For Your Gee-Whiz Collection

Some assorted facts collected by Kimber.

There are fewer than ten cars for every thousand people in India, as compared to forty cars for every thousand in China, and four hundred and fifty cars for every thousand people in the US.

A pearl will completely dissolved if immersed in vinegar.

The average number of sesame seeds on a hamburger bun is ninety-six.

Tigers have striped skin along with striped fur.

Duck-billed platypuses have no nipples.

In the seventeen hundreds, people used to take pills made of pulverized mummies, believing that this would grant them long life.

Flossing daily increases a person’s life expectancy by about fifteen years.

Little kids don’t like spicy food because their taste buds have not thinned yet. Adults have less taste buds than children do, and so enjoy more flavorful food.

Scientists now believe that there is a fifth taste. The first four are sweet, sour, salty, and bitter. The fifth is called “umami”, and refers to meatiness, relish, or savoriness.

75% of people make up three-fourths of the population.

Rigor mortis goes through the body from head to toe, and leaves the same way as well.

Ancient Etruscans bathed by dousing themselves in olive oil, and then scraping it off. Obviously, perfume was a very popular product with them.

Bats are the only mammals that can fly (flying squirrels only glide).

Platform shoes were first used in the middle ages by the wealthy in order to elevate themselves above the refuse in the streets.

Up until the 1920s, pink was a boys’ color.

If an engagement is broken, who keeps the ring is determined by who initiated the break-up. If the girl dropped the boy, she gives the ring back. If the boy dumps the girl, the girl keeps the ring.

Mel Blanc, the voice of Bugs Bunny, was allergic to carrots.

Honey is actually regurgitated nectar, or bee barf.

Mammaries are actually modified sweat glands; milk is just especially nutritious sweat.

There are 110 dimples on a golf ball.

The first food to be microwaved was chocolate. It was an accident, and lead to the development of the microwave oven.