Random Fact Sheet #276 – 35 Thought-Provoking Facts to Ponder

Linda Blair fractured her spine whilst filming The Exorcist (1973), later suffering from scoliosis. Linda was rigged to a mechanical bed that shook her so-violently; she broke her back. The shot was used in the final film and her screams of pain were real.

2. The mansion used on the ABC reality tv series, The Bachelor, is owned and lived in by a family. The family moves out and takes their furniture with them two times a year for 42 days of filming. This allows ABC to redecorate their house each season.

3. Giraffes have a blue tongue to protect them from sunburn because they graze on the tops of trees for up to 12 hours a day in the direct sunlight. Their tongue contains melanin, the same pigment responsible for tanning.

4. Profanities, vulgarities, and obscenities are all distinctly different from one another. Profanity relates to religious matters like blasphemy. Obscenity typically relates to sexual matters. Vulgarity is a coarse language.

5. In Argentina, the 29th day of each month is Gnocchi Day, with almost all families eating gnocchi. The tradition started because the 29th of the month was just before payday, so money was tight, and only potatoes and flour were left. For extra luck, everyone gets a peso under their plate.

Giving a shot of ketamine to heavy drinkers after reactivating their drinking-related memories led to a rapid decrease in urges to drink and a prolonged decrease in alcohol intake over nine months.

7. A golden retriever named Toby saved his owner Debbie Parkhurst from choking to death on an apple slice by jumping on her chest until it dislodged. He also licked her face to keep her from passing out.

8. Charlie Cox actually received an award from the American Foundation for the Blind for his portrayal of blindness as Matt Murdock in the Daredevil series.

9. There are no legal ways to be buried in the Arctic town of Longyearbyen in Norway. In 1950, they discovered bodies of residents from the 1918 flu pandemic which had not begun to decompose in the cold. Scientists fear that the corpses, preserved in permafrost, could still contain live strains of the virus.

10. There is as much vitamins and nutrients in frozen vegetables as in fresh ones. This is due to the fact that they have been quickly frozen after picking to preserve their properties, unlike "fresh" ones that can stay for days in storage or display.

Michael Houghton, the co-discoverer of the hep-C virus declined the $100,000 Gairdner award in 2013 because they wouldn't include two other co-discoverers.

12. Eddie Van Halen once put a gun to Fred Durst’s head and demanded Durst return music gear Eddie Van Halen had left at Durst’s house after a failed jam session.

13. During the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Molson delivered a fully-stocked beer fridge to Team Canada Olympic House. The only way to open the fridge was to use a Canadian passport on the electronic passport reader.

14. While driving in Wisconsin, Elvis Presley drove up on a man being assaulted by 2 others. Elvis got out and in a karate stance, threatened to take the 2 shocked thieves on. A monument now marks the scene where Elvis saved the day.

15. A cabbie who has been nicknamed “Cupid Cabbie” has collected the names and phone numbers of over 2,000 New Yorkers and organized over 100 dates, over 30 of which have led to long-lasting romances.

People Walker is a for hire service in Los Angeles where you can hire people to walk with you, motivate you, walk you home, listen to your problems and keep you company all while walking about.

17. German citizens in Ohrdruf were forced to view the inside of the Ohrdruf labor camp (the first concentration camp liberated) and bury the dead. This practice was repeated at other camps.

18. Shortly after English comedian Benny Hill died in 1992, grave-robbers dug up his grave under the mistaken belief that he was buried with copious amounts of gold and jewelry. He was re-buried with a 1-foot thick slab of concrete on top to prevent future dusturbances.

19. Wild camels living around a nuclear test site in the Great Gobi Desert can drink saltwater with a higher salt content than seawater.

20. 1 in 6 women have herpes, which is double the male rate. This is due to anatomical differences that make it easier for women to become infected.

If you shake keys near a flying moth with ears, it will dive to the ground to avoid encountering what it thinks is a bat. This is because shaking keys emits sonar similar to that produced by bats.

22. Neil Armstrong met his second wife (Carol Held Knight) at a group breakfast where they were seated together. Two weeks later, he called her to ask what she was doing and she said cutting down a cherry tree. Half an hour later, he was at her house to help. They stayed married until his death.

23. Despite being a symbol of counterculture, Andy Warhol was a devout Byzantine Catholic who went to church almost daily. His brother said he was "really religious, but he didn't want people to know", and Andy Warhol even enthusiastically financed his nephew's studies for the priesthood.

24. Henry II, the king who uttered the famous phrase "Will no one rid me of this turbulent priest?" got beaten up by 80 monks as part of his penance for his part in said priest's death.

25. The only reason indigo was included in the ROYGBIV rainbow spectrum was because Sir Isaac Newton considered 7 a sacred number and didn't want the rainbow to be "unsacred."