Read Online 1,227 QI Facts to Blow Your Socks Off by John Lloyd, John Mitchinson - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: John Lloyd, John Mitchinson
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of 1999.
Google
was originally called
Back-Rub.
The
acnestis
is the part of the back
that is impossible to scratch.
The most common treatment
for angina is
nitroglycerin.
It comes in pills, sprays or patches.
All Bran
is only
87% bran.
Malo kingi
is a jellyfish
named after Robert King,
an American tourist
who died in Australia
after being stung by one.
The man after whom
Parkinson’s disease is named
was once arrested for plotting
to assassinate George III
with a poisoned dart.
The man after whom
Tourette’s Syndrome is named
was shot in the head
by one of his patients.
Spix’s macaw
is named after
the first man to shoot one.
Until 1857, it was legal for
British husbands to sell their wives.
The going rate was
£
3,000
(
£
23,000 in today’s money).
The most common reaction
from men confronted by
TV Licensing Enforcement Officers is,
‘I thought my wife
was dealing with it.’
King Herod’s first wife
was called Doris.
Thomas Edison
proposed to his second wife
in Morse code.
The first escalator was for fun,
rather than for practical purposes.
It was installed at Coney Island
in New York and ridden by 75,000 people
in its first two weeks.
Attendants bearing brandy and
smelling salts stood at the top of the first
escalator in Harrods, to revive shoppers
who became light-headed on the ride.
At least one person a week in the UK
changes their middle name
to ‘Danger’ by deed poll.
If all the British Empire’s dead of the
First World War were to march
four abreast down Whitehall, it would
take them almost four days and nights
to pass the Cenotaph.
At the age of 19, J. S. Bach
walked 420 miles to see
a performance by the composer
Buxtehude.
To
chork
is to make a noise like feet
walking in waterlogged shoes.
J’ai des rossignols
(‘I’ve got nightingales’)
is French for
unexplained noises
coming from a car.
250,000 birds were killed
by the
Exxon Valdez
oil spill in 1989.
About the same number die
from crashing into window glass
in the US every day.
Only half the passengers and crew
who reached America on the
Mayflower
in November 1621
survived until the following spring.
Two-thirds of the world’s caviar
is eaten aboard
the
QE2
.
There are 35,112 golf courses
in the world,
half of them in the USA.
All the world’s golf courses put together
cover more land area
than the Bahamas.
The land around the Iron Curtain
lay untouched for decades. In 1989,
it was turned into a nature reserve
1,400 kilometres long, but less than
200 metres wide.
Victorian guidebooks advised women
to put pins in their mouths
to avoid being kissed in the dark
when trains went through tunnels.
Beekeeping is illegal under the
New York City Health Code,
because bees are
‘naturally inclined to do harm’.
Herring talk out of their arses,
communicating by firing bubbles from
their backsides that sound like
high-pitched raspberries.
The filament of the first
commercial light bulb,
patented by Thomas Edison in 1880,
was made of bamboo.
The tall chef ’s hat or
toque blanche
traditionally had a hundred pleats
to represent the number of ways
an egg could be cooked.
It was once suggested that
New York should be called Brimaquonx,
combining the names
of all the city’s boroughs –
Brooklyn, Staten Island, Manhattan,
Queens and Bronx –
into one.
Tibet has a smaller GDP than Malta,
but is 4,000 times its size.
Hamesucken
is the crime of assaulting someone
in their own home.
Hapax legomenon
describes a word or phrase
that has only been used once.
Haptodysphoria
is the feeling you get from
running your nails
down a blackboard.
Hydrophobophobia
is the fear of
hydrophobia.
Women buy
85% of the world’s Valentine cards and
96% of all the candles
in
was originally called
Back-Rub.
The
acnestis
is the part of the back
that is impossible to scratch.
The most common treatment
for angina is
nitroglycerin.
It comes in pills, sprays or patches.
All Bran
is only
87% bran.
Malo kingi
is a jellyfish
named after Robert King,
an American tourist
who died in Australia
after being stung by one.
The man after whom
Parkinson’s disease is named
was once arrested for plotting
to assassinate George III
with a poisoned dart.
The man after whom
Tourette’s Syndrome is named
was shot in the head
by one of his patients.
Spix’s macaw
is named after
the first man to shoot one.
Until 1857, it was legal for
British husbands to sell their wives.
The going rate was
£
3,000
(
£
23,000 in today’s money).
The most common reaction
from men confronted by
TV Licensing Enforcement Officers is,
‘I thought my wife
was dealing with it.’
King Herod’s first wife
was called Doris.
Thomas Edison
proposed to his second wife
in Morse code.
The first escalator was for fun,
rather than for practical purposes.
It was installed at Coney Island
in New York and ridden by 75,000 people
in its first two weeks.
Attendants bearing brandy and
smelling salts stood at the top of the first
escalator in Harrods, to revive shoppers
who became light-headed on the ride.
At least one person a week in the UK
changes their middle name
to ‘Danger’ by deed poll.
If all the British Empire’s dead of the
First World War were to march
four abreast down Whitehall, it would
take them almost four days and nights
to pass the Cenotaph.
At the age of 19, J. S. Bach
walked 420 miles to see
a performance by the composer
Buxtehude.
To
chork
is to make a noise like feet
walking in waterlogged shoes.
J’ai des rossignols
(‘I’ve got nightingales’)
is French for
unexplained noises
coming from a car.
250,000 birds were killed
by the
Exxon Valdez
oil spill in 1989.
About the same number die
from crashing into window glass
in the US every day.
Only half the passengers and crew
who reached America on the
Mayflower
in November 1621
survived until the following spring.
Two-thirds of the world’s caviar
is eaten aboard
the
QE2
.
There are 35,112 golf courses
in the world,
half of them in the USA.
All the world’s golf courses put together
cover more land area
than the Bahamas.
The land around the Iron Curtain
lay untouched for decades. In 1989,
it was turned into a nature reserve
1,400 kilometres long, but less than
200 metres wide.
Victorian guidebooks advised women
to put pins in their mouths
to avoid being kissed in the dark
when trains went through tunnels.
Beekeeping is illegal under the
New York City Health Code,
because bees are
‘naturally inclined to do harm’.
Herring talk out of their arses,
communicating by firing bubbles from
their backsides that sound like
high-pitched raspberries.
The filament of the first
commercial light bulb,
patented by Thomas Edison in 1880,
was made of bamboo.
The tall chef ’s hat or
toque blanche
traditionally had a hundred pleats
to represent the number of ways
an egg could be cooked.
It was once suggested that
New York should be called Brimaquonx,
combining the names
of all the city’s boroughs –
Brooklyn, Staten Island, Manhattan,
Queens and Bronx –
into one.
Tibet has a smaller GDP than Malta,
but is 4,000 times its size.
Hamesucken
is the crime of assaulting someone
in their own home.
Hapax legomenon
describes a word or phrase
that has only been used once.
Haptodysphoria
is the feeling you get from
running your nails
down a blackboard.
Hydrophobophobia
is the fear of
hydrophobia.
Women buy
85% of the world’s Valentine cards and
96% of all the candles
in
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