It's a strange, strange world

by Philip Yaffe

As someone once said (it may have been Einstein, but it may have been someone else): "The universe is not only stranger than we imagine, it's stranger than we can imagine."

Whoever may have said it, in 1929 a certain Robert Ripley took the message to heart and set about proving it. The result was a long-running cartoon strip titled "Ripley's Believe It or Not" that eventually boosted Ripley to head an international media empire.

Ripley's cartoons would illustrate bizarre facts and happenings around the globe. They were extremely popular and sometimes had surprising consequences.

For example, in November 1929 he published a panel saying, "Believe it or not, America has no national anthem," which started a national debate on the subject. It took less than two years to rectify the situation. In March 1931 President Herbert Hoover signed a law adopting "The Star Spangled Banner", based on an 1814 poem by Francis Scott Key, as the America's musical standard bearer.

I used to be an avid reader of "Ripley's Believe It or Not", as well as other sources of odd and amusing facts. I still enjoy learning about the weird and the wonderful, because it is an excellent way of staying young.

Here are a few of my favorite oddities. I have actually checked some of them myself and they proved to be correct. It is therefore probably safe to assume that the rest of them are as well, however bizarre some of them might seem. It is possible that some of the weird laws I have come across are now (hopefully) outdated.

A male emperor moth can smell a female emperor moth up to 11 kilometers (7 miles) away.

A man had the hiccups continuously for 69 years.

A mole can dig over 81 meters (250 feet) of tunnel in a single night.

In South Bend, Indiana, a monkey was once tried and convicted for smoking a cigarette.

A person at rest generates as much heat as a 100 watt light bulb.

A group of owls is called a "parliament".

A group of ravens is called a "murder".

A group of rhinoceros is called a "crash".

A group of toads is called a "knot".

A group of whales is called a "pod".

A pregnant goldfish is called a "twit".

A rat can survive longer without water than a camel.

Rhinoceros horn is not horn but compacted hair.

A rodent's teeth never stop growing; they are worn down by constantly gnawing on bark, leaves, and other vegetables.

A shark can grow a new set of teeth in a week.

About 70% of all living organisms in the world are bacteria.

About 85% of all the plant life on Earth is in the ocean.

A starfish can turn its self inside out.

A whale's heart beats only nine times a minute.

A woodchuck breathes only ten times during hibernation.

Anteaters prefer termites to ants.

All 17 children of Queen Anne of England (1665 - 1714) died before she did.

After eating, a housefly regurgitates is food and then eats it again.

Gangster Al Capone was not sent to prison in 1932 for racketeering or murder, but income tax evasion.

Baby robins eat about 4.4 meters (14 ft) of earthworms every day.

Catgut comes from sheep, not cats.

A cat has 32 muscles in each ear.

In ancient Egypt, killing a cat was a crime punishable by death.

Chopsuey is not a native Chinese dish; it was created in California by Chinese immigrants.

If the Earth were smooth, the oceans would cover the entire surface to a depth of nearly 4,000 meters (12,000 ft).

If you are chased by a crocodile, run zigzag; a crocodile has difficulty making sharp turns.

Almonds are a member of the peach family.

Peanuts are an ingredient of dynamite.

A dragonfly has a life span of only 24 hours.

It's impossible to sneeze with your eyes open.

The microwave oven was invented after a researcher walked by a radar tube and a chocolate bar melted in his pocket.

The first commercial microwave oven was called the "1161 Radarange" and was the size of a refrigerator.

A Las Vegas hospital once suspended workers for betting on when patients would die.

In the 16th and 17th century, drinking coffee in Turkey was punishable by death.

In the Middle Ages, a court in France ordered a cow to be hanged for injuring a human.

?Millions of trees are accidentally planted by squirrels that bury nuts and then forget where they hid them.

Deep-sea explorer Jacques Cousteau invented scuba gear during World War II while in the French resistance.

In the 1830s, ketchup in the United States was sold as a medicine.

In the 1890s, Coca-Cola was originally sold as a medicine.

Kleenex tissues were originally used as filters in gas masks.

In 1969 Larry Lewis ran the 100 yard dash (92 meters) in 17.9 seconds; he was 101 years old.

Less than 2 per cent of the Earth's water is fresh.

Lightning strikes somewhere on Earth about 6,000 times every minute.

Lobsters have blue blood.

Abdul Kassam Ismael, Grand Vizier of Persia in the 10th century, took his 117,000 volume library with him wherever he went. They were transported on the backs of 400 camels.

Arabic numerals were invented in India.

Celtic warriors sometimes went to war naked, their bodies dyed blue from head to toe.

In 1840 Great Britain became the first country to issue postage stamps.

In 1836 Mexican General Santa Anna held an elaborate state funeral for his amputated leg.

In 1982 Larry Walters in Los Angeles tied 24 weather balloons to his lawn chair and ascended to an altitude of 16,000 feet.

Oak trees do not have acorns until they are 50 years old or older.

Orchids are grown from seeds so small that it would take thirty thousand to weigh as much as one grain of wheat.

The Mexican jumping bean is not a bean. It is actually a thin-shelled section of a seed capsule containing the larva of a small gray moth called the jumping bean moth (Laspeyresia saltitans).

The partridge berry is a botanical Siamese twin; each berry develops from two flowers.

The primary purpose of growing rice in flooded paddies is to drown the weeds surrounding the young seedlings. Rice can, in fact, be grown in drained areas.

A motorist in Finland was fined over $160,000 for going 80 km/hour in a 40 km/hour zone because speeders are penalized in proportion to their income.

A man filed a lawsuit against his doctor because he survived longer than what the doctor had predicted.

In Quebec, Canada, an old law stated that margarine had to be a different color than butter.

In Singapore, it is illegal to sell or own chewing gum in order to prevent it from being thrown on the sidewalks.

The majority of burglaries occur during the daytime when people are not home, not at night.

In Venice, all gondolas must be painted black, except those belonging to high public officials.

An old law in Bellingham, Washington, made it illegal for a woman to take more than three steps backwards while dancing.

To reduce traffic congestion, Julius Caesar banned all wheeled vehicles from Rome during daylight hours.

During the reign of Catherine I of Russia, the rules for parties stipulated that no man was to get drunk before 9 o'clock; a woman wasn't to get drunk at any time.

During the reign of Peter the Great of Russia, men who wore a beard had to pay a special tax.

During World War I, homosexuality in the French army was punishable by execution.

During World War II, bakers in the United States were ordered to stop selling sliced bread. It was never explained how selling only un-sliced bread helped the war effort.

Every citizen of Kentucky is required by law to take a bath at least once a year.

Early Romans used to use porcupine quills as toothpicks.

The longest recorded coma lasted 37 years.

The world's most prolific mother was an 18th century Russian peasant who gave birth to 69 children.

In the 1940 film "You're in the Army Now", Regis Toomey and Jane Wyman kissed for 3:05 minutes, the longest cinema kiss in history.

When a Rappel's vulture collided with a jet airplane on November 29, 1973, they were flying at 11,277 meters (36,086 ft), the highest altitude ever recorded for a bird.

Amongst mammals, the Asiatic elephant has the longest gestation period before giving birth. On average, a pregnancy lasts 609 days.

Bamboo can grow as much as 91 cm (35 in) in a single day.

The "bee hummingbird" in Cuba is the world's smallest bird, measuring only 57 mm in length and weighing only 2 grams.

The "bumble bee bat" of Thailand is the world's smallest mammal, also weighing only 2 grams.

The tree that lived to the greatest known age was a bristlecone pine found on Mt. Wheeler, Nevada. It was 5,100 years old when it died.

Open-heart surgery on a hemophiliac in Chicago, Illinois, in 1970 required 1080 liters of blood.

The longest lasting rainbow, observed in Gwynedd and Clwyd, North Wales, on August 14, 1976, lasted 3 hours, 5 minutes.

Albert Einstein's formula "e = mc², the basis of atomic energy, was published in 1905, not in the early 1940s as many people believe.

Pope John XII, elected in 955, was only 18 years old when be became leader of the Catholic Church.

William Pitt, considered one of Britain's best Prime Ministers, was elected to the office in 1783 at the age of 24.

A Sunday edition of the New York Times, printed in August 1987, weighed 6.3 kg (14 lb).

Contact lenses, originally reserved only for serious eye problems, were experimentally introduced in 1888.

A single flower of the rafflesia plant in Indonesia can weigh up to 10 kg.

Dueling is legal in Paraguay as long as both parties are registered blood donors.

Police in Radnor, Pennsylvania, interrogated a suspect by placing a metal colander on his head and connecting it with wires to a photocopier. The message "He's lying" was placed in the copier. Police pressed the copy button each time they thought the suspect wasn't telling the truth. Believing the "lie detector" was working, the suspect confessed.

A lawyer defending a man accused of burglary argued, "My client merely inserted his arm into the window and removed a few articles. His arm is not himself, and I fail to see how you can punish the whole individual for an offense committed by his limb." The judged agreed. "Using your logic," he said, "I sentence the defendant's arm to one year's imprisonment. He can accompany it or not, as he chooses." The defendant then detached his artificial limb, laid it on the bench, and walked out.

Philip Yaffe is a former reporter/feature writer with The Wall Street Journal and a marketing communication consultant. He currently teaches a course in good writing and good speaking in Brussels, Belgium. His recently published book In the “I” of the Storm: the Simple Secrets of Writing & Speaking (Almost) like a Professional is available from Story Publishers in Ghent, Belgium (storypublishers.be) and Amazon (amazon.com).

For further information, contact:

Philip Yaffe

Brussels, Belgium

Tel:        +32 (0)2 660 0405

Email:    phil.yaffe@yahoo.com,phil.yaffe@gmail.com

About the Author

Philip Yaffe is a former writer with The Wall Street Journal and international marketing communication consultant. Now semi-retired, he teaches courses in persuasive communication in Brussels, Belgium. Because his clients use English as a second or third language, his approach to writing and public speaking is somewhat different from other communication coaches. He is the author of In the “I” of the Storm: the Simple Secrets of Writing & Speaking (Almost) like a Professional. Contact: phil.yaffe@yahoo.com.

Daily 1UPdate 9/24/10: Dead Rising, Halo Reach, Gary's Mod, Prince of Persia

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