The Wackiest Fun Facts That Will Surprise You!
1 The British Royal Family Is Forbidden From Playing Monopoly
The Queen banned the Royal Family from playing the board game Monopoly at home. The world learned of this rule in December 2008, when Prince Andrew attended the opening of Leeds Building Society’s newly refurbished Albion Street headquarters. They gave him a Monopoly game to mark his visit.
The Duke of York politely declined the gift. “We are not allowed to play Monopoly at home,” The Daily Telegraph reported. Andrew explained the game could cause arguments within the family, as ‘it gets too vicious.'” That is one Royal rule and regulation that we were not expecting to hear.
2 The Small Pocket Of Your Jeans Was Used To Store A Watch
All pairs of jeans have a small pocket above the front right pocket. While you may use it for a variety of purposes, such as putting coins or a ticket of some kind in it, you probably don’t know what it’s for in the first place.
This little pocket was invented in 1879 by Levi Strauss so that men, whether carpenters, miners or railroad engineers, could put their watches in it. And even if pocket watches are no longer in use, the little pocket has remained!
3 Lobsters Communicate With Their Bladders
How about an interesting fact about sea creatures? Lobsters are mysterious crustaceans that live in the ocean. They have a strange way of communicating with one another. Instead of communicating through gestures or noises, they urinate in each other’s faces, usually while mating or fighting.
According to National Geographic, lobsters have two bladders on both sides of their head. Right below their eyes are nozzles that release urine. So, if they want to talk to each other, they spray each other with pee. Gross!
4 Pen Cap Holes Have A Purpose
Do you love to chew on the cap of your pen? Have you ever noticed that most of them have a tiny hole on top? There’s actually a good reason they’re designed that way, and it’s all about safety. According to The Independent, around 100 people die every year from choking on pen caps. The little hole is there to increase airflow, should it become lodged in your throat.
“In addition to help prevent the pen from leaking, all our BIC caps comply with international safety standards that attempt to minimize the risk of children accidentally inhaling pen caps,” the company website said. “Some of these vented caps, like that used for the BIC Cristal, have a little hole in the top to comply with the existing safety standards.”
5 Lunar Rainbows Occur At Night
There is a rare phenomenon called a moonbow. According to The Farmer’s Almanac, “Like rainbows, a Moonbow forms when light—moonlight rather than sunlight—shines on water droplets. As the light passes through the droplet, it bends or “refracts,” bounces or “reflects” off the back of the droplet, and finally, exits the droplet after bending a second time.”
Hoping to catch a glimpse of a moonbow? Conditions have to be just right for you to spot one. Be on the lookout for a full moon on the horizon, rainfall or mist, a clear night, and a dark sky. The best place to see a moonbow is near waterfalls.
6 Kids Ask 300 Questions A Day
Ask any flustered mom and she will tell you that her kids can talk her ear off. Have you ever wondered exactly how many questions a day one kid asks? According to News.au.com, children ask an average of 300 questions in a 24-hour period.
A Littlewood retailer surveyed moms and revealed that mothers answer around 288 questions a day from their little ones. The number of inquiries varied according to the age of the child, but 4-year-old girls took the prize for asking the most questions with an impressive 390 questions a day!
7 Koalas Have Human-Like Fingerprints
Koalas are the only marsupials to have fingerprints that are almost identical to human ones. According to LiveScience, a team of anatomists at the University of Adelaide in Australia discovered koala fingerprints in 1996 and determined that our shared way of grasping played a role in their evolution.
“Koalas feed by climbing vertically onto the smaller branches of eucalyptus trees, reaching out, grasping handfuls of leaves and bringing them to the mouth,” a researcher wrote. “Therefore, the origin of dermatoglyphes [fingerprints] is best explained as the biomechanical adaptation to grasping, which produces multidirectional mechanical influences on the skin.”
8 Children’s Cereal Mascots Look Down
Next time you’re in the cereal aisle, note which direction the characters on the cereal boxes are looking. There is a psychology behind it all. According to a study by Cornell University, the children’s characters are drawn with their eyes tilting down by 9.6 degrees so they make eye contact with children walking by.
“By studying more than 80 breakfast spokes-characters, we found that kids’ cereals are positioned at the same height as kids, about 23 inches off of the floor and adult’s cereals are positioned at about 48 inches off of the floor,”post-doctoral lab researcher Aner Tal said in a statement.
9 Noses Work One Nostril At A Time
Most people don’t know that 85% of humans use only one nostril at a time to breathe in and out. Don’t believe us? Try this experiment at home. Place your finger under your nose and exhale, chances are you only felt air come out of one nostril.
According to Men’s Health, Rachel Roditi, M.D., section chief for the division of otolaryngology at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, Mass., confirmed that nostrils take turns sucking in air and the flow switches every few hours, thanks to a physiological response called the nasal cycle.
10 Hunting Unicorns Is Legal In Michigan
Lake Superior State University in Michigan offers an official unicorn hunting license, making it legal to hunt the mythical creature in the state. The Department of Natural Unicorns (DNU) lists all regulations on the University website. Hunting territories include enchanted forests and outer space.
The season includes “All days of the year except Valentine’s Day. No unicorn pursuit allowed during the 24 consecutive hours of love.” The bow-and-arrow season is the first weekend in October, but you must use rubber-tipped arrows. They require a potential member to print out their license and send a photo displaying their permit.
11 French Fries Pair Best With Champagne
Have you ever wondered what food pairs best with champagne? The answer might surprise you because it’s a low-brow item. Don’t bother ordering caviar or white truffles next time you’re at a fancy restaurant and order a bottle of champagne. Marie-Christine Osselin, Moët & Chandon’s wine quality and communication manager, says french fries are the perfect food to pair with champagne.
Osselin told The Drinks Business that champagne’s zesty acidity cuts through the saltiness of the fries while the crunchiness of the fries is the perfect complement to champagne’s fine bubbles. Sounds like a match made in heaven to us!
12 Scratch Inside Your Ear To Hear Pac-Man
If you enjoyed playing Pac-Man in the 80s, then you will love the next item on the list. There is a Reddit page dedicated to learning useless talents, and they have the funniest suggestion. If you scratch the inside of your ear, you will hear the Pac-Man sound from the video game.
This little trick lets you hear the famous “Wakka, wakka, wakka, wakka, wakka” that Pac Man is known for. You know you want to try it. Go ahead, we’ll wait. So cool! Right? This fun OMG fact will impress all of your nerdy friends. You’re welcome.
13 A Fungus Turns Ants Into Zombies
Nature has a way of using zombie creatures to do the work for parasitic hosts. A perfect example of this happens in the rainforest. The Ophiocordyceps unilateralis fungus infects Camponotus Leonardi ants and forces them to do the heavy lifting for them in a phenomenon known as adaptive parasite manipulation.
According to Scientific American, when the fungus infects a carpenter ant, it travels through the ant’s body, drains its body of nutrients, and hijacks its mind to leave the nest. The insect dies in the perfect spot and toxic spores explode from the ant’s head, spreading the seed of the fungus.
14 The Three Little Metal Buttons Are Not Just For Looks
Everyone wears jeans on a daily basis, and everyone has already noticed the 3 little metal buttons that are found on ALL pairs of jeans at the front pocket. However, hardly anyone knows that they are actually there for a reason!
These little metal buttons are actually called “rivets”, and the reason they are found on every pair of jeans is to prevent them from wearing out and ripping at the seam. It’s a young Levi Strauss who invented them in 1829.
15 It Rains Diamonds On Jupiter And Saturn
A fascinating fact about our solar system is that diamond rain falls on Saturn and Jupiter. The BBC reported that US scientists collected atmospheric data revealing that “lightning storms turn methane into soot (carbon) which as it falls hardens into chunks of graphite and then diamond,” they said in a conference.
These diamond hailstones melt into a liquid sea in the planets’ hot cores and the largest diamonds are about a centimeter in diameter—”big enough to put on a ring, although of course, they would be uncut,” said Dr. Kevin Baines, of the University of Wisconsin-Madison and Nasa’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
16 Zebra Finches Dream In Melodies
Zebra Finches use their singing muscles like they’re lip-synching while they’re asleep. According to Smithsonian Magazine, scientists discovered that sleep plays an important role in how zebra finches learn to warble. These birds learn songs from a mentor in adolescence, and their brains remember the same patterns while they slumber.
Their vocal cords vibrate, but no noise actually escapes their beaks. These young birds practice what they’ve learned during the day and are dreaming in melodies. Their musical mind wanders while they’re asleep. How adorable is that?
17 Dark Chocolate Can Cure The Common Cough
Chocolate-lovers rejoice! A study shows that chocolate can cure the common cough. According to the Daily Mail, Professor Alyn Morice, head of cardiovascular and respiratory studies at the University of Hull, claims there is research to prove it.
“The idea that chocolate could cure a cough might sound a bit mad, but the ROCOCO researchers believe the benefits are primarily down to the demulcent properties of cocoa,” Morice said. “This simply means it is stickier and more viscose than standard cough medicines, so it forms a coating which protects nerve endings in the throat which trigger the urge to cough.”
18 Frogs Use Their Eyeballs To Swallow
Have you ever noticed that frogs close their eyes when they swallow? According to Discover magazine, they’re doing more than just blinking at that moment. Scientists used X-rays to film frogs eating crickets and learned that a frog’s eyes retract down towards its esophagus, helping it to swallow food.
“Behavioral observations of frogs feeding on 1.5 cm long crickets reveal a high degree of variability in eye retraction and swallowing,” the study claimed. “Eye retraction can occur bilaterally or unilaterally, and both swallowing movements and eye retraction can occur separately as well as together.”
19 Grooves In The Road On Route 66 Play “America the Beautiful”
Here’s an idea for your next road trip. There is a strip of highway on Route 66 that plays “America the Beautiful” when you drive over it. The grooves are between Albuquerque and Tijeras, and if you drive the speed limit of 45 mph for the stretch, you can hear the song play from under your tires.
Matt Kennicott, the engineer behind the project, told Smithsonian, “Anything that vibrates 330 times per second will produce an E note,” he said. “This applies to violin strings and car tires alike. So all you need to do to produce an E note is make sure that the car hits 330 strips in one second at 45 mph, a scenario that works out to each rumble strip being placed 2.4 inches apart.”
20 Sea Otters Hold Hands When They Sleep
We have an adorable animal fact for you. Otters hold hands when they sleep so they don’t drift apart while they snooze in the water. According to the Daily Mail, the largest members of the weasel family hold hands in groups, which are called otters rafts. As many as 200 0tters can join hands in a raft.
These furry creatures have a tight bond and actually fear losing one another while they sleep. They’ve even been known to secure their bond by wrapping themselves in sea plants. So, they essentially use security blankets. How sweet is that?
21 It’s Illegal to Own Only One Guinea Pig in Switzerland
Switzerland has several laws aimed at protecting animals, and their strangest-sounding legislation makes it illegal for anyone to own a single guinea pig. The reason is actually pretty sweet. ZME Science reported that they’re a social species that feel lonely if they don’t regularly interact with other guinea pigs.
If they don’t have a friend to play with, it’s considered abuse because they often fall into depression when they live alone. They aren’t the only pets who have to live in pairs. The same law also forbids anyone from owning only one parrot, since they are also social creatures.
22 Humans Are Taller In The Morning
You can thank gravity for the fact that you’re taller in the morning than in the evening. According to Business Insider, most people are about 1cm taller when they start their day. This happens because the cartilage in our knees slowly compresses as we perform normal activities during the day.
Our spine also plays a part because our discs resorb more fluid while we sleep, making us taller in the morning. Being upright and plodding all day makes the spine lose fluid, which makes us appear shorter in the evening.
