Information that you never knew
by in Casablanca, Humphrey Bogart never said , "Play it again, SAm"
A "jiffy" is an actual unit of time for 1/100 of a second
money isn't made out of paper. it's made out of cotton.
The highest point in Pennsylvania is lover than the lowerst point in Colorado (yeah pa stinks)
everytime you lick a stamp, you consume 1/10 of a calorie
the most common name in the world is Mohammed
the longest non-medical word n the Oxford English dictionary is "floccinaucinihilipilification" whcih means "the act of estimating is worthless" (i dare you to find a place where this word is applicable to say)
the longest recorded flight of a chicken is 13 seconds.
these two had me laughing for such a long time. i couldn't believe it when i read it in the paper but they are true.
in four different instances between 1987 and Febraury 1988, small pink frogs rained down from the sky on various parts of Britian. (what???? isn't it supposed to rain cats and dogs?)
more people are killed annually by donkeys than die in air crashes!!!! (how is this possible?? it was suggested of how people riding donkeys in the grand canyon and they fall off and die, but how many?? apparently more than air crashes.)
AI Summary
32 Comments
Friday May 20, 2005
Dear Yahoo!:
Why are soap operas called "soap operas"?
Jose
Houston, Texas
Dear Jose:
While soaps themselves have complicated stories involving romance, betrayal, and dark family secrets, the story behind the term "soap opera" is simple and squeaky clean.
In the 1920s, radio was booming, and broadcasters wanted to get advertisers in on the act to increase their station's profits. So radio stations convinced businesses that sold household goods to sponsor radio shows. To appeal to the main consumers of these items -- female homemakers -- the radio stations created the daytime serial drama format. The first radio soap opera ran in Chicago and was sponsored by a margarine company.
Soon, all the networks had serials aimed at women, and companies selling cleaners and food products rushed to sponsor the shows. For example, Proctor & Gamble's Oxydol soap powder sponsored a popular serial drama in 1933. By 1939 the press started calling the shows "soap operas" because so many were sponsored by soap manufacturers. "Opera" had already been used in a non-musical sense in the '20s with "horse opera," which described Western movies.
Soaps moved from radio to TV along with most entertainment forms in the 1950s. Despite the intervention of evil twins, presumed-dead spouses, vengeful lovers, and the occasional vampire, soap operas have been going strong ever since.
I have also wondered this...we also call them telenovelas (like a television novel) whcih makes sense. But the "soap" thing did always confuse me since most the plots are pretty shady or just down right dirty. :P
i bet people in developing AND industrialized countries are kicked by donkeys all the time. some die. it's sad.
WOW
Got this in an email from my mommsies
Did You Know?
Just one thing: RE: The plague. It was called Black Death because the victim became black at the last stage of the infection; thus the color of ashes. They didn't get burned and then fall down. They turned black as ashes and then died (fell down...).
This is a fact, in your Library of Congress...!!
Did you know?
The first couple to be shown in bed together on prime time television were Fred and Wilma Flintstone.
Coca-Cola was originally green
Hawaiian alphabet has 12 letters.
Men can read smaller print than women; women can hear better.
City with the most Rolls Royce's per capita: Hong Kong
State with the highest percentage of people who walk to work: Alaska
Percentage of Africa that is wilderness: 28%
Percentage of North America that is wilderness: 38%
Cost of raising a medium-size dog to the age of eleven: $6,400
Average number of people airborne over the US any given hour: 61,000.
Intelligent people have more zinc and copper in their hair.
The youngest pope was 11 years old.
First novel ever written on a typewriter: Tom Sawyer.
The San Francisco Cable cars are the only mobile National Monuments
Each king in a deck of playing cards represents a great king from history.
Spades - King David,
Clubs - Alexander the Great,
Hearts - Charlemagne,
Diamonds - Julius Caesar.
If a statue in the park of a person on a horse has both front legs in the air, the person died in battle; if the horse has one front leg in the air, the person died as a result of wounds received in battle; if the horse has all four legs on the ground, the person died of natural causes.
Only two people signed the Declaration of Independence on July 4th, John Hancock and Charles Thomson. Most of the rest signed on
August 2, but the last signature wasn't added until 5 years later.
Hershey's Kisses are called that because the machine that makes them looks like it's kissing the conveyor belt.
The name Jeep came from the abbreviation used in the army for the "General Purpose" vehicle, G.P.
No NFL team which plays its home games in a domed stadium has ever won a Superbowl.
The only two days of the year in which there are no professional sports games (MLB, NBA, NHL, or NFL) are the day before and the day after the Major League all-stars Game.
The nursery rhyme Ring Around the Rosy is a rhyme about the plague. Infected people with the plague would get red circular sores ("Ring around the Rosy..."), these sores would smell very badly so common folks would put flowers on their bodies somewhere (inconspicuously), so that it would cover the smell of the sores ("...a pocket full of posies..."). People who died from the plague would be burned so as to reduce the possible spread of the disease ("...ashes, ashes, we all fall down!")
Facts
Q. What occurs more often in December than any other month?
A. Conception.
Q. What separates "60 Minutes," on CBS from every other TV
show?
A. No theme song.
Q. Half of all Americans live within 50 miles of what?
A. Their birthplace.
Q. Most boat owners name their boats. What is the most
popular boat name requested?
A. Obsession
Q. If you were to spell out numbers, how far would you have
to go until you would find the letter "A"?
A. One thousand
Q. What do bullet proof vests, fire escapes, windshield
wipers and laser printers all have in common?
A. All invented by women.
Q. This is the only food that doesn't spoil.
A. Honey
Q. There are more collect calls on this day than any other
day of the year?
A. Father's Day
Q. What trivia fact about Mel Blanc (voice of Bugs Bunny) is
the most ironic?
A. He was allergic to carrots.
Q.if everything has germs, dosen't soap have germs too?
A. Yes
Sorry buddy, but i got some corrections, it is a widely held misconception that the original color of coca-cola was green.
this one i'm not too sure about, the song ended "atishoo-atishoo, we all fall down' because sneezing was a common symptom that usually happened in the later stages of the plague..
as a kid we were never allowed to play ring around the rosie because it was disrespectful to all the people that had died from the disease.
90% of all people know that anybody can make up true statistics regarding mike schiano's homosexual taste
whats a homosexual taste? do you mean sexual preference? say what you want, but ur the limp wristed one buddy!
who tastes homos? that's nasty...
snapple is the leading beverage in giving out useless factual information.
play it again sam was from the marx bros movie...
pink frogs..hmm..how on EARTH is that explainable
I thought antidisestablishmentarianism was the longest, which I think means something along the lines of the philosophy of people who believe in opposition of the removal of establishment.
Floccinaucinihilipilification is tied with antidisestablishmentarianism at 29 words, right?
or 29 letters... whichever lol
Letters, corrrect. oops Good eye Good eye
is there any relation between them?
no, but say hi to your mom for me.
haha yes me too me too!
something didn't look right, so I checked:
floccinaucinihilipilification means: "the act of estimating something As worthless"
ok, so here's a sentence I made up:
If I had to tell you the value of these nuggets of information, it would be an exercise in floccinaucinihilipilification.
hmm are you estimating something to define it as worthless.. orrrrrrrr is the act itself worthless...
so i'm thinking..
I find that your floccinaucinihilipilification of bubs is totally invalid and incorrect, not to mention sinful
we call them babbies in this site
actually bubs. but i thought i'd go with the proper title for definition
i just sawa geico comercial with that word
I always knew all of these things!!! EVERYONE knows about the donkey deaths except YOU!!! * hahaha
ill admit i didnt know about the money thing... i guess i never thought about it.
yeah. frogs rain down once in a blue. happened in that movie Magnolia. a smart boy, seeing the frogs fall, repeated to himself, "this happens, this really happens."