"Trivia nerd" is good.
It bests alot of other kinds.
The Surinam Toad carries its young in holes in its back.
The shortest war was in 1896 between Great Britain and Zanzibar. It lasted approximately 45 minutes.
The Hundred Years War, between England and France, lasted 116 years. I don't know if it is the longest war or not, but it certainly deserves honorable mention.
The Lone Ranger debuted on American Radio on the same day that Adolf Hitler became Chancellor of Germany.
The Green Hornet, alias Britt Reid, was related to The Lone Ranger, alias John Reid. Britt was the grandson of the Ranger's brother Dan.
"The Hundred Years War, between England and France, lasted 116 years. I don't know if it is the longest war or not, but it certainly deserves honorable mention."
Between Chirac and Blair, they may have just started another 100 year war.
All clams start out as males; some decide to become females at some point in their lives.
All pet hamsters are descended from a single female wild golden hamster found with a litter of 12 young in Syria in 1930.
An albatross can sleep while it flies. It apparently dozes while cruising at 25 mph.
Ticomaya wrote:...An albatross can sleep while it flies. It apparently dozes while cruising at 25 mph.
I saw a lttle old guy in a Lincoln on Rte 3 who can match that.
George, That's a good un. LOL
The word 'amethyst' means 'not-drunk'. The semiprecious stone was used as an amulet in ancient Greece to ward off drunkenness. (It doesn't work)
It is impossible to sneeze with your eyes open.
Horses can't throw up.
More than half of the coastline of the entire United States is in Alaska.
Equus wrote:The word 'amethyst' means 'not-drunk'. The semiprecious stone was used as an amulet in ancient Greece to ward off drunkenness. (It doesn't work)
Personal experience, Equus?
Even a cockroach has more connections between its 53 neurons than there are stars in the universe. We have 100 bn neurons... ever feel you aren't using the old grey matter enough?
None of us ever come close to using all the grey matter that's supposed to be "up there." And I can tell from personal experience that those grey matter becomes less dependable as we grey on our head. LOL
Libra is the most unique sign in the zodiac. Besides being my sign, it's the only sign that's an inanimate object.
The plane that dropped the second atomic bomb (Nagasaki) was named "Bock's Car".
The City and County of San Francisco is the fourth-largest city in the state of California, in terms of population. It is a consolidated city-county (the only one in California), meaning the City and County share the exact same land mass
The San Francisco garter snake does not even reside in San Francisco. Contrary to its common name, this snake does not occur in San Francisco at all, but only in San Mateo county on the San Francisco peninsula.
There are two locations in the United States where you can stand in a city, a county, and a state all with the same name: New York City, New York County (Manhattan), New York State; and Oklahoma City, Oklahoma County, Oklahoma State.
Texas is the state with the most counties: 254. Delaware has the fewest with 3. Alaska and Louisiana technically do not have counties. Louisiana has 'parishes' and Alaska has districts and boroughs.
The largest county in the 48 contiguous states is Coconino County, Arizona, 18,600 sq mi. which is about as large as Vermont and New Hampshire combined. If you include Alaska districts, the largest is Yukon-Koyukuk at 145,900 sq mi, almost as large as California. The smallest county in area is New York County, New York 23 sq miles. If you include Hawaii, it is Kalawao County 11 sq miles.
The most populous US County is Los Angeles, California, with 9.8 million people. The least populous is Loving County, Texas with 62.
There are 45 independent cities (not part of any county) in the United States. 41 of them are in Virginia. Saint Louis, Missouri; Baltimore, Maryland; Carson City, Nevada; and Washington, DC are also not part of any county.
The largest city in the United States that is neither a county seat nor an independent city (not part of any county) is Kansas City, Missouri.
The cockroach is the only living creature that can survive an atomic bomb.
The cockroach can live without its head for days....it eventually dies of starvation....
Vehicles and travel
The amount of time that people spend on travel has been consistent at 1,1 hours per person per day in all societies.
Traffic jams of New York, San Francisco and Paris are well known - beaten only by those in Seattle where a driver annually spends 59 hours stuck in traffic.
Traffic jams are nothing new. In 45 BC, Rome banned all vehicles from within the city - and in other cities vehicles, including horses, were allowed only at night... because of traffic jams.
Traffic lights were used before the advent of the motorcar.
Thomas Cook, the world's first travel agency in the world, was founded in 1850.
The Wright Brother tested the first aeroplane in a wind tunnel before flying it.
Air-filled tyres were used on bicycles before they were used on motorcars.
A dog was the first in space and a sheep, a duck and a rooster the first to fly in a hot air balloon. A dog was the first to parachute.
In ancient China, the nose of a criminal who attacked travellers was cut off.
Electric cars were introduced in 1896 and by the end of the century almost 50% of motorcars worldwide were electric.
Yet, by 1905 80% of cars were petrol driven and by 1920 the electric car was, well, almost history.
The shortest scheduled airline flight is made between the island of Westray to Papa Westray off Scotland. The flight lasts 2 minutes.
In 1913, the Russian Airline became the first to introduce a toilet on board.
In 1620, Dutch inventor Cornelius van Drebbel launched the world's first submarine in the Thames.
More than 60 million people annually visit France, a country of 60 million people.
The first motorcycle speedway race was held in Maitland, Australia, in 1925.
Mercedes Benz cars are named after Mercedes Jellinek.
It is said that, in 1941 the Ford motor company produced an experimental automobile with a plastic body composed of 70% cellulose fibres from hemp. The car body could absorb blows 10 times as great as steel without denting. The car was designed to run on hemp fuel. Because of the ban on both hemp and alcohol, the car was never mass produced.
There are more than 16,400 parking metres in Manhatten, New York.
New York cabs get about 2000 tickets per month, handed out by about 2000 traffic attendants.
Manhattan traffic crawls at an average of 6.2 miles an hour on midtown city streets.
The first Ford cars had Dodge engines.
About a quarter of the world still drives on the left, and the countries that do are mostly old British colonies.
The Ilyushin-76TD is the world's largest waterbomber.
The pilot with the most flying hours is American John Edward Long. From May 1933 to April 1977 he flew 62 654 hours, achieving a total of more than 7 years airborne.
There are about a billion bicycles in the world, twice as many as motorcars.
In 1955, the Ford Thunderbird outsold the Chev Corvette 24 to one.
The fewest aeroplane passengers killed in one year was 1 in 1993 and the most was 583 in 1977 when two Boeing 747s collided on the runway at Los Rodeos airport, Tenerife, the Canary Islands.
In 1893 J. Frank and Charles E. Duryea produced the first successful gasoline-powered automobile in the United States. They began production of their Duryea in 1896, the same year Henry Ford started operations of his first successful car in Detroit.
The usual thermal efficiency of reciprocal steam engine is 15%. That of steam turbine is over 40%.
Nuclear ships are basically steamships and driven by steam turbines. The reactor just develops heat to boil the water.
The world's oldest surviving boat is a simple 3 metre (10 feet) long dugout dated to 7400 BC. It was discovered in Pesse Holland in the Netherlands.
Rock drawings from the Red Sea site of Wadi Hammamat, dated to around 4000 BC show that Egyptian boats were made from papyrus and reeds.
The world's earliest known plank-built ship, made from cedar and sycamore wood and dated to 2600 BC, was discovered next to the Great Pyramid in 1952.
The Egyptians created the first organized navy in 2300 BC.
Oar-powered ships were developed by the Sumerians in 3500 BC.
Sails were first used by the Phoenicians around 2000 BC.
The first train reached a top speed of only 8 km/h (5 mph).
There are eleven Universities in the Big Ten Conference.
Canned food was invented almost 100 years before the can opener.
The USA's first National Park (Yellowstone), first National Monument (Devil's Tower) and first National Forest (Shoshone) are all in Wyoming.
bmth wrote: The amount of time that people spend on travel has been consistent at 1,1 hours per person per day in all societies.
I just returned from a trip to Bali and Singapore. In Bali, no matter where you stay, most other sites are one hour away by vehicle. We stayed at the Le Meridien hotel close to Tanah Lot Temple, and gong to Kuta or Ubud took about one hour each way. Gas is about US$4/gallon, so many own mopeds rather than cars.
