The book of cool pointless facts

These sure sound good, but they're not true-part 5

The Mongolian pony is the only animal other than an elephant capable of fending off an attack by a healthy adult tiger.

In 1984, an Ohio family visiting New York City stood at a broken DON'T WALK sign for three days.

Because of their unusual shape, Hershey's Kisses contain more calories per ounce than the same amount of chocolate in other forms.

If you tar and feather a 2x4 and place it in your yard, it will ward off bats.

The largest home in the United States, North Carolina's Biltmore House, was originally intended to be the official residence of a new monarchy to be established when the South rose again.

The Toltec calendar was based on a 360-day year, with each day being about 24 hours and 20 minutes long.

The universal size of the credit card is based entirely on the size of the 1960s US Communist Party membership card. Credit cards were designed so that they wouldn't cause the Communist Party card to stand out.

The K in K-Mart stands for K-Mart.

Nobody born in Kentucky has ever been elected to Congress.

In an effort to improve the nutritional value of its "Shamrock shakes," McDonald's colours them with broccoli extract.

M & Ms were candy-coated peas during a chocolate shortage in the 1950s.

After he resigned from the Presidency, Richard Nixon could often be found on the beaches of San Clemente, with his ever-present metal detector.

Winston Churchill was born with a third nipple, which he removed himself with nail-clippers at the age of 14.

Only a single dissenting vote prevented the death penalty in Texas from being carried out by immersing the convicted person in a nest of fire ants.

If you place a fresh Viagra tablet in a houseplant's soil every six months, the plant will not wilt.

Because he forgot his boots, Buzz Aldrin walked barefoot on the moon.

The practice of putting a letter "e" in front of words to mean "web-based" (e.g., eBusiness, eLearning, etc.) was patented by Microsoft in 1992. They are waiting until their anti-trust trial has been officially completed to begin enforcing it.

If a cricket were the size of Mount Rushmore, it could jump to the moon.

During a nine month strike in 2002, the Weather Channel broadcast reruns.

A 9-volt battery contains roughly the same amount of kinetic energy as a bowl of Lucky Charms.

The Yanomami tribesmen of the Amazon basin can track game birds by the slight difference in warmth their shadows create on the forest floor as they fly by, for up to an hour after the birds have departed.

Rapid deforestation has decreased the friction of the surface of the Earth, causing it to spin infinitesimally faster and thereby cool the air, combating global warming.

President Harry S. Truman would often go on vacation and secretly have his identical twin Larry run the country.

The flush toilet was invented in Flushing, NY.

New data suggests that so-called global warming may be due to a batch of faulty thermometers.

The inner core of most standard golf balls is made of nougat, which helps the balls remain aloft longer.

Over the last two decades, more Americans died of heart attacks while watching horror movies in movie theatres than died while sky-diving.

Every common food product, with the exception of fish, contains some traces of peanuts.

A bad case of laryngitis forced Abraham Lincoln to lip-sync the Gettysburg Address. The speech was actually delivered by an aide hidden beneath the stage.

The number of words in the Bible divided by the number of verses equals exactly 666.

L L Cool J once marketed a line of mail-order clothing, under the name "L L Cool Bean".

Anthropologists have discovered a tribe of South American monkeys with a rudimentary system of government analogous to our own three-branch form of government.

The shoe Nikita Khrushchev used to bang on the United Nations table was purchased by Thom McAn.

Frank Sinatra didn't want to record the song "My Way" but was forced to by his record label.

It is physically impossible to urinate and give blood at the same time.

In China, John Steinbeck's "The Grapes of Wrath" is translated as "Angry Berries."

If you fill a standard 750ml wine bottle with live hornets, their angry buzzing will resonate at precisely the right frequency to shatter the glass.

During his famous "Blue Period", Pablo Picasso invented the substance that eventually became known as Play-Doh.

Every year in the fall, Niagara Falls is shut down for maintenance for 24 hours. The flow is diverted using a massive series of pipes and spigots built for this purpose in 1837.

At thirteen hospitals around the country, there is a Dr. Pepper on staff.

Every 23 seconds, someone is having sex in a carpet store.

In the early 1940s, Heinz produced a version of Alphabetti Spaghetti especially for the German market that consisted only of little pasta swastikas.

The Chilean hummingbird has been known to suck blood from animals like a giant mosquito.

Now and then Queen Elizabeth lights up a # 10 Downing Street cigar. (thanks to Eric Snyder)

Singer Cat Stevens is allergic to cats.

For every minute you stand in front of the refrigerator with the door open, you could feed a child in Africa for a year. (Thanks to Kriston Slayton)

Singer Bruno Mars was born Bruno Venus.

Jennifer Aniston's first acting job was in a Rice Krispies commercial. The commercial never aired because the actress quickly had welts all over her body due to an allergic reaction.

Prior to statehood, North Carolina was called South Virginia.

Ostriches are the only birds that occasionally have 2 birds in one egg.

Singer/Actor Kris Kristofferson is considering a run for president to confuse New Jersey governor Chris Christie's supporters.

"El Torito" in English means "The Torito".

A potato isn't a vegetable. It's a large bean.