Goat's Eyes

The pupil in a goat's eye is rectangular.

The Toxic Avocado

At least they are to some animals, such as horses, cattle, goats and birds.

From the ASPCA website:

Avocado leaves, fruit, seeds and bark may contain a toxic principle known as persin. The Guatemalan variety, a common one found in stores, appears to be the most problematic. Other varieties of avocado can have different degrees of toxic potential.

Swimming in Spit

Your body produces enough saliva during your lifetime to fill two swimming pools.

Largest Eggs in the World

The ostrich lays the largest eggs on land, but the whale shark lays the largest eggs in the world.*

An egg from a whale shark measuring 14 inches in diameter was found in the Gulf of Mexico in 1953.

*Not counting the huge eggs the Cowboys have laid in several games this season.

How Low Can YOU Go?

The limbo world record is under six inches.

Lethal Buzz

A lethal dose of caffeine is about 10 grams or a hundred cups of coffee consumed within 4 hours.

QWERTY Trivia

F-G-H and J-K-L are the only three consecutive letter sets on a QWERTY style keyboard and they are right next to each other.

Lots of Licks

It takes somewhere between 144 and 411 licks to get to the center of a Tootsie Pop^TM

For your musical enjoyment, a topical video:

Not The Last, But The First

The drinking straw was developed by the Egyptians in order to taste beer without removing the fermenting ingredients that floated on top of the container.  The oldest straw ever found was in a Sumerian tomb and was a tube made of gold and inlaid with the precious stone lapis lazuli.

The modern paper straw was invented by Marvin C. Stone in 1888 because the rye grass straw he was using to drink his mint julep was dissolving into the drink and altering the taste.

Hairs to You

The average person has 100,000 hairs on his/her head.  Each hair grows about 5 inches every year.

This is one time I'm not proud of at least being average. -sigh-

20 Questions Squared

A 4-year-old child asks an average of 437 questions a day.

pics on Sodahead

I don't ask that many per day, but I do wonder about a good number of things each day and thanks to the Internet, I can find my own answers. The only thing I don't ask that children do is "Why?"...because as an adult (technically), I know there's often no answer at all to that particular question.

Full of It

The longest known record for constipation is 102 days.

Friday the 13th Trivia

Months that begin on a Sunday will always have a Friday the 13th.

This blog will probably always post something scary when Halloween is near.

Blanket Skin

A full-grown adult has about 20 sq. ft. of skin on their body - about the same square footage as a blanket for a queen-sized bed.

Hoo-Hoo Knows This Owl Trivia?

Owls are the only bird that lowers their upper eyelids to blink;  all others raise their lower lid to blink.

An owl has three eyelids: one for blinking, one for sleeping and one for keeping the eye clean and healthy.

Grawlix

When you use &%#@$ (or something similar) instead of profanity, it's called a Grawlix.

Follow the Money

Note:  The following is meant to be a mini-rant and a bit of trivia but is also a semi-snarky review of the new Fox series Minority Report based upon the 2002 hit movie.

---

I was torturing myself watching the fourth and latest episode of Minority Report last night when I noticed something strange;  when a man is attempting to buy some fake I.D.,he plops some banded currency on the table, then reluctantly throws down some more on top of it.  The scene went by fairly quickly, but not so quick that I couldn't make out the face on the $500 bill:

(click for larger view)

Yes, that's President Obama on the bill and it proved to me that Hollywood is indeed full of leftist partisan hacks.  Andrew Jackson notwithstanding, I've always thought the portraits on American currency were intended to be of good Presidents or at least of people who made a significant contribution to society.

Why Obama?  If he deserves to be on a bill, then - in all fairness - so does G.W. Bush;  after all, both of them certainly spent enough money, printed more than their fair share out of thin air, too.

Be that as it may...and I certainly didn't mean for this to turn into a political rant...I believe that's the last episode I will watch.  If Minority Report had been anything but a ubiquitous, poorly done police procedural show (albeit set in the future) I would have given it a proper review. 

My recommendation?  If you're watching it now and enjoying it, please be my guest and continue doing so.  I just don't think it's going to last long, that's all.  What's wrong with it?  Oh, if I only had enough time and space to list the things.  I had high hopes for the series, but IMHO (and according to the ratings), it doesn't have much of a future, especially considering how many Obama dollars much money it's got to be losing. The show is visually appealing, the special effects are pretty good and the acting isn't horrible...but not even the gorgeous Meagan Good can save this series.  The potential was there but it was wasted.

On a related note:  I noticed a woman on the hundred dollar bill, so I took a screen shot, rotated it to get a better view but still didn't recognize the face, but did see it was Australian currency. (or maybe American money honoring Australian notables)  Thanks to the world-wide interwebs, I was able to find out the woman was Dame Nellie Melba, a noted opera singer of the late Victorian era and the early 20th century. I had never heard of her.

My only hope is that if the world lasts to the time this TV series takes place, we'll honor folks like her much more than we do those such as President Obama.

Long Time in the Bathroom

The average person will spend 1.5 yrs. of their lifetime in the bathroom.

And when you really need in the bathroom and someone else won't come out, it seems like a year and a half.

Rubik's Cube Trivia

A Rubik's cube has 43,252,003,274,489,856,000 (43 quintillion) possible configurations.

Trivia Coming Aaaachoo

A sneeze coming out of your mouth travels at more than 100 mph.