12 Satisfying Bits of Trivia We Buried on This Desert Island the Last Time We Passed Through Just in Case We Found Ourselves Marooned and in Desperate Need of Fun Facts
You can survive for a month or two without food. You can get by for about three days without water. But without trivia tidbits? Buddy, you’d be lucky to make it through the night. That’s why we’ve visited every last islet in this archipelago, and stocked it with enough minutiae to sustain us for a thousand years. You want to know who owns the word “onesie”? Or why Eleanor Roosevelt dangled her baby out a window? Or all about the superfan who metaphorically murdered Stephen King?
My friend, you've found yourself stranded on the right desert island.
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You Can Fart Out of Your Mouth If You’re Not Careful
If you somehow can’t or won’t release gas from your tailpipe, some of it will re-enter your bloodstream and eventually escape out of other orifices, including your mouth. (Source)
Broccoli and Cauliflower Are Just Inbred Cabbage
They’re almost the exact same plant, and neither is naturally occurring. They were created by selectively breeding a bunch of cabbage, making them “genetically modified” by definition. (Source)
The Baffling Medieval Porpoise Tomb
Archaeologists found the ancient remains of a porpoise in what appears to be a deliberately chiseled stone grave. The island they found it on was a popular destination for monks to meditate, so their best guesses are that it has religious significance, or it was just a doggy bag for a monk who wasn’t quite finished eating his porpoise. (Source)
You Can Legally Steal Food in Italy
An Italian court ruled that it’s not a crime to steal a little bit of food, if you’re hungry and destitute. A customer snitched on a homeless man for stealing a $5 sausage from a supermarket, and the ensuing case made it all the way up to Italy’s Supreme Court. The court ruled the man was acting based on an “immediate and essential need for nourishment.” (Source)
Google’s Founders Wore Disguises to Recruit Engineers
Larry Page and Sergey Brin showed up to a big 2005 driverless car competition to scope out the talent in the budding field. The winner said he was approached by Page, who was “disguised with, like, a hat and sunglasses.” (Source)
The Word ‘Onesie’ Is Owned by Gerber
They claim the word has a 95-percent brand recognition rate, and promise on their website that they’ll “continue to be aggressive in protecting our trademark.” (Source)
The Word ‘Gulag’ Is an Acronym
It stands for “Glavnoye Upravleniye Ispravitelno-trudovykh Lagerey,” which translates to “Chief Administration of Corrective Labour Camps.” (Source)
Stephen King Was (Metaphorically) Murdered by a Fan
King was so prolific in the 1970s that he started publishing novels under a pseudonym, Richard Bachman. A fan noticed that the two authors had identical writing styles, and eventually tracked down hard evidence linking the two. After reaching out repeatedly, he finally got an answer from King: “Okay, you know I’m Bachman, I know I’m Bachman, what are we going to do about it? Let’s talk.” The truth eventually leaked, and the fan published an article in the Washington Post that started, “Novelist Richard Bachman died of exposure early this year. I helped kill him.” (Source)
The Pentagon’s Top-Secret Hot Dog Stand
Legend has it that the Soviets had two missiles trained on the mysterious building at the center of the Pentagon at all times, assuming it was a top-secret meeting bunker. In reality, it was just a hot dog stand (now an Au Bon Pain), which the Soviets definitely didn’t mistake for a secret compound. (Source)
The Worst Modern Serial Killer Is Up for Parole
Luis “La Bestia” Garavito was proven to have murdered 193 children in and around Colombia, but may have more than 300 victims. His original sentence of 1,853 years was amended to 22 years after he revealed the location of a bunch of the bodies. He'll be eligible for parole some time this year, when he’s served the mandatory three-fifths of his sentence. (Source)
The Great Baby Cage Controversy
In the first half of the 20th century, it was thought to be of utmost import to air out your baby, in order to keep tuberculosis at bay. Though Eleanor Roosevelt got in a lot of trouble in 1906 for storing her baby in a wooden box on her windowsill like a hot pie, patents were later filed for a “portable baby cage” and a “health cage” that became popular ways to give the urban baby some fresh air. (Source)
The Shark Café in a Submarine Desert
In 2002, researchers noticed great white sharks converging in the absolute middle of nowhere in the Pacific Ocean. They had actually considered that patch to be an underwater food desert, but eventually found that, far deeper than their satellites could detect, there was a massive and thriving food chain they named The White Shark Café. (Source)
