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This’ll basically be a spa day for your brain

40 Random Bits of Trivia to Drop in Your Noggin Like So Many Bath Bombs

December 17, 2024

When it comes to gifts, we like to give experiences rather than physical objects. Your brain has been through a lot lately, so we got it a day pass to the local fact spa. Let it soak in the warm bath of these tidbits. Let their knowledge cascade down every brain fold and work their way in like a nice oily massage.

It deserves it — and you deserve it.

40

William Shakespeare

Disrespectful uses of priceless artifacts Hate for tourists beats love for Shakespeare Reverend Francis Gastrell purchased Shakespeare's final home in 1753, but there was one problem: friggin' tourists. So he went and cut down the large mulberry tree Shakespeare himself planted and loved. Then he escaped the angry townsfolk, but as he was still forced to pay taxes, he went full Joker and burned the place to the CRACKED.COM — Wiki Commons
5 Historical Places We've Managed To Totally Trash
5 Irreplaceable Cultural Treasures (Destroyed By Stupidity)

39

Jane Lynch

Jane Lynch Lynch graduated Thornridge High School in Dolton, IL in 1978. Along with her spots on the tennis and basketball team, Lynch was a star of her debate team. GRACKED.COM — source: classmates.com

38

Zombie Fungus

The zombie ant fungus takes over motor control, leaving brain function alone. The fungus Ophiocordyceps unilateralis controls ants by destroying motor neurons, connecting directly to the muscles. In this way, the brain is a prisoner in the body. CRACKED.COM — Source: The Atlantic

37

Wall Street Honor

A restaurant at Wall Street operated on the honor system. - OF TARC Oi The Exchange Buffet ran successfully from 1885 to 1963 and oper- ated on the honor sys- tem, where customers would tally their own bills. CRACKED NOW YOU KNOW — Source

36

George Clooney

George Clooney's first role on TV was playing a down-to-earth handyman in 1985 on the sitcom, The Facts of Life. CRACKED.COM Early on in his career, before ER turned him into a superstar, he was also seen on Roseanne and even The Golden Girls. — History

35

Red Bull

CRACKED Red Bull A former Thai duck farmer came up with what would become Red Bull in 1976 as a way to help people with hangovers. Не teamed up with an Austrian businessman and the drink was released around the world as an energy drink. FAUDONT UE EUROPE 250 ml PRODUCT OF 4 EUROPE PACK Red Bu Red B ENERGY DRIN ENERGY DRIN Red Bull 4Pack 250 ml ENERGY DRINK — The Guardian / Reuters

34

Moe’s Tavern

Two Simpsons fans turned a run- MOE'S down shop into a replica of Moe's Tavern in a suburb of Buenos Aires, TAVERN Argentina. It wasn't just for the looks; the place was planned to (ALMOST) operate as a themed bar. OPENED IN Fox's lawyers came down on the bar at the last minute and ARGENTINA. prevented it from opening. MOES CRACKED.COM — Source

33

Sonic the Hedgehog

Sonic the Hedgehog has a shout-out to Apocalypse Now. It's when Dr. Robotnik uses a piece of metal to shave his head -- that's a nod to Colonel Kurtz. CRACKED.COM — Source

32

Seth Rogen and Beyonce

SETH ROGEN AND BEYONCÉ THE LI ING Rogen met Beyoncé at the premiere of The Lion King...and got some of his beard stuck in her sequins. The first time he tried to meet her-years ago at the Grammys-he walked straight up to her, only to have a bodyguard hit him so hard he spilled his drink all over the place. CRACKED.COM — Bustle

31

Abraham Lincoln

Lincoln gave a speech so enthralling that reporters stopped taking notes and now we don't know what he said. CRACKED.COM His Lost Speech was giv- en at the Bloomington Convention on May 29, 1856, in Bloomington, Illi- nois. It is believed to have been an impassioned con- demnation of slavery. — Source

30

Sugar

Brown sugar is not healthier than regular white sugar. vs The only difference between the two is the taste. Although the difference in taste is caused by brown sugar's containing more minerals, the amount is too small to have any sort of effect. CRACKED.COM — Source

29

Franz Kafka

Franz Kafka wanted his work destroved. Kafka burned many of his writings, and asked his friend Max Brod to burn the rest after his death. Brod ignored

28

Lady Bird

THE PINK CAST FROM LADY BIRD The physical manifestation of Lady Bird's rebellion is so iconic that you can buy a jigsaw puzzle version from the A24 store. CRACKED.COM — Source

27

Andrew Wakefield

Andrew Wakefield 1998 CRACKED © COM Wakefield came up with the false study that linked the MMR vaccine with autism. Even anti-vaxxers should hate this guy-he planned to make a fortune by patenting his own, alternative MMR vaccine. — Source

26

Dracula

When they shot Bela Lugosi's Dracula, they shot a Spanish version too. The Spanish one was shot at night, when the sets were free, with the same script but a different cast. Today, that version is considered better. CRACKED.COM — Source

25

Bake-Kujira

This is the Bake-Kujira, a skeletal Japanese ghost whale that haunts the seas near whaling villages, and if anyone sees it, it curses their village with fire, plague, famine, and other catastrophes. Japanese mythology doesn't screw around... CRACKED.COM — Source

24

Rugrats

A Rugrats Chanukah snuck in an adult joke for anyone who knows Hebrew. RE OUT RATE The sign on this storefront says mohel. A mohel is a Jewish circu

23

Walk Hard

BEHIND-THE-SCENES FACTS JOHN C. REILLY SANG ALL OF HIS SONGS. WALK! HARD. Reilly put a huge amount of effort into becoming Dewey Cox. He would be on set all day and then record songs during the night. I was really determined not to be treated like an actor playing a musician. CRACKED.COM — The Ringer

22

Moray Eels

Allow us to make moray eels even less cuddly by telling you that they have two separate sets of teeth. One set is in their mouth, you know... where they're supposed to be. The other is in their throat, and we hate it. CRACKED.COM — Source

21

Nerf

Nerf's first slogan was You can't hurt babies or old people. The world's first INDOOR BALL NERF NBRF Yu The world's BALL first INDOOR The motto helped sell millions of Nerf balls in just its first year. CRACKED.COM — Source

20

Strange Customs

In certain parts of China, ghost marriages for deceased bachelors (so they won't end up alone in the afterlife) are still a thing. Because of that, bo

19

Lincoln Logs

Frank Lloyd Wright's son, John Lloyd Wright, invented the Lincoln Logs. Не got the idea when he saw his dad employ a similar interlocking style in order to earthquake proof one of his buildings. CRACKED.COM — Source

18

Top Gun

TOP GUN: MAVERICK SOARED 36 YEARS AFTER THE ORIGINAL. CRACKED Editor Billy Weber said the studio didn't want to make a sequel after the 1986 classic because they used up all the flying shots (even reusing some 2 or 3 times), and they knew how hard it would be to make another film. — CBR / Flying Mag

17

Thomas Edison

Tired: gold. Wired: steel. THOMAS EDISON CRACKED.COM Edison was convinced we were on the verge of dispensing precious metals like a Taco Bell soda fountain. And what would we do with the power of alchemy? Devalue gold and turn all our furniture into cold, hard steel. — Source

16

Lungs

One of your lungs is slightly smaller than the other. CRACKED.COM The left lung is slightly smaller than the right lung because 2/3 of the heart is located on the left side of the body. The left lung contains the cardiac notch, an indentation in the lung that surrounds the арех of the heart. — Inner Body

15

Apollo

CORDLESS POWER TOOLS AH 18.0v ERTOTS Cordless power tools were developed during the Apollo project in order for astronauts to be able to do repairs in — Source: NASA

14

Scott Pilgrim

The movie was in production before the graphic novel was finished. SCO They had to get POME out ahead of LIEE the source LITTLE material while PRECIOS — O'Malley ended up incorporating elements written for the movie into his books.

13

Sarah Silverman

COMEDY NERD Sarah Silverman apologized to Paris Hilton for a joke 14 years after the fact. It was a joke about Paris going to prison she'd made at the 2007 VMAs, and she apologized in 2021 at length on her podcast. CRACKED.COM — Source: 13 Times Comedians Flat-Out Regretted Their Old Jokes

12

The Beatles

The Beatles CRACKED.COM FIRST SHOW: George Harrison was almost booted from the venue for breaking the dress code... the foppish bloke wore jeans.

11

Neanderthals and Denisovans

CRACKED SURPRISE! YOU'VE GOT A BIT OF NEANDERTHAL AND DENISOVAN IN YOU. People today have a bit of genetic material from Neanderthals and Denisovans, two types of early humans who lived in Europe and Asia, passed down to them. — Fractal Pictures/Shutterstock
MedlinePlus

10

Polio

Polio was actually a serious disease only in a very small minority of cases. Less than 1% of infected people got paralytic poliomyelitis, while 72% have no symptoms and about 24% have symptoms that quickly resolve. CRACKED.COM — Source: 13 Cool Facts To Feed Our Knowledge-Starved Brains

9

Blackfin Icefish

The Antarctic blackfin icefish has no scales, white blood, and transparent bones. GRACKED.COM Instead of red blood cells or hemoglobin pigments for transporting oxygen, oxygen simply diffuses into their cir- culating blood plasma from the frigid seawater thanks to the fish's enlarged gills and smooth skin. — Quanta Magazine

8

Henry Cavill

Henry Cavill got seriously hurt while making The Witcher Season 2. Не was running through the woods, and he tore his hamstring -- It was a very, very bad tear, and I was very lucky that it wasn't a complete detachment of the hamstring, he said. CRACKED COM — Source

7

Auschwitz

HOW TO GET RESCUED BREAKING OUT OF AUSCHWITZ HALT ARBEIT MACHI FRET Italian TV presenter Riccardo Pacifici got stuck in Auschwitz-Birkenau after filming for the 70th anniversary of its liberation wrapped up for the night. Не and his crew literally had to break out of the camp to get free. CRACKED — G_D Photography/Shutterstock
The Jerusalem Post

6

Ticks

The Paralysis Tick CRACKED.COM This Australian bug dispenses a toxin that can paralyze you. This doesn't help the tick-as a parasite, it prefers you healthy and mobile-but it does it anyway. — Annals of Tropical Medicine & Parasitology

5

War

A war almost started in 1579 over the omission of a bear penis on a coat of arms. D GRACKED.COM The bear in the coat of arms of Appenzell, Swit- zerland, is represented with a visible penis, but a calendar printer in Saint Gallen left it out by acci- dent, enraging the North- east canton. — Source

4

9/11

CRACKED 9/11 CAUSED 164 SONGS TO BE BANNED FROM THE RADIO. Including Walk Like An Egyptian by the Bangles, because it vaguely references the Middle East. — The Bangles/YouTube
5 Nonsense Reasons Music Was Banned

3

Mao and Stalin

At Mao and Stalin's first meeting, the USSR stole Mao's poop. On Stalin's personal orders, the sewage pipes in the house where the two met were rerouted to special storage boxes. The thinking was that an analysis of the chemicals in his poop would reveal secrets about Mao's psychology. (Did it work? Nobody knows.) CRACKED.COM — Source

2

Windows XP

Windows XP was first launched in 2001 and it is still being used by some people today. CRACKED.COM NetMarketShare reported that 1.26% of laptops and desktop computers were running on the 19-year-old OS last month. This means that there are 25.2 million PCs running on Windows ХР, which is a problem because it is a highly insecure system. — TechRadar

1

Movie Terms

CRACKED.COM High-concept movie doesn't mean what you think it means. A movie isn't called high-concept because it's supposed to be deep or artsy (or because you have to be high to watch it). It just means that the premise is easily summarized, making for a concise, quick pitch. Jaws, for example, is shark terrorizes town. — Source

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