Well, rumour had it that I was supposed to be on vacation in Arizona this week, but as life will have it that did not happen so I am on a partial “staycation”. With that in mind, I had elected to just share some interesting information with everyone as opposed to writing a serious column and I am going to do that anyway. One never knows when they need a bit of trivia to start the conversation at the dinner table or just to appear worldly and wise. Enjoy the “Did you Know”…
• Your tongue is the only muscle in your body that is attached at only one end.
• Zero is the only number that cannot be represented by Roman numerals.
• Kites were used in the American Civil War to deliver letters and newspapers.
• Drinking water after eating reduces the acid in your mouth by 61 percent. Drinking a glass of water before you eat may help digestion and curb appetite.
• The roar that we hear when we place a seashell next to our ear is not the ocean, but rather the sound of blood surging through the veins in the ear.
• Nine out of every 10 living things live in the ocean.
• The banana cannot reproduce itself. It can be propagated only by the hand of man.
• Airports at higher altitudes require a longer airstrip due to lower air density.
• The tooth is the only part of the human body that cannot heal itself.
• In ancient Greece, tossing an apple to a girl was a traditional proposal of marriage. Catching it meant she accepted.
• Warner Communications paid 28 million for the copyright to the song Happy Birthday, which was written in 1935!
• Intelligent people have more zinc and copper in their hair.
• A comet’s tail always points away from the sun.
• The Swine Flu vaccine in 1976 caused more death and illness than the disease it was intended to prevent.
• Caffeine increases the power of aspirin and other painkillers so that is why it is found in some medicines.
• The military salute is a motion that evolved from medieval times, when knights in armor raised their visors to reveal their identity.
• If you get into the bottom of a well or a tall chimney and look up, you can see stars, even in the middle of the day.
• When a person dies, hearing is the last sense to go. The first sense lost is sight.
• In ancient times strangers shook hands to show that they were unarmed.
• Avocados have the highest calories of any fruit at 167 calories per hundred grams.
• The moon moves about two inches away from the Earth each year.
• The Earth gets 100 tons heavier every day due to falling space dust.
• Due to earth’s gravity it is impossible for mountains to be higher than 15,000 meters.
• Soldiers do not march in step when going across bridges because they could set up a vibration which could be sufficient to knock the bridge down.
• Everything weighs one percent less at the equator.
• For every extra kilogram carried on a space flight, 530 kg of excess fuel are needed at
lift-off.
• The letter J does not appear anywhere on the periodic table of the elements.