Topical Tens: Top Facts

Presenting my favourite facts from this blog during 2022:

January

You are statistically more likely to win a game of Bingo if your name is Margaret.
In the UK, more money is spent on bingo tickets every year than on all footballing events combined.
A painting by Jackson Pollock in the collection of the Museum of Modern Art in New York has a fly stuck in it.
JD Salinger carried pages of the manuscript of Catcher in the Rye into battle during WWII.
During WWII, Battersea Power Station burned bundles of surplus banknotes so that they wouldn’t fall into the hands of the enemy, and the US Embassy later used it as a means of getting rid of confidential documents.
Buzz Aldrin is the astronaut’s real name. He had his name officially changed from Edwin to Buzz in 1988.
Buzz Aldrin’s mother’s maiden name was Moon.
There are more Cats and Dogs in Seattle than children.
James Joyce would ask his drinking buddy, Ernest Hemingway, to fight for him in bar brawls because Joyce couldn’t see well enough to punch anyone.
It was a conscious decision by the producers of Dynasty that no-one would wear the same outfit twice, and costume designer Nolan Miller had a weekly wardrobe budget of $35,000.

February

A single Ostrich egg contains 2000 calories, which is about the total daily recommended intake for an adult woman.
Kiwi’s eggs are about 15% of the female's body weight and can be as much as 20%, which is comparable to a 120-lb. (54 kg) woman giving birth to a 24-lb. (11 kg) baby.
Snowboarding was banned as a dangerous craze in ski resorts in the US in the early 1980s.
Money for Nothing was inspired by a couple of workmen Mark Knopfler happened to overhear as they delivered boxes to an appliance store which had a wall of TVs playing MTV.
In 2014, a Parrot named Magic managed to pick the padlocks his owner put on his cage after he'd escaped several times.
In EastEnders, Dot Cotton wore the same dress every Christmas for the 30 years or so she was in the show.
Most of the Oxygen in the atmosphere, about 70%, comes from Seaweed.
Gustaf V, King of Sweden and Henry Fonda both enjoyed Embroidery as a hobby.
Elizabeth Taylor was a mutant. She had a genetic mutation which meant she had twice as many eyelashes as anyone else.
Nylon was almost called “Duparooh,” an acronym for “DuPont (the company which made it) Pulls A Rabbit Out Of a Hat.”

March

The Great Train Robbery gang were caught because they played Monopoly with the money they’d stolen while in hiding. They left their prints on the Monopoly board at Leatherslade Farm.
Mozart had a pet Starling. He bought it from a pet shop after hearing it sing one of his compositions.
There have been eight versions of the Neighbours theme song, as well as a sombre version which is used whenever a character dies or there is a disaster.
An estimated 162,719 pints of Guinness are wasted every year due to facial hair. A drinker with a Beard or moustache will get .56 millilitres trapped in his facial hair with each sip.
Vienna has an independent republic within its boundaries, namely the Republic of Kugelmugel, which is 0.00003 km2. It was created by a local artist who declared independence in 1976. It has 650 citizens, none of whom actually live there.
Nanki-Poo, the hero of The Mikado, was named for Victorian nursery slang for a handkerchief.
Kidneys are mentioned more often in The Bible than the Heart.
A Recorder that is 16 feet tall exists, but even though it’s fully functional it’s virtually impossible to play it.
Henry VIII, while mostly known for collecting wives, also collected recorders. He had around 76 of them by the time he died.
King Kong’s roar is a Tiger roar played backwards against a Lion roar played forwards.

April

In the 16th century a Scottish bishop put a curse on Carlisle because people from there had been pillaging Scottish border towns. For the millennium celebrations, the local council commissioned a granite artwork inscribed with the full curse. There followed floods, an outbreak of foot and mouth disease, and the football team failed to score goals. The Council considered removing the stone, but a local white witch counselled against doing so, because it would show they believed in the curse, thus giving it more power.
Dallas was banned in Romania, until Nicolae Ceaușescu was tricked into believing it was anti-capitalist, and therefore safe for Romanians to watch. Some people believe that Dallas caused the downfall of the Soviet Union.
ABBA had to engage in legal negotiations in order to use the name, because it was also the name of a Swedish herring producer.
As well as cramming them with food, Hamsters can fill their cheek pouches with air, allowing them to float in Water.
Sir John Gielgud once attended a formal dinner where he asked a fellow guest, "Whereabouts are you living now?” to which the guest, whose name was Clement Attlee, replied, "Ten Downing Street".
Leonardo da Vinci would buy caged Birds from the market just so he could set them free.
Macbeth is the only one of Shakespeare’s plays to contain the word “Rhinoceros”.
Raindrops aren’t teardrop shaped as usually drawn. Due to air resistance as they fall, they are more like the shape of a Jelly bean or Hamburger bun.
Diana, Princess of Wales, was descended from two of Charles II’s illegitimate children, so when her son William takes the throne, he will be the first monarch in 400 years to be a direct descendant of Charles II.
There’s a self-styled Superhero in the UK called Angle-Grinder Man, who uses an angle grinder to illegally cut wheel clamps off vehicles.

May

There’s a legend which states that the bronze lions in Trafalgar Square will come to life if Big Ben chimes 13 times.
Shakespeare’s King Lear was banned entirely during the reign of George III because King Lear’s descent into madness mirrored what was happening to the real king too closely. All performances of King Lear were banned 1810 and 1820.
At the turn of the 21st century, foreign-born dancers weren’t allowed to perform Belly dancing in Cairo, because it would smear the heritage and culture related to the art form. The ban was lifted in 2004.
There are over 15,000 miles of Neon tubing within Las Vegas.
The Luxor Las Vegas’ Sphinx is larger than the original Great Sphinx of Giza.
None of the casinos in Vegas have Clocks or Windows, a deliberate measure to make sure customers lose track of time.
The German army used Nettle fabric to make army uniforms during World War I.
The Victorians developed a code for conveying secret messages on Postcards, through the angle at which they stuck on the stamp.
Gran Canaria’s Agaete valley is the only place where Coffee is produced in Europe.
There is a death metal band in Maryland whose lead vocalist is a parrot called Waldo.

June

To avoid being recognised in public, Marilyn Monroe adopted an alter ego, Zelda Zonk, by wearing a dark wig and Sunglasses.
The favourite Smell of people in the UK is freshly baked Bread.
Newcastle cathedral was used as a Lighthouse. A Fire would be lit in the tower to help sailors navigate up the river.
The day after Judy Garland died, there was a Tornado in Kansas.
People from some native cultures would carry Clay around with them so they could dissolve a little into water to drink with meals to prevent poisoning.
There’s an ongoing contest between the Isle of Wight and Rutland as to which is the smallest historic county in the UK. When the tide comes in, the island is smaller. When the tide goes out, Rutland is smaller.
The corrections officer who returns Jake’s belongings at the beginning of the Blues Brothers is played by puppeteer Frank Oz.
None of the Beach Boys could Surf.
At one time, Sushi was prized so highly that it could be used as Money. People were allowed to use it to pay taxes in 8th century Japan.
George Orwell had to rescue his manuscript for Animal Farm from his bombed house. Orwell had to go back to the ruined house during his lunch break and sift through the rubble to find the manuscript, which he piled into a wheelbarrow to take back to his office.

July

Amy Johnson called her first two aeroplanes Jason.
About 20% of Meerkat deaths are actually murders by other meerkats, making them the most murderous animals on the planet.
Meerkats are immune to the venom of Snakes and Scorpions.
All pet Gerbils in the UK are descendants of the 20 males and 26 females which were brought to the United States from eastern Mongolia for scientific testing in the 1950s.
Nearly all species of Fig tree have evolved with a type of Wasp which depends on the tree for food and a place to breed, while the tree depends on the wasp for pollination.
Turmeric paper, also called curcuma paper, is used as an indicator for acidity and alkalinity. The paper is yellow in acidic and neutral solutions and turns reddish-brown in alkaline solutions.
The planet Pluto was almost named Cronus, but the astronomy community voted against it because they didn’t like the person who suggested it, Thomas Jefferson Jackson See.
The Star Trek episode The Trouble with Tribbles was based on a short story called Pigs Is Pigs by Ellis Parker Butler is about two Guinea pigs held at a railway station. While the humans argue about whether they are pigs or pets, the animals do what comes naturally and the station becomes overrun with them.
The chances of two holes in one during a game of Golf is 1 in 67 million.
Skateboarding was banned in Norway between 1978 and 1989. You could be fined for even owning one. The film “Thrashin” was rated an 18 certificate in Norway because it was about skateboarding.

August

A famous dish in Colorado is Rocky Mountain Oysters, which may seem odd as Colorado isn’t by the sea. Until you learn that they are actually bull’s testicles.
Lucille Ball was enrolled in drama school at 14 by her mother, who wanted to get her away from an unsuitable boyfriend.
Jersey in the Channel Islands has a street named Rue Trousse Cotillon, which translates to Tuck Up Your Petticoat, and was basically a warning to women in long skirts that they needed to lift them off the ground if they didn’t want them covered in muck!
In 1608 a law was passed in Jersey banning knitting during harvest season. Knitting in church was also banned because vicars deemed the clacking of knitting needles during sermons to be too distracting.
The friction generated as the needle passes over the groove on a Vinyl Record means that the point where the needle touches the record can reach a temperature of 230 to 250 degrees Fahrenheit.
While living in Trinidad, John Logie Baird kept a giant locust as a pet. He kept it in a bird cage and fed it on grass, Whiskey and soda.
Napoleon Bonaparte once wrote a romance novel. It was called Clisson et Eugénie which was translated into English in 2009 and is available on Amazon.
Napoleon had 13 cardinals thrown in jail because they failed to attend his wedding.
Between 1924 and 1984 it was illegal to own a dog in Reykjavik.
The letters J, K and Z do not appear in any numbers in the English language.

September

You won’t ever find a Partridge in a Pear tree. They live and nest on the ground.
About 150 people are killed by falling Coconuts every year: 10 times the number of people killed by Sharks.
The rough skinned Newt, native to the American west coast, produces a toxin on its skin which could kill 25,000 Mice.
The same whistle is blown at the start of the first game in every Rugby world cup tournament. It’s the one used by Welsh referee Gil Evans for an England-New Zealand match in 1905.
It’s said that the traditional last drink taken by mobsters before they go to prison is Creme de Menthe.
Rev Wilbert Awdry was nicknamed “The Puff Puff Parson” by the media.
Some writers have suggested that the Bermuda Triangle stretches as far as the coast of Ireland.
Olivia Newton John’s grandfather was the Nobel Prize-winning physicist Max Born.
Commander Data's data storage capacity is 100 PB (petabytes) or 100 000 terabytes. The entire Internet in 2005 only contained 1-2PB.
The ceiling of the transporter chamber on the Enterprise-D in Star Trek the Next Generation is the floor of the transporter chamber from the original Enterprise.

October

Buzz Aldrin is said to have smuggled a bottle of Smirnoff aboard Apollo 11 to drink on the Moon.
There’s a Sausage academy in Neumarkt, Germany, where students can earn a certificate in sausage studies.
There’s only one lake in Cumbria, Lake Bassenthwaite. The other bodies of water are considered to be Waters, Meres or Tarns.
If you go to the Ship Inn on Piel Island, just off the coast of Barrow-in-Furness, and buy a round of drinks for everyone, the landlord, who is also considered to be the king of the island, will grant you a knighthood, in a special ceremony involving Beer being poured over your head.
Winnie the Pooh was rejected as the patron for a children’s playground in Tuszyn, a small town in Poland, because he doesn’t wear Trousers or pants and is therefore half naked and not an appropriate role model for children.
Bill Wright, creator of the quiz show Mastermind, was inspired by his experiences of being interrogated by the Gestapo during WW2.
Neckties are banned in Iran where the government of the Islamic Republic considers neckties to be "decadent, un-Islamic and viewed as "symbols of the Cross" and the oppressive West." A three piece suit is fine, just not the tie.
The domestic cat is never mentioned in the Bible.
As youngsters, notorious gangsters the Kray Twins enjoyed writing poetry.
Humans and Giraffes have the same number of bones in their necks – seven.

November

At the end of their historic transatlantic flight, Alcock and Brown landed in a bog in Ireland.
Charles Dickens’ wife, Catherine, was particularly fond of serving Watercress alongside toasted Cheese.
The Romans also believed that Watercress juice rubbed into a bald head could restore Hair growth.
Lord Lucan was once offered a screen test to play James Bond.
The phrase ‘back to square one’ originates from the game Snakes and Ladders.
In 2019, McDonald's Portugal promoted a Sundae for Halloween with advertising that dubbed it "Sundae Bloody Sundae".
All five of the main actresses in Absolutely Fabulous have names beginning with the letter "J": Jennifer, Joanna, Julia, Jane and June.
Rene Magritte is believed to have created forgeries of works by Picasso, Titian, Ernst and Chirico. According to legend, his talent for forging things came in handy during the German occupation of Belgium between 1940 and 1944. He forged bank notes in order to survive.
On August 6, 2013, Curiosity audibly played "Happy Birthday to you" in honour of the first anniversary of its Martian landing. It was the first time a song was played on another planet and the first time music was transmitted between two planets.
When they walk, Anteaters curl their front feet into balls to keep their sharp claws protected and prevent them from dulling.

December

When Watches are displayed for sale they will often be set to ten past ten or ten to two. This is a subliminal advertising thing, because watch hands in this position resemble a smiley face.
The thinnest Roof in the world is over the Fisht Olympic Stadium in Sochi, Russia. Its translucent, polycarbonate structure is only 0.02 inches thick.
A Jostaberry is a cross between a gooseberry and a blackcurrant.
Car manufacturers Audi and BMW both use Emu feathers to wipe their motor vehicles before and after painting them, because the feathers are particularly effective at removing fine particles.
John Travolta wanted to wear a black suit in Saturday Night Fever, until it was pointed out to him that he’d stand out more in a white one.
There are 12 "Fa la la la la la la la la"s in the song Deck the Halls, making a total of 96 "La"s.
Each series of Strictly Come Dancing uses 57 litres of fake tan and over 504 cans of hairspray.
According to Dave Filoni, supervising director of the animated television series Star Wars: The Clone Wars, the look of the police droid is based on the appearance of the Keystone Kops.
In 1791, according to the newspapers of the time, there was a Bubble and Squeak Society at Smithfield which met quarterly.
According to the Urban Dictionary, 364 is the number of licks it takes to reach the centre of a tootsiepop.

I write fiction, too! My characters include some British superheroes and a psychic detective. You never know, your new favourite could be here! You won't know unless you look...