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Tug- Of-War used to be an Olympic Event

That was between 1900-1920. Other past events included power-boating, water skiing, golf, lacrosse, croquet, and polo. These along with orienteering, bowling, billiards, chess, and
many other activities are on the Olympics Recognized Sports List, and can be added to the main Games at anytime.

http://www.olympic.org/uk/sports/recognized/index_uk.asp

http://www.olympic.org/uk/sports/past/index_uk.asp

There is no such thing as a full moon

Well technically there is, but it only lasts for brief moment.

http://www.space.com/spacewatch/moon_fallacies_040227_A1.html

Rare African Frog Breaks Bones to Use as claws

So this insane African frog actually breaks bones in it's arms, then pierces it's own toe pad in order to use the bone for self defense.

http://scienceblogs.com/zooillogix/2008/06/african_frogs_break_own_bones.php

You're always 22 miles from a road in the lower 48

http://www.livescience.com/environment/080529-green-asphalt.html

A lost parrot told people his address

A parrot that flew away from home told the vet where he lived, as he had been trained to do. Pretty slick.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080521/ap_on_fe_st/odd_japan_parrot_returns

A Military Bomb-Defusing Robot Uses the Wii Remote as its controller

The older versions of the bomb-defusing robot featured controls that resembled that of an Xbox or Playstation, but this one uses an actual modified Wii-mote. Awesome.

http://us.i1.yimg.com/videogames.yahoo.com/feature/defuse-bombs-with-a-wii-remote/1200820

http://www.irobot.com/sp.cfm?pageid=170

The Highest Parachute Jump Started almost 20 Miles High

On August 16, 1960 Joseph W. Kittinger Jr. of the US Air Force threw himself from a balloon gondola floating to 102,800 ft, or 19.46 miles above sea level, for government experiment "Excelsior III". Four minutes and 36 seconds after jumping and reaching speeds of 614 mph his main chute automatically opened at 17,500ft of altitude. Ten minutes after that he touched down.

"Joseph Kittinger." Centennialoflfight.Gov. 2006. US Centennial of Flight Commision. 27 Mar. 2008 http://www.centennialofflight.gov/essay/Explorers_Record_Setters_and_Daredevils/Kittinger/EX31.htm

"The 20-Mile Fall - TIME." TIME. 29 Aug. 1960. Time Magazine. 27 Mar. 2008 http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,939169,00.html.

An Italian lady tried to bring a skeleton on a plane

And succeeded....

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/03/12/ap/strange/main3929110.shtml

Redheads will soon be almost non-existent

Some reports say that they'll actually go extinct by 2100 or earlier, but thats stretching it. Since the redhead gene isn't going anywhere, rather just getting diluted in the gene pool, there will always be the chance of a redhead popping up. At one time it was an advantage to be a redhead, since red hair is caused by the lack of the eumelanin (brown or black) pigment in the hair and skin. Fair skin allows more sunlight to enter the body stimulating the production of disease fighting vitamin D. Of course these days we get enough Vitamin D and fair skin is only good for goths and getting a nasty sunburn.

Rees, Johnathan. "The Roots of Red Hair." The Human Genome. 4 Feb. 2003. University of Edinburgh. 18 Mar. 2008 genome.wellcome.ac.uk/doc_WTD020874.html

Marticke, Simone. "Ask a Genetist." Understanding Genetics. Stanford University. 18 Mar. 2008 http://www.thetech.org/genetics/ask.php?id=144

The Weinermobile is now on a Mini Cooper S

They've just recently downsized the Weinermobile and it's new platform is a Mini Cooper S. Let the shrinking wiener jokes begin.

http://abcnews.go.com/Video/playerIndex?id=4436308&affil=wplg

Alcohol Can Increase Girls Cup Size by 2

sort of...

"The WineRack." Firebox. 10 Mar. 2008 www.firebox.com/product/2061?src_t=cat&src_id=party

Pollution Helps Birds Sing Better

Of course, it eventually helps kill them too, but who needs to get into details? Pollutants basically cause the "song" part of a birds brain to increase in size, hence allowing males to create and sing more complex songs to impress the ladies. This means that birds may actually start to move into polluted areas.

Choi, Charles Q. "Pollution Helps Birds Sing Better." LiveScience. 04 Mar. 2008. NASW. 4 Mar. 2008 www.livescience.com/animals/080304-pollution-song.html

Actually, you could climb Rapunzel's hair

In the fairy tale, Rapunzel lets down her hair and a prince climbs up it so they can hook up, but it turns out it's not all that magical. According to Chris Gorski of the American Institute of Physics, one human hair can support about 3 1/2 ounces. The average blonde has about 140,00 hairs on her head so therefor...

3.5 ounces x 140,000 = 490,000 ounces or 30,625 lbs.

So yeah, it wouldn't be a problem at all, as long as she wrapped it around something first to alleviate the strain directly on the roots and her neck.


Gorski, Chris. "The Science of Fair Tales." LiveScience. 14 Feb. 2008. American Institute of Physics. 3 Mar. 2008 www.livescience.com/strangenews/080211-fairytales-science.html

Napoleon's height was about 5' 6", which was average for the time

He really wasn't all that short, although he's often said be be 5'2" because the French measure of inches differs from that of the English system. For the time, he was just about average height, although some sources believe the average height in his army was only 5'-0"or 152cm.

"Napoleon Height." Celeb Heights. 27 Jan. 2008. 3 Mar. 2008 www.celebheights.com/s/-Napoleon-1535.html

Nafziger, George F., Koen D. Smedt, and Robert Burnham. "How Tall Was Napoleon?" Napoleon Bonaparte | Emperor of the French. 2007. Napoleon Series. 3 Mar. 2008 www.napoleon-series.org/faq/c_tall.html

"Facts." Napoleonic Literature. Napoleonic Literature. 3 Mar. 2008 www.napoleonic-literature.com/Facts.html

"Human Height." Slider. 3 Mar. 2008 enc.slider.com/Enc/Human_height

"Napoleon Bonaparte." Napoleon, His Army and Enemies. 3 Mar. 2008 web2.airmail.net/napoleon/NAPOLEON_FOREVER.html

There are twice as many hotel rooms in the MGM Grand than in all of Tahiti

McCabe, Kathy. "Where the Boys and Girls Aren't." AOL Travel. 18 Dec. 2007. 2 Mar. 2008 http://information.travel.aol.com/article/spring/_a/where-the-boys-and-girls-arent-less/20070316133109990002

Derek Jeter is a Crappy a Shortshop (or was between 2002-2005)

A new scientific breakdown of statistics shows that Derek Jeter was one of the 10 worst fielders using data from the 2002-2005 seasons. Ironically A-Rod was one of the best shortstops when he played with the Rangers.

Lloyd, Robin. "New Baseball Study Reveals Surprises." Livescience.Com. 16 Feb. 2008. 19 Feb. 2008 http://www.livescience.com/strangenews/080216-baseball-stats.html

Kentucky Bend

Kentucky is the only state that has a part of it that can't be reached from Kentucky. It's the "Kentucky Bend" and was created when the Great New Madrid earthquakes of 1811-1812 changed the course of the Mississippi river. And because of some wacky border laws.

"Kentucky Bend Map." 19 Feb. 2008 http://strangemaps.wordpress.com/2007/09/24/178-the-kentucky-bend-or-bubbleland-not-far-from-monkeys-eyebrow/

Monastersky, Richard. "The Great American Quakes." Science News 149 (1996): 362. 19 Feb. 2008 http://www.sciencenews.org/pages/pdfs/data/1996/149-23/14923-10.pdf

and some more...
http://archive.showmenews.com/2002/Aug/20020804Feat006.asp
http://hsv.com/genlintr/newmadrd/
http://geology.com/state-map/kentucky.shtml

The Electric Tux

One day in the not so distance future, you may be able to charge your cell phone by plugging into your suit, made out of nano-fiber yarn that produces it's own electricity.

Sanderson, Katherine. "Nature News." Nature.Com. 13 Feb. 2008. Nature Publishing Group. 15 Feb. 2008 . http://www.nature.com/news/2008/080213/full/news.2008.572.html

Gas prices

Gas is more expensive now that ever, but adjusted for inflation the cheapest gas prices we saw were in 1995 ($1.28 per gallon) and as recently as 2003 ($1.31 per gallon)

United States. Department of Energy. Retail Gasoline Historical Prices. 11 Feb. 2008. 15 Feb. 2008 . http://www.eia.doe.gov/oil_gas/petroleum/data_publications/wrgp/mogas_history.html

Grabianowski, Ed. "How Stuff Works "How Gas Prices Work"" How Stuff Works. 2007. 15 Feb. 2008 . http://auto.howstuffworks.com/gas-price.htm

The Island Universe

"Eventually all evidence of the Hubble expansion will disappear, so that observers in our “island universe” will be fundamentally incapable of determining the true nature of the universe, including the existence of the highly dominant vacuum energy, the existence of the CMB, and the primordial origin of light elements."

Basically, any new intelligent species would never be able to determine if there was anything else out there without knowledge gained from prior species.

Krauss, Lawrence M., and Robert J. Sherrer. "The Return of a Static Universe and the End of Cosmology." General Relativity and Gravitation ns 39 (2007): 1545-1550. SpringerLink. Deptford, NJ. 15 Feb. 2008.

Four names for the "Mountain Lion"

There are only four names for the Mountain Lion, also known as the Cougar, Panther, or Puma. Not five as some have suspected.

"San Diego Zoo's Animal Bytes." San Diego Zoo. 2008. San Deigo Zoo. 15 Feb. 2008 .
http://www.sandiegozoo.org/animalbytes/t-puma.htm

The other "Cougar" has a variety of other nicknames that can be found here...
http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=cougar

10,000 years ago, there were no blue-eyed humans

Bryner, Jeanna. "Blue Eyes Linked to One Common Ancestor." LiveScience. 14 Feb. 2008 .
www.livescience.com/health/080131-blue-eyes.html