(Some knowing is not worth knowing)
~-~-~-~-~-~

Ever wanted to murder something? Here’s a handy tip: Google the term “weird facts.” I guarantee you you’ll kill a perfectly good weekend.

I did.

This is what normal people would call a waste of time, but what humor columnists refer to as “billable hours.”

And so, in order to claim another tax deduction, I’ll share my discoveries with you. Every statement presented below is a confirmed fact, according to my exhaustive online research, which I plan to do.

At least, “confirmed fact” is the way every statement begins.

For instance, did you know…

• The man who founded Match.com lost his girlfriend to a man she met on Match.com. The only way that story could be funnier is if she had left him for another woman.
• All polar bears are left-handed. And, not to be judgmental, but their handwriting is atrocious.
• The Tyrannosaurus Rex’s closest living relative is the chicken. This became the source of the first joke setup in human history: “Hey, Og. What T-Rex taste like?”
• When you type, your breathing rate increases. When you type “LOL,” your IQ drops.
• The youngest Pope was eleven years old. His name was Pope Timmy. As far as you know.
• It’s possible to lead a cow up a flight of stairs, but it’s not possible to lead the cow back down. From this observation, we can draw two disturbing conclusions: somebody actually thought to do this, and somewhere in America there’s a house with a second story full of cows.
• Fish can drown. That is the only thing I can think of that’s more ironic than the sentence, “The man who founded Match.com lost his girlfriend to a man she met on Match.com.”
• Men get hiccups more often than women. In a possibly related story, men are held upside-down next to beer kegs while fraternity brothers fire-hose Bud Lite into their mouth more often than women.
• The first US telephone book contained only fifty names. Forty-eight of those were personal injury lawyers.
• China has only one time zone. That time zone is 400 BC.
• Fish cough. And “Fish Cough” would be a great name for a band.
• As Heinz catsup exits its bottle, it can reach speeds of up to 25 miles a year. There are no relevant statistics on the driving habits of French’s mustard.
• The average raindrop falls at seven miles per hour, which makes rain way faster than catsup.
• Cows give more milk when they listen to music. Well, so would I.
• In 1895, the speed limit in New York City was eight miles per hour, which was very good news for average raindrops.
• Giraffes can lick their own eyes. And it is with all the willpower I can muster that I step away from further comment.
• Over a lifetime, the average human will produce 10,000 gallons of saliva. Except for a guy I know at work, who apparently is way above average.
• Besides humans, the only animals that can get sunburned are pigs. This is not the pigs’ fault, of course…it’s just that Coppertone never invented a squeeze bottle for cloven hooves.
• At birth, a human has 350 bones, but a fully-grown human has only 206. Apparently, the Tooth Fairy has a cousin: the Bone Fairy. “Bone Fairy” would be a good name for a band.
• A flea can jump 30,000 times without stopping. This has led some behavioral experts to suggest that some children diagnosed with ADHD are actually fleas.
• The sailfish has been clocked at speeds of over 60 miles per hour. This is why sailfish aren’t allowed to drive in New York City. They are, however, allowed to vote.
• It is physically impossible for pigs to look up into the sky. So they have no idea where all that sunburn is coming from.
• The Hawaiian alphabet has just twelve letters. That’s a paradox, because the average Hawaiian word seems to have about sixty-eight syllables.
• Hawaii has just one school district. But then, hey, Hawaiian kids only need to learn twelve letters.
• There’s also only one school in Hawaii. It’s named Weir High.
• Okay, I made that up.
• Crocodiles cannot move their tongues. This discovery was made by an anonymous rural male just after announcing, “Hey, y’all. Watch this.”
• Oysters can change from one gender to the other, and back again. That’s why the City of San Francisco — in a bold (and rare) employee benefits cost-saving effort — is considering replacing hundreds of civil servants with oysters.
• Frogs never drink. This proves, conclusively, that Ted Kennedy was not a frog.
• In 1515, Leonardo da Vinci invented the parachute. Unfortunately, it was nearly 400 years later before anybody invented a plane.
• When you’re looking at something pleasing, your eye expands up to 45%.
• Teddy Roosevelt was blind in one eye. Apparently, Teddy looked at Hillary.
• Beavers were once the size of bears. In fact, the Hoover Dam was built by a single prehistoric beaver.
• Ninety percent of birds are monogamous. This explains why you rarely saw birds on The Jerry Springer Show.
• Eskimos never gamble, and I can confidently claim that never before in literary history have those three words been used in that order.
• You exhale air at a rate of fifteen miles per hour, so don’t exhale in New York City.
• In parts of LA, it’s probably not a good idea to inhale, either.
• The first man to urinate on the moon was Buzz Aldrin.
• What do you mean, the first?