35 Curious Random Facts For The Curious Minds Out There | Random List #132

In 2003, a high school football player set a new record for career passing yardage; he later found out that both teams' coaches had conspired in his last game to ensure he'd beat the record, and he requested that the yardage from that game be expunged from his record, relinquishing the record.

2. Bees can be blue. Xylocopa caerulea, the blue carpenter bee, is non-aggressive and semi-solitary. They do not build hives like honeybees but instead prefer to live inside the dead wood. They live in Southeast Asia, India, and Southern China.

3. Without bats, there would be no tequila. Tequila is made from the agave plant which is pollinated by bats.

4. Late actor Michael Clarke Duncan was assigned to protect Notorious B.I.G. on the night he was killed, but Duncan switched assignments at the last minute. The death caused Duncan to quit working as a bodyguard and pursue acting full-time.

5. In Stalingrad during World War 2, the average life expectancy of a Soviet soldier was 24 hours.

The Terminator's world-famous phrase "Hasta la vista, baby" is translated to "Sayonara, baby" in the Spanish version of the film, to preserve the humorous nature.

7. The Voyager engineers calculated over 10,000 launch windows so that encounters between the craft and the planets on its trajectory didn't happen during Thanksgiving or Christmas, allowing them to stay home for the holidays.

8. Americans, on average, work more hours than the workers of any developed nation, including Japan.

9. American criminals Bonnie and Clyde were so impressed by the 1934 Ford V-8 Model B, that they wrote a letter to Henry Ford expressing that the Model B was the perfect getaway car.

10. Polydactyl (having many fingers) in cats was seen by sailors as advantageous for catching mice aboard ships. Consequently, there is a high proportion of these cats in seaport areas such as Boston, Nova Scotia, and Great Britain.

Lidocaine is often added to cocaine as a diluent. This is why it numbs the gums when applied. This often gives users the impression of high-quality cocaine, while the user actually is receiving a diluted product.

12. Prior to British troops firing on civilians at the Boston Massacre in 1770, they were pelted with oyster shells, ice, stones, sticks, and beaten with clubs by an unruly mob. At the trial, the soldiers were successfully defended by none other than John Adams and all were acquitted of murder.

13. An average housefly lives for about a month, a lot longer than the commonly thought 2 or 3 days.

14. The "Keep Calm and Carry On" poster from World War 2 Britain was never widely distributed during the war, and only became famous when a bookseller found an original poster in a box of old books in 2000 and commercialized it.

15. Approximately 90% of all gunpowder used by the Patriots during the American Revolution was supplied by France.

Nai Khanomtom was a Thai legend who was captured by the Burmese invading army. He fought and beat 10 people in a row without breaks to show the invading king how Muay Thai compared to Burmese boxing. The king set him free and offered him riches or two beautiful wives. He chose the wives.

17. Ignosticism or igtheism is the idea that the question of the existence of God is meaningless because the term God has no coherent and unambiguous definition and/or that every other theological position assumes too much about the concept of God and many other theological concepts.

18. In 1935, Senator Huey Long was assassinated by Carl Weiss in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Years later, when the case was reopened, it was found that he was accidentally shot to death by his own bodyguards, who had opened fire on Carl Weiss when he pulled out his gun.

19. Television ads can use inaudible sound to link your phone, TV, tablet, and PC. Companies can track what commercials you see, how long you watch it, and whether you act on the ad by doing a web search or buying a product.

20. Radiosynthesis is a process similar to photosynthesis where melanin pigment is used to convert gamma radiation into chemical energy for growth. Radiotrophic fungi were discovered in 1991 in and around Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant.

Abercrombie & Fitch founder David T. Abercrombie created a fictional story about the founding of Hollister saying that John Hollister, Sr. emigrated from New York City to the Dutch East Indies, and established his company once returning to California in 1922. In actuality, the company was founded in Ohio in 2000.

22. The bull mascot from Elmer's Glue and the cow mascot from Borden Dairy products are a canonical couple with four children.

23. Zebras fart with every stride when running away from a predator.

24. A sailor named Howard Blackburn after becoming stranded and losing his mittens in a small boat off the coast of Newfoundland, let his hands freeze in a hooked position so he could row back to shore. He lost all his fingers, but survived and went on to sail across the Atlantic single-handedly.

25. While the guillotine was being prototyped, King Louis XVI "recommended that an oblique blade be used instead of a crescent blade, lest the blade not fit all necks". His own was "offered up discreetly as an example". He was later beheaded in 1793 during the French Revolution.