There are six villages in France called Silly, 12 called Billy and two called Prat (there's apparently a village somewhere in Spain called Gavin too, not sure how far it is from Silly though)
Since 1990, more people have been killed by sandcastles than by sharks.
A group of kittens is called "a kindle".
The Arabic word for hamster translates as "Mr Saddlebags".
Earthworms have five hearts.
40 million people in China live in caves.
Sgiomlaireachd (pronounced "scum-leerie") is a Scots Gaelic word meaning "the kind of friend who only drops in at mealtimes". (and you need at least 5 pints inside you before you attempt to pronouce it)
Albert Einstein claimed that his second best idea was to boil his eggs in his soup, thereby saving on washing up.
We dot our I's, but Shakespeare "tittled" his (what Shakespeare got up to in his own time is entirely his own business)
"Son-of-a-bitch" stew was a cowboy dish made from the internal organs of a whole cow and an onion. (Son-of-a-bitch) probably being the most used epithet uttered after the first horrible mouthful)
There is only one sneeze in the Bible (bless you)
In Armenia, chess is a compulsory school subject.
A person who illegally exports sheep is called an "owler" (they're easier to export when dressed as owls?)
More reverse-charge telephone calls are made on Father's Day than any other day (as a father myself this surprises me very little).
The small pocket in the front of a pair of jeans was intended for a pocket watch.
The largest millipede in Tanzania is called the wandering leg sausage.
One in ten women cares more for a fictitious male character than her actual partner (totally understandable).
Galileo's middle finger is on display in the Museo Galileo, Florence (welcome to the Museo Galileo...)
In the Polish version of Scrabble, Z is only worth one point.
The guillotine was last used in France in 1977 (now the chefs use knives).
The French word for "hashtag", coined this year, is Motdièse ("sharpword").
Air trapped inside hedgehogs can make them blow up like a balloon. They should be carefully deflated with a syringe before they burst (no hedgehogs were harmed in the making of this chapter of oddity).
YOU ARE READING
Orangutangents
RandomEverybody is somebody else's weirdo: I suspect I may be many people's. Consider this a brain dump, or indeed a Brian dump given the misspelled pseudo-entity who lives in my skull. Tangential thoughts, comments, ideas, and general Brianisms from the...
