12 Trivia Tidbits for Friday, April 26, 2024

12 Trivia Tidbits for Friday, April 26, 2024

‘Fawlty Towers’ Creator John Cleese Really Doesn’t Understand ‘Fawlty Towers’

‘Fawlty Towers’ Creator John Cleese Really Doesn’t Understand ‘Fawlty Towers’

26 of the Funniest Tweets from Friday, April 26, 2024

26 of the Funniest Tweets from Friday, April 26, 2024

These Are the 400 Years No One Gave a Shit About the Mona Lisa

These Are the 400 Years No One Gave a Shit About the Mona Lisa

Jennifer Aniston Thinks She Can Do Dolly Parton Justice With ‘9 to 5’ Remake

Jennifer Aniston Thinks She Can Do Dolly Parton Justice With ‘9 to 5’ Remake

29 Bits of Trivia to Pressure Cook in Your Skull

We stumbled upon a pretty groundbreaking discovery today. Sure, this site might not qualify as a “scientific journal” or anything, but if you know a guy who knows a guy over at the American Association for the Advancement of Science, please pass this along. 

You ready? Okay, here goes. The tidbit of knowledge within each fact is only unlocked by the warmth of your brain! Your ability to read and comprehend each fact isn’t enough. That 98.6-degree sponge (or higher, if you’re sick) makes that raw fact burst open like popcorn. Here, try it for yourself.

Click right here to get the best of Cracked sent to your inbox.

29

CRACKED.COM Nope, a frog won't let itself be boiled. When trying to make a point, people often bring up this froggy experiment which was done by... someone or other. It is a real experiment, though, done in 1869 by German scientist Friedrich Goltz - who first removed the frog's brain. That feels like an important detail.

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28

CRACKED.COM NEWS Google and Facebook are destroying news. Due to both companies' near monopoly, most of the ad revenue from news goes to them for acting as middlemen. Meanwhile, the news sites doing the actual reporting are left to scrape by on the scraps, unable to negotiate better terms with the tech giants.

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27

CRACKED.COM Chiropractic was dreamed up by a 19th-century quack. Daniel David Palmer disbelieved germs and strongly opposed vaccinations. His idea of treating disease by manipulating bones was revealed to him, he said, by the spirit of a dead doctor. Oh, and he totally expected chiropractic to become a new religion.

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26

CRACKED.COM The writers' room of Friends was a toxic bro-fest. In 2002, writer assistant Amaani Lyle sued Friends for harassment. The (mostly male) writers never denied their edgelord sexism and racism, claiming it was all necessary for their creative process. The suit was eventually dismissed, as the horrible remarks weren't aimed specifically at Lyle.

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25

Half of all sloths die while pooping. Sloths are permanently constipated - they only poop once a week, losing up to one-third of their body weight in each bowel movement. And for some reason they always do it on the ground, where predators can get to them. Up to half of all sloths are eaten while going to the bathroom. CRACKED.COM

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24

CRACKED.COM 9420R Farmers are forced to hack their own tractors. Ridiculously restrictive license agreements require owners to haul their increasingly computerized tractors to a dealer for repairs, even for the smallest problems. Farmers often rely on black market software to jailbreak (and be able to fix) their own goddamn equipment.

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23

CRACKED.COM The U.S. government used hundreds of Nazis as spies. After World War II, America didn't just employ German scientists - it came out in 2014 that at least 1,000 actual Nazis served as spies for the U.S. during the Cold War. For their (largely worthless) services, the government would often shield them from prosecution for their Nazi crimes.

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22

CRACKED.COM Restaurants are going fully virtual. Your Chuck Е. Cheese delivery order may not come from Chuck Е. Cheese - it's likely to come from a place that's only a kitchen, with no dining area or waitstaff. Many of these ghost kitchens run several brands at the same time.

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21

GRAGKED.COM VATHLO ISLAND-- HOME OF HIGHLY DEVELOPED BLACK RACE Krypton was racially segregated. In the early '70s, DC Comics decided to address the fact that their comics were blindingly white - so they introduced Vathlo Island, where all black Kryptonians lived. Condescendingly describing them as a highly developed black race didn't help matters.

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20

Ice cream actually warms you up. Your body heats up a little bit when digesting the fat content of ice cream. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM

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19

Most wasabi is just horseradish tinted green. Real wasabi tastes more herbal and is difficult to grow, making it more expensive to produe. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM

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18

Fortune cookies originated in San Francisco. y Numbers 27, at you can do You *11 ne Before WWII, they were known as fortune tea cakes, influenced by Japanese tea cakes. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM

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17

Before 1965, chicken wings were discarded for being undesirable. Before buffalo wings, they were considered the worst parts of the chicken. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM

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16

Almost all avocados in the U.S. can be traced back to a single tree. The Hass avocado is descended from a seedling planted in 1926 by postman Rudolf Hass. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM

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15

English muffins were made in New York. They also aren't muffins. They're crumpets. What a misnomer. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM

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14

Hard shell tacos were popularized by Taco Bell. They were developed in the U.S. in the 1890s. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM

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13

The most widely consumed fruit in the world is the mango. Apples and oranges don't even compare to mangoes. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM

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12

A single pineapple used to cost $8000. Pineapples were imported to be used as lavish decoration in the American colonies. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM

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11

The Great Wall of China is held together with sticky rice. The innovative use of sticky rice in mortar has helped the structure survive the elements. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM

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10

Snoop Dogg employs a professional blunt roller he pays $40-50k annually. About employing people with talent, Snoop says, If you are great at something I need, I am hiring you. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM

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9

In the 1960s Batman series, Batman and Robin buckled their seatbelts before taking off in the Batmobile. This occurred after a complaint by the National Safety Council & the Dynamic Duo set a good example thereafter. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM

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8

Methamphetamine was used as an antidepressant from the 1930s to the 1950s. Gordon Alles patented the drug after being injected with it. Не said it made him more talkative and imparted a sense of well-being. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM

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7

Great Britain is annually responsible for 63 Independence Day celebrations around the world. That averages to about one every six days. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM

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6

When The Hobbit came out, fans reported feeling literally sick after viewing it. Apparently the trilogy's 48-per-second frame rate causes nausea. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM

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5

Mohammed V of Morocco protected Jewish people in Casablanca from the Nazis. Не reportedly told them, There are no Jews in Morocco. There are only Moroccan subjects. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM

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4

When he was 15, The Rock saved his mom from committing suicide. She left her car on Interstate 65 and just started walking into traffic. The Rock followed her and pulled her back - - and today, he says, she doesn't remember any of that (Probably best she doesn't, he says). NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM

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3

On Groundhog Day, Bill Murray hired an assistant just to troll everyone. The production team couldn't get a hold of him when they needed to, so they asked him to hire an assistant to make things easier. Не agreed, but hired someone who was deaf and only spoke American sign language (which neither Murray or anyone else on set spoke). NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM

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2

Joel Schumacher wanted to cast Drew Barrymore and Rosanna Arquette in a sequel to The Lost Boys. It'd be called The Lost Girls, and he wanted to do it because girl vampires on motorcycles would be sexy and funny and something that I'd like to see. But the movie just never made it out of development hell. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM

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1

Basquiat was in Blondie's music video for Rapture. Debbie Harry bought Basquiat's first painting for $200. NOW YOU KNOW CRACKED.COM

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