585-million-mile orbit around the Sun approximately eight times faster than a bullet travels.

It was the style among 18th-century Englishmen to wear pantaloons so tight they had to be hung on special pegs that held them open, allowing the wearer to jump down into them.

When astronauts first shaved in space, their weightless whiskers floated up to the ceiling. A special razor had to be developed which drew the whiskers in like a vacuum cleaner.

Canadians eat more Kraft macaroni and cheese packaged dinners than any nationality in the world.

UK group The Tornadoes' hit single "Telstar" was the first UK single to reach Number 1 in the USA on December 22, 1962. This was more than a year before the Fab Four made it to Number 1 in the USA with "I Want to Hold Your Hand" on February 1, 1964.

If the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere was doubled, the average temperature of the Earth would rise by 4 degrees Fahrenheit. Many forecasters expect carbon dioxide to double by the year 2025. The world would then be warmer than at any time in the last 100,000 years.

Adult polar bears usually eat just the skin and blubber of a seal. They leave the meat for cubs and scavengers. One seal will sustain an adult bear for 11 days.

Because of the speed at which Earth moves around the Sun, it is impossible for a solar eclipse to last more than 7 minutes and 58 seconds.

The names of Popeye's four nephews are Pipeye, Peepeye, Pupeye, and Poopeye.

In Las Vegas, local 911 operators took two million calls in 1996, about half of which were non-emergencies. One communications supervisor said he had a man call who insisted they help him find his uncle at a hotel.

Every three seconds, an area of the South American rain forest the size of a football field is cut down.

In the latter part of the 18th century, Prussian surgeons treated stutterers by snipping off portions of their tongues.

The invention of typing correction fluid is credited to Bette Nesmith, the mother of former Monkee Mike Nesmith. In the 1950s, Mrs. Nesmith was a typist. One day, she brought with her to work a small brush and a bottle of white paint which she used to correct her typos. She shared her "Mistake Out" with other secretaries, and was soon approached by an office supply company to market her invention. She later renamed the product Liquid Paper, and in 1979, sold the rights to the Gillette Company for $47.5 million.

Not all Broadway musicals have had happy premises or happy endings. Popular stage musicals over the years which featured death or murder include: Carmen Jones (1943), Carousel (1945), Evita (1979), Irma La Douce (1958), Lost in the Stars (1949), Man of La Mancha (1965), Oklahoma! (1943), Oliver! (1960), Perchance to Dream (1945), Porgy and Bess (1935), Redhead (1959), Rose-Marie (1924), Sunset Boulevard (1994), Sweeney Todd (1979), The Ballad of Dr. Crippen (1961), The King and I (1951), and West Side Story (1957)

Shakespeare spelled his own name several different ways.

The seed of the redwood trees are so small that 123,000 of them weigh scarcely a pound.

It is estimated that 4 million "junk" telephone calls – phone solicitations by persons or programmed machine – are made every day in the United States.

Pieces of bread were used to erase lead pencil before rubber came into use.

There are buffalo in Poland. They live mainly in the area of the Bialowieza Forest and are known as "zubra." The well-known Polish vodka Zubrowka, which means "buffalo brand," takes its name from these animals.

Tony the Tiger, cartoon mascot of Kellogg's Frosted Flakes since the early 1950s, was called "Tom-Tom the Tiger" in the island nation of Grenada.

One-fourth of the people who lose their sense of smell also lose their desire for sexual relations.

Pandas spend about 12 hours a day eating bamboo.

Your brain is more active sleeping than it is watching TV.

The brain is surrounded by a membrane containing veins and arteries. This membrane is filled with nerves of feeling. However, the brain itself has no feeling; if it is cut into, the person feels no pain.

In Muddy, Illinois, the post office measures only 7½ by 10½ feet, about the size of a garden shed. If it wasn't for a sign hanging above the door stating, "U.S. Post Office, Muddy, IL., 62965," finding the tiny, wooden building could be difficult. It is believed to be one of the smallest post offices in the United States.

Macaws are the largest and most colorful species of the parrot family.

The literary collections in the New York Public Library expand at the rate of approximately 10,000 items per week, in dozens of languages.

The average life span of London residents in the middle of the 19th century was 27 years. For members of the working class, that number dropped to 22 years.

Ninety-nine percent of all forms of life that have existed on Earth are now extinct.

A recent survey reveals that one in four Americans "believe in" astrology, up from 18 percent in 1988. One third (33 percent) of those in the 18- to 29-year-old bracket believe, to some extent, that horoscopes and the stars influence and predict events in their lives. Only 18 percent of those 60 years or older put much credence in astrology.

Christmas trees are edible. Many parts of pines, spruces, and firs can be eaten. The needles are a good source of vitamin C. Pine nuts, or pine cones, are also a good source of nutrition.

A recent study conducted by the Shyness Clinic in Menlo Park, California, revealed that almost 90 percent of Americans label themselves as shy.

An alligator can go through 2,000 to 3,000 teeth in a lifetime.

It is estimated that within the entire universe there are more than a trillion galaxies.

For golfing enthusiasts, Maricopa County in Arizona boasts the most golf courses in the country with a reported 168, followed by Palm Beach County in Florida with 150 and Riverside County in California with 145.

The ball on top of a flagpole is called a "truck."

When commercial telephone service was introduced between New York and London in 1927, the first three minutes of a call cost $75.00.

The marquees of the fifty largest casinos and hotels in Las Vegas use enough electricity to run more than a thousand average U.S. homes.

If you add together all the numbers on a roulette wheel (1 to 36), the total is the mystical number 666, often associated with the Devil.

Only men were allowed to eat at the first self-service restaurant, the Exchange Buffet in New York, opened in 1885. Customers ate standing up.

Australia is the smallest, flattest, and driest inhabited continent in the world. It is the only country which is also a whole continent — 18.6 million people live here.

Goldie Hawn is a direct descendent of Edward Rutledge, the youngest signer of the Declaration of Independence.

If the fresh water of the earth (only 1.6 percent of the water on the planet) was divided equally among all the people on earth, each one would get 40 million gallons.

In most advertisements, including newspapers, the time displayed on a watch is 10:10.

Fleas can accelerate 50 times faster than the space shuttle.

There are approximately 100,000 glaciers in Alaska.

A "fulgerite" is fossilized lightning. It forms when a powerful lightning bolt melts the soil into a glass-like state.

In Sweden, it is a breech of etiquette for you to toast your host or anyone who is your senior in rank or age until after they toast you.

According to poetic legend, Lizzie Borden used her ax and gave her mother 40 whacks and her father 41. In actuality, the police accused her of giving her father 10 whacks and her stepmom 19. Lizzie was acquitted at her trial of the double murder.

Until the 1920s, babies in Finland were often delivered in saunas. The heat was thought to help combat infection, and the warm atmosphere was considered pleasing to the infant. The Finns also considered sauna as a holy place.

There are about 2,500 different species of horsefly in the world.

Rafflesia flowers can measure 3 feet across -- the biggest flowers of any plant. They are also the smelliest flowers, reeking of rotten meat. This is a trick designed to attract flies for pollination.

In one year, hens in America lay enough eggs to encircle the globe a hundred times

The short-term memory capacity for most people is between five and nine items or digits. This is one reason that phone numbers were kept to seven digits (not including area code).

People in Sweden, Japan, and Canada are more likely to know the population of the United States than are Americans.

American actresses Sharon Stone and Lara Flynn Boyle both have appeared in Japanese ads for cosmetics.

According to a recent study, there are more than 100 art galleries in Scottsdale, Arizona, which, surprisingly, exceeds the number in either Los Angeles or San Francisco.

All porcupines float in water.

Someone who speaks through clenched teeth is called a dentiloquist.

A bucket filled with earth would weigh about 5 times more than the same bucket filled with the substance of the Sun. However, the force of gravity is so much greater on the Sun that a man weighing 150 pounds on our planet would weigh 2 tons on the Sun.

The Coast Guard Academy in July of 1976 was the first U.S. service academy to admit women.

The McDonald’s in Ft. Huachuca was the first restaurant to have a drive through window. The drive through allowed soldiers from Ft. Huachuca to get food since uniforms were not permitted in business establishments.

Penny Marshall was the first woman film director to have a film take in more than $100 million at the box office — she accomplished this with the 1988 flick Big.

The Salvation Army's motto is "Blood and Fire."

In Japan, there was a time when a wife being left-handed was ground for a divorce. Today the prejudice against lefties has lessened.

An old Irish saying states, "The left hand of a dead man dipped in a milk pail causes cream."

In North American sign language, a raised right hand means "powerful" and "brave." A left hand place over a right hand means "burial" and "death."

Ambidextrous taken to mean "able to use both hands equally," really translates as "having two right hands."

Left-handed brains can often handle music easily, but have trouble with language. Bob Dylan, a lefty, wrote the music for "Blowin' in the Wind" in less than five minutes, but it took him a month to write the lyrics.

When painting the Sistine Chapel, Michelangelo used both hands to paint.

The fish, turbot, is a "left-eyed" flounder and the halibut is a right-eyed flounder. Lobsters are also subject to handedness. If the left claw is bigger than the right, it's left handed, and vice versa.

Of the five people that designed the Macintosh computer, four were left-handed.

It is easier for a lefty to try "mirror writing" then a righty. This was a skill mastered by left-handers Lewis Carroll and Leonarde da Vinci.

According to SAT results, left-handed students have higher math scores than right-handed students do.

When hanging the United States' flag, it must fly to the left of any other flag when you look at it head on.

Most champion fencers are left-handed.

On a left-handed person, the nails tend to grow faster on the left hand than on the right hand.

According to biographer Donald Spoto, Alfred Hitchcock had a fear of eggs

Anne Rice has stated that she is afraid of the dark

Country star, Lyle Lovett, is reportedly afraid of cows

Some math: 111,111,111 x 111,111,111 = 12,345,678,987,654,321

If a statue in the park of a person on a horse has both front legs in the air, the person died as a result of wounds received in battle; if the horse has all four legs on the ground, the person died of natural causes.

No word in the English language rhymes with month, orange, silver, and purple.

Canada is an Indian word meaning "Big Village".

There are two credit cards for every person in the United States.

Only two people signed the Declaration of Independence on July 4th, John Hancock and Charles Thomson. Most of the rest signed on August 2, but the last signature wasn't added until 5 years later.

"I am." is the shortest complete sentence in the English language.

The most common name in the world is Mohammed.

The word "samba" means "to rub navels together."

The international telephone dialing code for Antarctica is 672.

The glue on Israeli postage stamps is certified kosher.

Mel Blanc (the voice of Bugs Bunny) was allergic to carrots.

Until 1965, driving was done on the left-hand side on roads in Sweden. The conversion to right-hand was done on a weekday at 5pm. All traffic stopped as people switched sides. This time and day were chosen to prevent accidents where drivers would have gotten up in the morning and been too sleepy to realize that *this* was the day of the changeover.

Dr. Seuss pronounced "Seuss" such that it rhymed with "rejoice."

In Casablanca, Humphrey Bogart never said "Play it again, Sam."

Sherlock Holmes never said "Elementary, my dear Watson."

More people are killed annually by donkeys than die in air crashes.

The term, "It's all fun and games until someone loses an eye" is from Ancient Rome. The only rule during wrestling matches was, "No eye gouging." Everything else was allowed, but the only way to bedisqualified was to poke someone's eye out.

A 'jiffy' is an actual unit of time for 1/100th of a second.

The average person falls asleep in seven minutes.

Hershey's Kisses are called that because the machine that makes them looks like it's kissing the conveyor belt.

Money isn't made out of paper, it's made out of cotton.

Every time you lick a stamp, you're consuming 1/10 of a calorie.

Coca-Cola was originally green.

The first couple to be shown in bed together on prime time television were Fred and Wilma Flintstone.

The phrase "rule of thumb" is derived from an old English law which stated that you couldn't beat your wife with anything wider than your thumb.

The name Jeep came from the abbreviation used in the army for the "General Purpose" vehicle; G.P.

The nursery rhyme "Ring Around the Rosey" is a rhyme about the plague. Infected people with the plague would get red circular sores ("Ring around the rosey"), these sores would smell very badly so common folks would put flowers on their bodies somewhere (inconspicuously), so that it would cover the smell of the sores ("a pocket full of posies"). Furthermore, people who died from the plague would be burned so as to reduce the possible spread of the disease ("ashes, ashes, we all fall down").

The percentage of Africa that is wilderness: 28%

The percentage of North America that is wilderness: 38%