useless facts

[Undave]

A Chinese encyclopaedia, The Celestial Emporium of Benevolent Knowledge, from the tenth century classifies plants and animals as follows:
(a) those that belong to the emperor;
(b) embalmed ones;
(c) those that are trained;
(d) suckling pigs;
(e) mermaids;
(f) fabulous ones;
(g) stray dogs;
(h) those that are included in this classification;
(i) those that tremble as if they were mad;
(j) innumerable ones;
(k) those drawn with a very fine camel\'s-hair brush;
(l) others;
(m) those that have just broken a flower vase;
those that resemble flies from a distance.

 

[Naukhel]

I can do that hand/foot thing, too. Took me about 2 minutes to manage it, after
being told it was impossible.

Hint: Move slowly at first, until you get used to how weird it feels.
Because it does. It feels very weird.

My useless facts:

Being stabbed doesn\'t really hurt until the adrenaline wears off.

Being hit by a bus hurts immediately.

A 32\" television falling on your head from a height of 8 feet won\'t necessarily break
your neck.

Falling isn\'t so bad. It\'s the sudden stop when it\'s over that sucks.

Telephone cords appear to be designed to tangle themselves up when you aren\'t
looking.

After more than 10 years of trying to find out the origin of the phrase \"Naked as a
jaybird\", I have given up. Nobody seems to know where it came from.
(If that isn\'t a useless fact...)

 

[Roger Bunting]

@Einion. I did clarify my statement with the following comment.

The second one is called Cruithne, although not technically a moon like the other, it\'s an asteroid which shares the same orbit of the sun as Earth . There may also be others like it

.

So I know it\'s not an actual moon and that it doesn\'t orbit the earth, although it is sometimes referred to as our second moon.

 

[DaN]

Here\'s an extra moon for ya :moon:

 

[Roger Bunting]

See, we do have an extra moon. I was right with my first comment.

 

[freakinacage]

Originally posted by uberdark

Originally posted by BarstoolProphet
Hair and finger/toe-nails continue to grow after the body dies.

actually not... your skin just recedes and it causes your body to look as if it is still growing. documented and what not in my bio class in college.

actually hair continues to grow. as it\'s not properly hard wired into the system, all it requires is nutrients. they used real hair for hitler in mdme toussauds and they had to cut it due to the nutritionally rich wax

Originally posted by reverend
There\'s a bloke at the local pub who is very loud and opinionated and no-one really likes him. Not a very interesting fact, but it\'s true.

is it you?!!

 

[johnboyjjb]

Originally posted by Einion

Originally posted by johnboyjjb
No matter how large or small a sheet of paper, it can not be folded exactly in half 9 times.

False: see Mythbusters.

Einion

It was impossible to fold a piece of letter-sized (8.5\" x 11\", 216 mm × 279 mm) 20 lb (75 g/m²) copy paper with perpendicular folds more than seven times. The thickness of the paper exponentially grew with each successive fold, and after the seventh fold the paper was just too thick to fold without breaking. Breaking the rules of the challenge, Grant showed that folding a particularly thin sheet of paper in the same direction 4 times then 4 times the other way, it is possible to fold the paper 8 times. The MythBusters then laid out a football field-sized sheet of interconnected paper (170 ft x 220 ft, 51.8 m x 67.1 m), and due to the reduction of its area-to-thickness ratio (and with help from a steam roller and a forklift), were able to perpendicularly fold the paper 11 times. Other methods of folding a piece of paper (such as with alternating folds) proved able to break the fold threshold of 7 for letter-sized paper, and perpendicular folds of more than 7 are theoretically possible with thinner paper.

 

[demonherald]

Originally posted by Naukhel
I can do that hand/foot thing, too. Took me about 2 minutes to manage it, after
being told it was impossible.

Smart arse..... Or freak.....:beer:

After more than 10 years of trying to find out the origin of the phrase \"Naked as a
jaybird\", I have given up. Nobody seems to know where it came from.
(If that isn\'t a useless fact...)

there are several local variations on that one mainly dependent on the prevelant bird type , I am pretty sure it dos tail back to the fact that a new born chich that falls out of the nest is boith naked and helpless... I don\'t have any hard solid proof to back that but I am pretty sure I have had that one explained to me before......


@ vike is a red c%&t hair thinner than a cats C&%K hair ??????lol

 

[Einion]

Originally posted by uberdark
@einion:

KILLJOY!!!!

What can I tell ya, true trivia does not get met with The Killjoy Effect

Originally posted by freakinacage
actually hair continues to grow. as it\'s not properly hard wired into the system, all it requires is nutrients. they used real hair for hitler in mdme toussauds and they had to cut it due to the nutritionally rich wax

I call BS.

For a start the hair would have to still be alive when mounted, when in fact it could be months or years old by the time it\'s used. What does it do, come back to life?

Plus it\'s cut hair, not plucked anyway!

Einion

 

[Amazon warrior]

There are only two liquid elements- mercury and bromine.

Gerbils originated in Mongolia. Their Latin name, Meriones unguiculatus, means \"clawed warrior\", because the first specimens caught fought like mad.

 

[Thecadian]

santa used to have a green tunic until coca cola portrayed him as having a red coat.

 

[squig hunter]

Originally posted by demonherald
you can\'t move your finger in a clockwise circle while rotating your foot anticlockwise at the ankle.

??? I can do it ???

Squig

 

[Roger Bunting]

Yes, but you\'re evil. lol

 

[nunu]

This is starting to feel like an episode of QI.

That was not a useless fact. :innocent:

 

[Roger Bunting]

QI is one of my favourite programmes.

 

[Necroghast]

1 out of 350,000 Americans get electrocuted in their life.

yay post 200

 

[Euphorion]

You can´t blend Chuck Norris.^^

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NdD54rG9oQA&feature=related

 

[silverdragonn]

santa used to have a green tunic until coca cola portrayed him as having a red coat.

The current portrayal of a red-suited, jolly-cheeked, fat man with white hair is the product of Coca-cola, that\'s why he\'s red and white.

St Nick, the legend whom Santa is based off, is actually thin.

 

[AinuLainour]

Originally posted by squig hunter

Originally posted by demonherald
you can\'t move your finger in a clockwise circle while rotating your foot anticlockwise at the ankle.

??? I can do it ???

Squig

Same. Does that make me evil?

 

[lizcam]

Originally posted by AinuLainour

Originally posted by squig hunter

Originally posted by demonherald
you can\'t move your finger in a clockwise circle while rotating your foot anticlockwise at the ankle.

??? I can do it ???

Squig

Same. Does that make me evil?

Nope. That just makes you surprisingly normal (instead of saint like). Squiggy\'s evil because.........well.........he\'s squiggy!