Ah yes, but how many of you knew that a Bell Pepper is actually a …
Berry!
It’s true, I tell you!
I also know lots of randow Star Wars trivia, Figure Skating Trivia, and Buffy the Vampire Slayer Trivia
A mixture of Twinkie filling and Vaseline will flouresce under ultraviolet light.
The Greenwich meridian (0 degrees) that is used by the Ordnance Survey (the British Government mapping agency) is about 12 feet to the west of the one recognised by the rest of the world.
There is an ancient burial mound or something in Dorset that was known as “The Death of Thomas Hardy.” Hardy went to see the excavation when he was in his 80s and died of pneumonia 3 months later.
Aberdeen scored a last minute equaliser against Dunfermline in a match in February 1965. If that hadn’t gone in, and all other scores had remained the same, Dunfermline would have won their only ever championship.
Spanish words begining with Al… (alberca, etc) date back to when the moors were in spain.
The phrase ‘ojala…’ (Sp?) means almost the same thing in Spanish as it does in Arabic.
Spanish words endingwith …te (coyote, chocolate, etc) have Aztec origins.
The Taraumara (sp?) tribe in Mexico hunt deer in an unusual fashion: they out run it.
A stack of three standard sized bricks, including mortar, measures 8".
the pearly ingredient in most cosmetics is made from ground up fish scales.
McDonalds French Fries can not truly be considered vegetarian.
I know Shelley’s “Ozymandias” by heart (I’ve been known to wander around Office Depot typing it into each and every working typewriter and word processor), as well as Verlaine’s “Chanson d’Automne” and my rhyming English translation thereof. And most of Lady Macbeth’s lines, but that’s because I played her. (her first name, historically speaking, was Gruoch, and no I didn’t learn that from “Gargoyles”)
I collect random useless knowledge. The bit I usually use as an example is the fact that the bump at the nape of your neck is the 7th cervical vertebra, but I can also mention that, say, the ridge running the length of a gorilla’s skull is the sagittal crest. Chimpanzees and gorillas have roughly the same testicle size. I know (and dislike) the en passant rule and its origins. Thanks to Aimé Césaire, I know the meanings of words like “suppurating” and “leukoma”. Thanks to half a lifetime of knee problems and jury duty on a lawsuit case, I know the inner workings of the knee too well for my liking.
Oh, and Hamlet wasn’t talking about suicide.
Blondie Bumstead’s maiden name is Boopadoop.
The oldest, authentic steamboat still operating on the Mississippi River is the “Belle of Lousiville” operating out of Louiville, Kentucky.
The oldest continuously operating street railway system in the world is the St. Charles Avenue streetcar line in New Orleans.
“Steamboat Willie” is NOT the first Mickey Mouse cartoon. That honor goes to “Plane Crazy.” Mickey Mouse cartoon #2 is “The Galloping Gaucho.” “Steamboat Willie” was the third Mickey Mouse cartoon produced, but the first released to the public. All three shorts date from 1928.
It is impossible to lick your elbow
A crocodile can’t stick its tongue out
A pregnant goldfish is called a twit
That’s about it…
The first few notes of the Norwegian National Anthem are the same as the beginning of “Deck the Halls with Boughs of Holly.”
In his “Magnetic Rag”, Scott Joplin included phrases from a tune popular fourteen years earlier, “Living a Ragtime Life.”
Johann Strauss’ operetta Eine Nacht in Venedig exists in two versions: it was received poorly at its Berlin premiere and was given a makeover before its first Viennese performance.
The name of the Lone Ranger’s nephew’s horse is Victor.
Oh, wait. Everyone knows that!
The movie RoadHouse was directed by Rowdy Herrington.
The bar Moe’s in The Simpsons is named after a real life bar of the same name in DeKalb, IL (home of Northern Illinois University, alma mater of Dan Castellanetta and ME!). This bar closed down a couple of years back.
That’s all I can think of right now.
Colin
Isometric Hydrogen radiates on a wavelength of 21 centemeters.
All natural radio waves radiate on a wavelength of 9 feet.
Any painkiller that has the suffeix ‘set’ in it contains asprin.
Any word in the English language can be mathmaticly reduced to 4.
I have several pieces of ancient Egyptian poetry memorized.
The Kriss of India was once quenched in arsenic instead of water so that even a scratch could be deadly.
The core of Jupiter is metallic hydrogen.
Only saltwater conducts electricity.
The average pack-a-day smoker consumes 420 milligrams of nicotine in a week. If adminstered at once, it’s enough to kill a Bull Elephant.
The amount of nicotine in a pack of full flavored cigarettes is enough to induce heart failure in a human being.
Any of the metallic elements on the extreme left side of the perodic table react violently with water.
Jaluit men in the Marshall Islands invite sex by rolling their eyes and uttering the name of the genitals.
During the latter stages of a Hidatsa woman’s pregnancy, her husband is allowed to have intercourse with her sister.
The Siriono have intercourse every afternoon. Outdoors.
The term “missionary position” originated among the Oceanic people such as the Trobriand Islanders, who were urged by missionaries to adopt the “man on top” position as the only morally acceptable way to have intercourse. This position, uncommon in their society, was a source of amusement, as was as the belief that their preferred positions and sexual variations were sinful and heathenlike.
In some regions of Italy it was customary for the a suitor to abduct and deflower the female, then offer to marry her.
An accepted marital custom of 17th centuary Italian society was for a husband to provide his wife with the cicisbeo, a male escort, confident, and lover.
Military outposts along the Great Wall of China included a “barracks brothel”. In addition to their regular duty of entertaining lonely men, government prostitutes were trained as reserve soldiers in the event of an attack by Mongolian hordes.
The age of Popeye as depicted in the cartoons is 40 years old. This is stated explicitly in two cartoons, one B&W and one color.
I know all four verses of the Star Spangled Banner.
I know Longfellow’s The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere by heart, and I also know that it is just one segment of a larger poem called Tales of a Wayside Inn which takes its format from Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales.
I can recite Shakespeare’s sonnets 18, 27, 29, 30, 75, 116, 138, and 139.
I can name the winner of every PGA major golf tournament since 1987.
The first piece of music to sell more than a million copies was Scott Joplin’s “Maple Leaf Rag.” I suppose you could call it the first platinum record… except for that the copies sold were sheet music.
The San Francisco city flag depicts a phoenix, representing the destruction and rebirth of the ctiy after the earthquake and fire of 1906.
Until the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge was opened in 1936, San Francisco’s Ferry Building was the second busiest transit center in the world, after London’s Charing Cross Station. Today, the Bay Bridge is the second busiest automobile bridge in the world, after New York’s George Washington Bridge. Both bridges carry over 250,000 vehicles a day.
The standard “righty tighty lefty loosy” rule for screws does not apply to bicycle pedals. The left-side pedal tightens by turning it counterclockwise. The right-side pedal screws on clockwise. The reason for this is to keep the pedals from loosening while riding.
“Revenge of the Little People” is a show broadcast on KALX (the radio station for UC Berkeley) at midnight on Saturdays. The show’s promo features helium-enhanced voices singing.
A current campaign being broadcast on KALX urging people to think twice before buying a bunny for a toddler for Easter features the song “Bunnies” by John Morton.
My signature refers to the Kryptonite u-lock, a necessity for urban bicyclists that can also be used as an impromtu weapon.
I have never wielded my Krypto in anger.
Actually this looks to me like an opinion poll, so I’m going to ship it off to IMHO.
I can recite from memory The Dust Blows Forward ‘n’ The Dust Blows Back by Captain Beefheart and may well do so at ChiDope against everyone’s will.
Probably not so much “obscure” as “who cares”:
There are 14 agate lines to the inch.
Arlo Guthrie’s “Ring Around the Rosey Rag” has the same chord structure as “Swanee River.”
Similarly, Joe Jackson’s “Hometown” has the same chord structure and key signature as Pachelbel’s Canon in D.
The third word ending in -gry isOWOWOWSTOP IT!!!
Mad Dog’s favorite dessert is banana pudding, and his girlfriend’s name is Penny.
Fifty points goes to the first person who can name a common grocery item (you probably all have it in your kitchen) that contains tamarinds and anchovies.
In a standard deck of cards, the spot cards contain 365 pips, same as the number of days in the year.
In “Moog synthesiser”, Moog should be pronounced to rhyme with ‘vogue’.
Stan Laurel, of Laurel & Hardy, was born in Lancashire, England.
The most valuable natural fur is not mink or sable or any other, it’s otter. Because it’s the only naturally occurring water-proof fur.
The word “Ouija”, as in Ouija Board, comes from the French and German words for “Yes”. Which is also how to remember how to spell it.
There was a UK rock band called The Sensational Alex Harvey Band. The lead singer, Alex Harvey, suffered a serious accident and was out of commission for a year. During this time the other four members of the group recorded an album called “Fourplay” which was officially listed as being by “The Sensational Alex Harvey Band Without Alex”. This is the only album in history on which the lead singer’s name appears on the album sleeve, and is in the album title, even though he himself is featured nowhere on the actual album.
The only time Houdini failed to escape from a prison cell was when the officers concerned had forgotten to lock it. So in effect he was trying to ‘pick’ an already open lock, and failed.
The word ‘Dalek’, as in Dr Who & The Daleks, was dreamed up by author Terry Nation. He said he got it from the lettering on the spine of a volume of an encyclopedia sitting on his bookshelf, which said “DA - LEK”.
I’m not sure I understand what you mean by this. Can you elaborate?
Bonus obscure fact: In the original line of Star Wars action figures by Kenner, the company confused the names of two bounty hunters, 4-LOM and Zuckass. It was some time before this error was corrected, and many older collectors and viewers still confuse the two.
worchestershire sauce?