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28 Factoids That Will Win You At Least One Bet

August 08, 2023

If there was one thing in this messed up world we thought we could count on – a single immutable fact, one bedrock certitude that would remain unchanged and unchallenged across time and space – we thought we could say, with complete confidence, that the big goofy bird on Sesame Street is named Big Bird.

Oh, how wrong we were.

The hard truth is that, in other countries, Big Bird's “cousins” are the ones teaching children how to read, and rhyme, and respect their elders. In fact, there's an entire avian army of hulking goofballs, with different names, even different colors!

We know this is a hard pill to swallow. We just wanted you to hear it from us.

Read on to find out the names and hues of these pastel pretenders – and a couple dozen more life-altering factoids.

28

Tsunamis

In 2011, a Japanese hospital admin gave his life to help his co-workers survive a tsunami. 10 OR JOB MIYAKO When the tsunami hit, Shigeru Yokosawa ran back into the building and got a satellite phone, then threw it to a co-worker with seconds to spare. That gave the survivors a way to reach the outside world. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM — Source: 13 Movie & General Now-You-Know Facts To Rev Up Your Gray Matter

27

Thomas Jefferson

Thomas Jefferson gave his library to Congress after the British burned the Capitol in 1814. That doubled the size of the Library of Congress - -- there were 3,000 volumes before the fire (all of which burned down), and Jefferson sent about 6,500 volumes. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM — Source: 13 Movie & General Now-You-Know Facts To Rev Up Your Gray Matter

26

Apparently, teeth come from our fish ancestors. Ancient fish had dermal denticles - - small, spiky scales that some fish, like sharks or mantas, still have. Scientists think that, as those fish evolved into land animals, the denticles moved from the skin and into the mouth, where they became teeth. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM — Source: 13 Movie & General Now-You-Know Facts To Rev Up Your Gray Matter

25

In 17th-century London, you'd have to pay one of several fire brigades to save your building. A fire mark You'd insure it against fire, and the company would place its fire mark on the building. That way, when it caught fire, the company's firemen would know they were supposed to put out the fire (otherwise, they'd just leave). NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM — Source: 13 Movie & General Now-You-Know Facts To Rev Up Your Gray Matter

24

Penguins can drink saltwater like it's regular water. A gland above their eye filters the salt from their blood, and that salt then gets sneezed out or it comes out through their bill. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM — Source: 13 Movie & General Now-You-Know Facts To Rev Up Your Gray Matter

23

That was Jim Carrey's real chipped tooth in Dumb and Dumber. 27% It got chipped in grade school, and he had a cap put on it t---he just took it off for the movie. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM — Source: 13 Movie & General Now-You-Know Facts To Rev Up Your Gray Matter

22

2012's Skyfall revived the straight razor industry. The movie's straight razor scene led to a spike in demand that didn't totally fade away even years later. One company went from making 8,000 straight razors per year in the mid-2000s to having orders for 110,000 a decade later. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM — Source: 13 Intriguing, Now-You-Know Things About Movies (And More)

21

Big Bird is a different color in different countries. Pino They're called his cousins on the show, and they include Abelardo (green, from Mexico), Pino (blue, from the Netherlands) and Minik Ku (orange, from Turkey). NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM — Source: 13 Intriguing, Now-You-Know Things About Movies (And More)

20

The interviews at the start of Interstellar are (mostly) real. One of them includes an actor (Ellen Burstyn), but the others are interviews with real people, describing what they lived through, from the 2012 documentary Dust Bowl. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM — Source: 13 Intriguing, Now-You-Know Things About Movies (And More)

19

The first ideas for Indiana Jones involved making him a pedo. At an early brainstorming session for the character, George Lucas suggested that he and Marion Ravenwood might have had an affair when he was an adult and she was 11. Не then moved her age up to all of 15 (Once she's sixteen or seventeen it's not interesting anymore.) NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM — Source: 13 Intriguing, Now-You-Know Things About Movies (And More)

18

There are no snakes in New Zealand. The islands that make up the country have zero native snake species -- a few lizard species are the closest thing. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM — Source: 13 Intriguing, Now-You-Know Things About Movies (And More)

17

High G-Forces gives pilots something called geasles. They're small, dark spots on your skin that form when capillaries burst due to the intense pressure, and they're called G-measles (or geasles for short). NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM — Source: 13 Intriguing, Now-You-Know Things About Movies (And More)

16

A single animal species has a skeleton that's part metal. It's the scaly-foot snail, a critter found on hydrothermal events deep in the ocean, and its shell and scales (i.e. its skeleton) are partly made out of iron sulphides. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM — Source: 13 Intriguing, Now-You-Know Things About Movies (And More)

15

Scientists can work out how much pee there is in a pool by measuring artificial sweeteners. Some of those sweeteners aren't digested and don't easily break down in water, so measuring their amount in a pool gives you a pretty good idea of the amount of pee. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM — Source: 13 Intriguing, Now-You-Know Things About Movies (And More)

14

In the 17th century, coffee was thought to make men impotent. At one point, in an attempt to restore their husbands' virility, a bunch of London women petitioned against coffee houses. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM — Source: 13 Intriguing, Now-You-Know Things About Movies (And More)

13

The Pentagon wasted $5 billion on a plane that was never made. The A-12 Stealth Bomber was billed as a long-range bomber for the 21st century, but the development program just fizzled out after burning a bunch of money and never produced anything (except lawsuits). NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM — Source: 13 Intriguing, Now-You-Know Things About Movies (And More)

12

Breakdancing has officially become an Olympic sport. CALIFORNIA 86 The first breakdancing event will be held at the 2024 Olympics in Paris -- it's part of the Olympic committee trying to get a younger crowd to tune in. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM — Source: 13 Intriguing, Now-You-Know Things About Movies (And More)

11

Making a pound of honey requires 50,000 hours of bee flight. In other words, a bee is going to fly over a distance that's twice the circumference of the Earth to gather enough nectar to make one pound of honey. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM — Source: 13 Intriguing, Now-You-Know Things About Movies (And More)

10

The MCU

They asked Don Cheadle for a 12-year acting commitment at his kid's birthday party. The person from Marvel who'd called him about starring in the MCU gave him an hour to decide, and when Cheadle said he was celebrating his kid's birthday, they told him he can have two hours. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM — Source: 13 Intriguing, Now-You-Know Things About Movies (And More)

9

Russian Military

Russia's military makes. its arsenal look more imposing with inflatable weapons. It's literally a bunch of tanks, radar stations, and everything between that look real from a distance but are inflatable - they're very cheap and reasonably convincing. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM — Source: 13 Incredible Now-You-Know Facts About Russia

8

Russian prisoners tattooed images of Lenin and Stalin as protective amulets. While the USSR existed, some prisoners believed guards weren't allowed to shoot Lenin's and Stalin's faces, so they got those tattooed on their chests. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM — Source: 13 Incredible Now-You-Know Facts About Russia

7

At one point, the government in one part of Siberia paid teachers with vodka. w ЩАЯ HA Славянская ОДКА NI в ... РОССИИ ПУТИНИ НАСТОЯЩАЯ СТАНДАРТ Русския POUR PUTINK MAD - - قسم МА ВЛАДИМИ NOTA excount РСКА AIR VON ROLM МОСЬ ЗЕЛЕНАЯ МАРКА TASTAB АСТОЛЬБ THERES BOGS a The government ran out of money, so it gave teachers 15 bottles each. They were happy with that, since they could resell it in local markets. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM — Source: 13 Incredible Now-You-Know Facts About Russia

6

You could completely fit Pluto within Russia's borders (but Pluto's area is greater). Russia is about 6,000 kilometers wide and 3,000 kilometers high, and Pluto has a diameter of 2,370 kilometers - - so, in 2D, it could fit inside Russia. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM — Source: 13 Incredible Now-You-Know Facts About Russia

5

During the 1930s, weekends were abolished in Russia (and the whole USSR). The new calendar had days of rest scattered kind of randomly, and those days were different for different groups of workers. The scheme was nixed in 1940. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM — Source: 13 Incredible Now-You-Know Facts About Russia

4

One time, the Russian Air Force bombed a river to break the ice that blocked its flow. 25 Ice on the Sukhona River created a dam which could have made the river overflow, endangering thousands -- so it was bombed every hour until it broke. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM — Source: 13 Incredible Now-You-Know Facts About Russia

3

Until 2011, beer was officially considered a soft drink in the Russian Federation. Before that, anything with less than 10% alcohol was classified as foodstuff, and classifying beer as alcoholic gave the government more control over it. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM — Source: 13 Incredible Now-You-Know Facts About Russia

2

Metro Dogs

Moscow's metro dogs actually use the subway system to travel through the city. Some of them just live in the subway, but some use it to take short trips through city, and some take long trips and work the subway crowds for treats. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM — Source: 13 Incredible Now-You-Know Facts About Russia

1

Craters

Deep beneath a Siberian impact crater, there are trillions of carats of diamonds. The Popigai crater, about 100 kilometers wide, lies above enough diamonds to supply all the world's diamond needs for the next three millennia. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM — Source: 13 Incredible Now-You-Know Facts About Russia

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