Tell me something useless but interesting I don't know. No googling allowed. Corrections welcomed.

[YourMaNoBraBackOfMyCar]

I love these threads so please tell me all manner of useless info. [Thanks]

Months that begin on a Sunday will always have a Friday the 13th.

react not rect

I have a few...
Two animals can last longer without water than a camel can - rats and giraffes.

The Declaration of Independence was written on hemp (marijuana) paper.

marijuana, at one point if as a landowner you refused to grow it, you were fined. Queen Victoria I think it was, used marijuana for menstrual pain relief. It was eventually banned because of something to do with wood and cotton, and lots of propaganda and racism from people high up in those industries.

The kings in a deck of cards, each represents a real king.

Ketchup used to be a medicine

Coconuts kill more people than sharks.

Shoes came in left and right until heels were invented (mad guess at 16th century). They couldn't work put the technology to combine a lifted heel with a left and right design so they did indeed revert to a one-shoe-fits-ether-foot method for a few hundred years.

"The octopus eye and the human eye are nearly identical, even though our nearest common ancestor didn't have eyes. This is one of the arguments used for intelligent design."

The first sentence of this is absolutely true. The second may well also be true but at best it's an argument for stupid design, not for an intelligent version. Octopus and human eyes have a couple of critical differences - one is the lens (related to the way an eye works in air compared with the way it does in water, so that's fair enough); the other is the retina and is down to chance factors in the order in which each component of the eye developed over the course of its evolution. In an octopus eye the retina is the surface layer of the back of the eye, so there's nothing between the light entering the eyeball and the retinal cells that sense the light; in the human eye the retina is not on the surface, all the blood vessels that supply the retina are laid over the top of it and get in the way.

Hippos (whose name is derived from the Latin for 'horse' - pretty odd looking horse if you ask me) are, like coconuts, much more dangerous than people think. I don't know how they compare with sharks but they kill more people than lions do.

Australia has eight of the world's ten most dangerous spiders.

Worse, it has eight of the world's eight most dangerous spiders.

the most dangerous animal in Australia is not a croc, a spider or a snake.

More people are killed on or by horses.

Now I know why I never got to Oz when I was on my Gap Year, always something came up. If I knew about all the spiders I wouldn't have allowed the plane to land. I think I'd die of the fright if I met one, I'm a big wuss!

Hippopotamus is "river horse" in Ancient Greek not Latin. Though now I'm doubting myself...

The most common sound in English is the schwa.

if it's pronounced "errh" surely it should be called an "errh"

Thanks punk, interesting that there were indeed left and right until some idiot came up with the idea of heels.

Agree with you re. 'intelligent' design but was letting it pass as I didn't know much about octupus eyes.

Two things I ready in my pg that I haven't forgotten:
The only part of a woman's body that doesn't change/isn't affected by pregnancy is a small part of the inner ear. On a personal note, a friend of mine was told her contact lenses were no good when she was around 22wks as her eyeballs had grown
Also newborns do not have knee caps. They develop around the 2yr mark.

A group of ladybirds is called a "loveliness".

Not as interesting as some, but having checked my emails today I had an email from Fatface telling me if I order before 1pm today I can still get delivery before Christmas. Time message arrived in my inbox? 4:51pm.
Definitely the most useless piece of information I have garnered today

Japanese people like to bathe collectively in the nuddie.

Japan has twice as many citizens as the UK but less habitable land (owing to the mountains, volcanoes and the like)

Japanese people believe that anonymous Valentine cards are utterly pointless, that melons and tomatoes are vegetable and that being able to buy popcorn and drinks in a DVD rental store in silly.

I said it was used as an argument for it. I made no remark as to the strength of that argument

Oh and my eyeballs change shape in pregnancy - every time I have developed an astigmatism that has gone away after the birth. It's because the muscles holding it in shape/place relax.

::vom::

The only US flag which is never raised or lowered is on the moon.

There are no locks on the Suez canal- the water is level throughout. (Courtesy of my 'Top of the Form' quiz book 1974.)

Pregnany cured an astigmatism for me too! I thought I was alone.

Pregnancy made me less shortsighted, both times. Both times I have need new glasses with less strong lenses, and the change has lasted.

The giant sloth (now extinct) had bony scales in its skin called ossicles.

The Staffordshire Bull Terrier is one of only 2 breeds that the UK Kennel Club recommend for families with children. The other breed is a Chesapeake Bay Retriever.

I am the only person in my area that can bend their fingers at the top knuckle on both hands.

When putting clingfilm over a burn, you should not wrap it round the area. You should cut/rip/slice a section off, lay it on the burn and bandage it.

Reindeer's eyes change colour from gold to blue.

Another reindeer fact: those that pull Santa's sleigh are probably female, as only female reindeer retain their antlers over the winter.

the collective noun for owls is "parliament"

If an armadillo was a human then it's penis would be several feet long - it has the largest penis in relation to body size.

So the QI book of animal ignorance told me at about 4am when I couldn't sleep - it, and other QI books, are 99p today on the kindle daily deal.

so a lady armadillio?