Leading & Lesser Languages List

There are roughly 6,500 spoken languages in the world today. However, about 2,000 of those languages have fewer than 1,000 speakers.

The most popular language in the world is Mandarin Chinese, with over 1.2 billion people who speak that language.

In 2008, The International Civil Aviation Organisation decreed that all Air Traffic Controllers and Flight Crew Members engaged in or in contact with international flights must be proficient in the English language as a general spoken medium and not simply have a proficiency in standard ICAO Radio Telephony Phraseology.

Some languages are nearly extinct and are spoken by only a few older people.

Top 10 Rarest Languages Still Spoken in the World

The origins of many languages aren't clear to historians and researchers, but many people believe the Biblical tale of the Tower of Babel.

Pieter Bruegel the Elder - The Tower of Babel (Vienna) 
Licensed under Public Domain via Commons

The Christmas Song - Alvin & The Chipmunks

Debuting on this date in 1958, this song aka The Chipmunk Song (Don't Be Late) it was the only song to reach #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 Pop Singles Chart. The song was also a hit with the entertainment establishment, garnering three awards at the 1958 Grammys: Best Comedy Performance, Best Children’s Recording, and Best Engineered Record (non-classical).

World's Oldest Goldfish

A goldfish named Tish lived to be 43 years old, making it the oldest goldfish known.

Milky Way

If every star in the Milky Way was a grain of salt, they would fill an Olympic sized swimming pool.

(Click graphic for larger view - it's beautiful)

"Milky Way Arch" by Bruno Gilli/ESO
 http://www.eso.org/public/images/milkyway/
Licensed under CC BY 4.0 via Commons

The Ancient Spoon

Spoons were invented at least a thousand years before forks. It is thought the earliest ones were natural items, such as seashells or conveniently shaped stones.  Later versions were carved from wood, but the wealthy had ones made from bronze or silver.

That said, knives were the earliest utensil used for eating.

3 X Name

The scientific name of the Western lowland gorilla is gorilla gorilla gorilla.

Dock of the Bay - Otis Redding

On this day in history in 1967, Otis Redding and members of the Bar-Kays band died when their plane crashed into Lake Monona, just a few miles from the Madison, Wisconsin airport. Weather was thought to be a factor in the crash, but the exact cause was never determined.

Four months after his death at the age of twenty six, Redding's ("Sitting on the) Dock of the Bay", the last song he ever recorded, reached the top spot on the pop music charts. It was his first No. 1 hit as well as being the first posthumous single to top the charts in the U.S.

The Meat of the Matter

The average American eats about 200 sandwiches every day.

When I first saw that bit of trivia, I thought "That can't be right!  I'm an old bachelor and probably eat more sandwiches than the average person, but I don't eat THAT many!" Doing the math, I figured that each American consumes nearly four sandwiches per week.  That figure still seemed higher than the amount I eat a week, though.  

After doing a little research, I found out that 50 percent of America eats a sandwich daily. It made me think about my own sandwich consumption and considering that - probably every other day - I eat a sausage, egg and cheese biscuit for breakfast, that probably counts as a sandwich, too. In fact, I had one for breakfast earlier today and two small turkey sandwiches for supper.

Oh well, I guess I really am above the mean on sandwich consumption.

Diamonds Are Forever

And a lot of the time they last longer than the marriage.

The average size of an American diamond engagement ring is 0.8 carats.

This Diamond Ring - Gary Lewis & The Playboys

Thanksgiving Turkey Trivia

* It's unclear if the Pilgrims ate turkey at the first Thanksgiving. At the time, "turkey" meant any kind of fowl.
* Evidence indicates that turkeys have been around for more than 10 million years.
* Turkey eggs hatch in 28 days.
* A baby turkey is called a "poult."
* A mature turkey has about 3,500 feathers.
* More than 45 million turkeys are consumed during Thanksgiving.
* The average weight of a Thanksgiving turkey is 15 pounds.
* The typical 15-pound turkey is 70 percent white meat and 30 percent dark meat.
* A nest of turkey eggs is called a "clutch."
* The "caruncle" is the reddish, fleshy growth on the head and upper neck of a turkey. The red, fleshy growth from the base of a turkey's beak that hangs down over the neck is called the "snood."

giblets

giblets gib·lets [jib-lits] plural noun

the heart, liver, gizzard, and the like, of a fowl, often cooked separately.

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There IS one more definition, classified as slang, but I didn't see it at Dictionary.com.  It was a LONG time ago during a football practice and after a play, one of my teammates was still on the ground after the play was over.  The coach leaned over the prostrate boy asking him where it hurt.  I wasn't close enough to hear the muffled answer, but the coach got up with a smile on his face.

"He'll be all right." he informed the rest of us. "He just got hit in the giblets."

That was a scene that came to mind at every Thanksgiving dinner after that.

Since the Word of the Day was more-or-less related to Thanksgiving, I'll just combine two posts into one.  I was going to write one about how many calories were in the average Thanksgiving dinner: from 3-4,000 and the average American will consume more than 4,500 calories and 229 grams of fat on Thanksgiving Day alone, according to the Calorie Control Council. (there were other sources that cited different numbers, but I like the alliteration of that website's name) 

That would take a LOT of exercise to work off that many calories!  A nice brisk walk would be better than spending the day in a gym, so check out the Walking Calories Calculator to see how far/fast you need to walk to get rid of those excess calories, or you can use the Holiday Calorie Counter to figure both the calories in your holiday meal and the amount of exercise needed to work off the meal.

I have my Thanksgiving meal already prepared.

Pathetic, huh? One good thing is that it will be ready in a minute and a half after I pop it in the microwave; another good thing is that it's only 290 calories with 9 grams of fat. I'll work that off watching the football games on TV!

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.