Fun Friday Fact - hope you respond weekly to give us all a smile

[awkward-yet-sweet]

1 hour ago, Marcie Jensen said:

On Veterans; Day, it's interesting to know that Monaco has an army. 

 

Interesting.  My county's defense force is way larger than Monaco's army.  We should be a micro nation. 😁 

 

 

[Heather Shay]

The first novel in the world was written in c. 1000 CE by Murasaki Shikibu, a Japanese woman.

• 
• Photo Credit: Alchetron

Written in the early 11th century, The Tale of Genji is now a classic of Japanese literature. Author Murasaki Shikibu was a noblewoman and lady-in-waiting, who became a cultural innovator for her great work. The original manuscript was made in the orihon style of pasting several sheets of paper together and folding them in alternating directions. In the early 20th century, the book was first translated into modern Japanese, and has since been translated into dozens of languages. The book follows the life of Hikaru Genji, the son of an ancient emperor, and makes keen observations on court life and aristocratic society.

[Davie]

7 hours ago, Heather Shay said:

The first novel in the world was written in c. 1000 CE by Murasaki Shikibu, a Japanese woman.

• 
• Photo Credit: Alchetron

Written in the early 11th century, The Tale of Genji is now a classic of Japanese literature. Author Murasaki Shikibu was a noblewoman and lady-in-waiting, who became a cultural innovator for her great work. The original manuscript was made in the orihon style of pasting several sheets of paper together and folding them in alternating directions. In the early 20th century, the book was first translated into modern Japanese, and has since been translated into dozens of languages. The book follows the life of Hikaru Genji, the son of an ancient emperor, and makes keen observations on court life and aristocratic society.

I know this one. I'll have to brush up on my Japanese. Murasaki wrote The Diary of Lady Murasaki, a volume of poetry, and The Tale of Genji. Within a decade of its completion, Genji was distributed throughout the provinces; within a century it was recognized as a classic of Japanese literature and had become a subject of scholarly criticism. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M 

[miz miranda]

The world's youngest published author is Dorothy Straight, who wrote How The World Began at 4 years old in 1962.

 

There are more public libraries than McDonald's in America, with 16,766 public libraries compared to 14,157 McDonald's.

 

The longest ever book title consists of over 3,700 words and 26,000 characters.

 

The first book ever written on a typewriter was The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain.

 

The world's oldest continually operating library was established in AD 565. It is housed in Saint Catherine's Monastery at the foot of Mount Sinai in Egypt, and has the second largest collection of ancient manuscripts after the Vatican City.

 

After following over 17,000 people in England, Scotland and Wales over 50 years, researchers at Edinburgh University proved that reading well at age seven was linked to better socio-economic status even 35 years on.

 

Reading proved 600% better at fighting stress than playing a video game.

[Heather Shay]

[Abigail Eleanor]

This from the above graphic made me smile: "...a secretary will use its left hand..."

😊

[Jani]

Yes I picked up on that too!! What the heck!

[awkward-yet-sweet]

Fox species are quite different from one another, and typically will not share territory.  Gray foxes and red foxes avoid each other, and have unique behaviors.  For example, Gray foxes can climb trees with their cat-like claws. 

 

[miz miranda]

The average adult spends more time on the toilet than they do exercising.

According to a 2017 study by British non-profit UKActive, adults spend an average of 3 hours and 9 minutes on the toilet each week, but only spend around 1  hour and 30 minutes being physically active during that same time span. Maybe this somewhat useless, but also motivating fact is what we needed to hear to get to the gym.

 

A "jiffy" is about one trillionth of a second.

You've probably said you'll be "back in a jiffy" at least a few times in your life. But what you might not realize is that you made a promise you couldn't keep. According to Dictionary.com, a "jiffy" is an actual unit of time—and a very short one at that. Sometime during the late 18th or early 19th centuries, scientist Gilbert Newton Lewis defined a jiffy as the amount of time it takes light to travel one centimeter in a vacuum, which is about 33.4 picoseconds or one trillionth of a second. That's a short (and pretty much useless) amount of time indeed!

 

 

Maryland tried to ban Randy Newman's song "Short People."

In 1977, Randy Newman sang, "Short people got no reason to live … Well, I don't want no short people … Round here." Although it's meant to be a satirical take on short-sighted people's intolerance and prejudice, the state of Maryland didn't take kindly to the tune. In 1978, delegate Isaiah Dixon Jr. tried to introduce legislation to make it illegal to play the song on the radio, proposing a $500 fine. However, his effort was unsuccessful; the assistant attorney general deemed that the move would be a violation of the First Amendment.

 

The chicken and the ostrich are the closest living relatives of the Tyrannosaurus rex.

While we used to think that dinosaurs were giant lizard-like creatures that roamed the earth, it's now widely accepted that dinosaurs have more in common with present-day birds than they do with oversized reptiles. Research out of Harvard University in 2008 confirmed that the Tyrannosaurus rex shared more of its genetic makeup with ostriches and chickens than with alligators and crocodiles.

 

 

[Jani]

21 hours ago, miz miranda said:

In 1977, Randy Newman sang, "Short people got no reason to live …

Anyone that couldn't tell this was a parody wasn't thinking too much.  Its still a message we need to hear. 
 

Thats a beautiful photo of a Gray Fox!

[Heather Shay]

 

Creedence Clearwater Revival has the most No. 2 Billboard hits—without ever hitting No. 1.

Fantasy

John Fogerty's swamp rock band has the odd distinction of having seen more of its singles hit No. 2 on the charts, without ever hitting No. 1, than any other musical act. Between March 1969 and Oct. 1970, the band scored five No. 2 singles on the Billboard Top 100—"Proud Mary," "Bad Moon Rising," "Green River," "Travelin' Band," and "Lookin' Out My Back Door"—but never saw one of its songs get to the top spot. No other act has topped this dubious honor since.

 

[Marcie Jensen]

CCR is one of my all time favorite bands and this is astounding! I'm surprised by this, especially when you factor in songs like Fortunate Song, Have you Ever Seen the Rain etc. 

[Ivy]

They did a lot of good stuff.

[Heather Shay]

 

Sweden celebrates Christmas with a giant, straw Yule Goat.

MATS ASTRAND/TT/AFP via Getty Images

In Scandinavian countries, the Yule goat figures into the Christmas decor of many homes. In Norse mythology, the two goats pulled Thor's flying chariot the same way reindeer do for Santa's sleigh. On top of that, there's also a festive tale that focuses on an invisible Yule goat that checks in on holiday prep before the big day. That's why, in 1966, the Gävle Goat was created in an effort to draw shoppers to the Swedish city where it resides. Standing 42.6 feet high and seven meters in length, it also weighs a whopping 3.6 tons.

 

In Ukraine, spiders are considered symbols of good luck at Christmas.

Shutterstock

When you think about Christmas creatures, reindeer and polar bears probably jump to mind… but what about spiders? In Ukraine, families often add spider web ornaments to their trees as a nod to a lovely seasonal story about the critters once using their silky string to decorate the tree of a poor widow and her children.

 

The Christmas tree pickle is a tradition to keep eager kids calm on Christmas morning.

Shutterstock

According to Today, the Christmas pickle is more than just a common ornament, it's a tradition. As the quirky tradition goes, the first child to find the glass pickle hidden in the tree on Christmas morning either wins a prize or the privilege of opening the first gift. The goal? To keep kids from rushing through the process of opening presents, and instead take the time to enjoy each one.

 

You can recycle your Christmas tree by donating it to elephants.

Shutterstock

When the holidays are over and it's time to get rid of your Christmas tree, you could drag it to the curb to be picked up by garbage collectors or you could donate it to a zoo so that it can be fed to a hungry elephant. Zoos around the world, including The Elephant Sanctuary in Hohenwald, Tennessee, accept evergreens, which are enjoyed by the giant herbivores as a seasonal snack.

[Marcie Jensen]

@Heather Shay This was an absolutely marvelous post today! Thank you for sharing these worldwide Christmas traditions.

[miz miranda]

some strange Christmas Traditions

 

Italy: The Christmas Witch

In many cultures, Santa Claus is the person that travels around the world and delivers gifts to deserving young boys and girls on Christmas Eve. Kids are told to be good because Santa is watching them and will know if they behave! On Christmas morning, good kids are rewarded with gifts from this iconic figure.

But in Italy, there's someone else delivering gifts. Befana is the name of a witch in Italy who is said to travel around Italy on Epiphany Eve (January 5th) to deliver gifts to children all over the country. If the children were good all year, their socks are filled with candy and gifts. But if they were bad? They get nothing but coal.

 

Iceland: The Yule Cat

Animals are a big part of a lot of the mythology and traditions of many countries. In Iceland, there's a special Christmas tradition that involves a very special cat that roams the streets one time per year.

But this cat isn't the cute, friendly, four-legged friend that we might imagine roaming the streets of Iceland. According to myths and legends, the Yule Cat is a ferocious creature that wanders around during the winter time and eats anyone who hasn't gotten new clothes to wear on Christmas Eve.

 

Japan: Kentucky Fried Christmas

Many families have a tradition of getting together on holidays like Christmas to enjoy a meal together. Whether it's turkey, ham, or a secret family recipe, enjoying dinner together is a huge part of the holidays for many families. This is also true in Japan! Even though Christmas is celebrated a lot differently and has only started to be celebrated in the past few decades, it's still popular for a lot of people.

So, what's the special meal that people eat during Christmas in Japan? KFC! In the 1970s, KFC in Japan started advertising a special campaign during the winter called Kentucky for Christmas. During Christmas, KFC sells a special range of family dinners meant to help people celebrate the holiday together.

 

South Africa: Fried Caterpillars

There are some foods around the world that are slightly strange to people that don't live there. Some of them are surprisingly delicious once you give them a chance, but then there are others that we could never imagine trying.

In South Africa, there's one really unusual food that tends to be eaten during the Christmas season. It's fried, crispy, and they say it's delicious. What is it? Fried caterpillars! On Christmas Day, people in South Africa snack on deep-fried caterpillars.

[Abigail Eleanor]

That Yule Cat in Iceland!  I love it! 

[awkward-yet-sweet]

In German traditions, St. Nicholas is accompanied by a an imp or mildly evil fellow named Krampus.  St. Nicholas hands out sweet treats and fruit to good children, leaving the treats in a shoe.  Krampus beats bad children with a stick.  

[Marcie Jensen]

@miz mirandathank you for adding to the Christmas Traditions list. Again, it's very interesting. As is the story of the actual Saint Nicholas, bishop of Myrna and Bari, the precursor of Santa. I've gotta say, I think I'll pass on the fried caterpillars though.

[Marcie Jensen]

Krampus is another different tradition. I first learned about the character on an episode of General Hospital several years ago.

[Marcie Jensen]

You have all prompted me to do some research. Being of Scottish descent, I went in that direction and learned a bunch of things, some of the most unusual were:

 

On Christmas eve, the children leave a slice of mince pie and a shot of whisky for Father Christmas.

 

A rowan twig is often burnt on Christmas to restore good relationships between neighbors, family members and friends.

 

And, most unusual of all, Christmas wasn't celebrated openly by Scots from 1647 until the 1950s. Originally, this was because of edicts under Cromwell's rule and later the Presbyterian Church of Scotland discouraged the practice of celebrating Christmas. 

[Heather Shay]

Ancient Romans celebrated reversals at the midwinter festival of Saturnalia.

 

 

A Saturnalia celebration in England in 2012. / Christopher Furlong/Getty Images

The holiday, which began as a festival to honor the agricultural god Saturn, was held to commemorate the dedication of his temple in 497 BCE. It quickly became a time of widespread revelry and debauchery in which societal roles were overturned, with masters serving the people they enslaved and servants being allowed to insult their masters. Mask-wearing and play-acting were also part of Saturnalia's reversals, with each household electing a King of Misrule. Saturnalia was gradually replaced by Christmas throughout the Roman Empire, but many of its customs survive as Christmas traditions.

The sun illuminates an ancient tomb in Ireland on the winter solstice.

 

 

Newgrange mound in Ireland / Stephan Hoerold/iStock via Getty Images

Newgrange, a tomb mound built in Ireland about 1000 years before Stonehenge, lights up dramatically during the winter solstice. A roof-box above the entrance coordinates with the light from the winter solstice sunrise so that a beam of light travels the 19-meter passage and then illuminates the chamber for about 17 minutes. The attraction is so popular that visitors can only gain entrance to the chamber on solstice mornings via a lottery held in late September every year.

Some of Peru’s Nazca Lines converge with the sun on the winter solstice.

 

 

Nasca lines in Peru / lovelypeace/iStock via Getty Images

The 2000-year-old Nazca Lines in Peru are massive designs etched into the ground, depicting a variety of plants, animals, and shapes. Some of the straight lines are as long as 30 miles and the animals and plants as large as 1200 feet.

 

The geoglyphs are best viewed from the sky and remain a mystery to researchers. American historian Paul Kosok, working in the 1940s, believed the geoglyphs were related to astronomy and may have served as a calendar. Some of the lines appear to correspond to the winter solstice, as they touch the spot on the horizon where the sun sets.

The pagan festival of Yule honored the winter solstice.

 

 

Sunset over a snowy field / SV Photography/iStock via Getty Images

Despite showing up in a variety of Christmas-related songs and traditions, Yule originated as an ancient pagan winter solstice festival. People would celebrate with a 12-day feast that marked the sun’s rebirth and burn a Yule log, which stayed lit for all 12 nights. Some pagans consider Yule the beginning of the new year, a time when the days start getting longer. Druids would burn Yule logs for 12 days to eliminate evil spirits and bring about good luck.

 Mistletoe was part of some winter solstice celebrations.

 

 

Bundles of mistletoe / AY Images/iStock via Getty Images

Druid priests believed mistletoe, a parasitic evergreen plant that grows among oak branches, was the soul of the tree. The high priest would climb an oak on the sixth night of the new moon after the winter solstice and cut down pieces of the mistletoe, which people would wear for good luck and protection from evil spirits.

The winter solstice marks one of the most important celebrations of the Hopi.

 

 

Winter snow on Arizona mountains / Doug Berry/iStock via Getty Images

In northern Arizona, the Hopi people celebrate Soyal, or Soyaluna, the winter solstice celebration. They welcome kachinas, or katsinam, ancestral spirits that guard over the Hopi, to dance with them and bring the sun back to the world. The ritual is usually performed in an underground room, called a kiva, and is meant to bring about a prosperous year.

A world heritage site in North America is aligned with the winter solstice.

 

 

Chaco Canyon pueblo ruins / YinYang/iStock via Getty Images

At Chaco Canyon in New Mexico, where Ancestral Puebloans built an elaborate city more than 1000 years ago [PDF], the sun strikes a particular petroglyph called the Sun Dagger at the summer and winter solstices. The rock carving may have been part of the Ancestral Puebloans’ sophisticated practice of astronomy.

[miz miranda]

Winter cold kills more than twice as many Americans as summer heat does.

 

The Southern Hemisphere typically has milder winters than the Northern Hemisphere. This is because the Southern Hemisphere has less land and a more maritime climate.

 

While it seems counterintuitive, Earth is actually closest to the sun in December, even though winter solstice is the shortest day of the year.

 

According to the Guinness World Records, on January 28, 1887, a snowflake 15 inches wide and 8 inches thick fell in Fort Keogh, Montana, making it the largest snowflake ever observed.

 

While the winter solstice is the shortest day of the year, seasonal lag means that the coldest period usually follows the solstice by a few weeks.

 

Several discoveries happened in a Winter Solstice. The Pilgrims arrived at Plymouth on December 21, 1620; Pierre and Marie Curie discovered radium on December 21, 1898, and on December 21, 1968 the Apollo 8 spacecraft launched.

 

[Heather Shay]

Snow Was Almost Illegal

The 1991-1992 snow season was particularly bad for Syracuse, New York. More than 162 inches of snow fell on the city. So in March of 1992, the Syracuse Common Council passed a decree “on behalf of its snow-weary citizens” that said any more snow before Christmas Eve of that year was outlawed. But Mother Nature must have missed the memo: It snowed two days later, and the following winter brought even more snow.

Some Snowflakes You Can’t Catch in Your Mouth

The largest recorded snowflake was 15 inches wide and 8 inches thick. It fell in Fort Keogh, Montana in January of 1887. 

Snow Seems to Really Like Italy

The town of Capracotta in southern Italy holds the record for the city to get the most snow in one day. In March of 2015, more than 100 inches of snow accumulated in just 18 hours. That’s about five inches of snow per hour!

Lots of Snow = Super Tall Snowmen

The Guinness Book of World Records gave the record for Tallest Snowman to one jolly, happy soul in Bethel, Maine. The snow-woman, which took over a month to build, was over 122 feet tall.

[miz miranda]

Christmas Trivia

 

PopSci estimates Santa Claus would have to travel an average speed of 5.083 million miles per hour based on a 24-hour cycle to hit each household on Christmas Eve. It bases this on 2.67 children per household, with 75 million households worldwide. The speed of light is 671 million mph. So if we ever get there, presents for everyone!

 

The restaurant Denny’s, known for its “always open” motto, decided to give employees the day off in 1988. The only problem was 700 of the franchise’s then-1,221 locations had no locks per the policy. Thankfully, corporate was able to come through with last-minute installations.

 

The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission estimates there are approximately 15,000 decoration-related emergency room visits each holiday season.

 

The Catalan Region, Spain: Tió de Nadal, or “Christmas log,” is a hollow log with stick legs and other decor. From Dec. 8-24, children “feed” him nuts, dried fruit, and water each night. On Christmas Eve, Slate notes, they beat him with sticks until candy falls out, earning him the dubious nickname of “defecating log.” We poop you not.

 

The Italy-based emergency services organization Pubblica Assistenza Carrara e Sezioni in Carrara, Tuscany, Italy, captured the world’s longest Christmas stocking title from GWR on Jan. 5, 2011. The final size was over 168 feet in length and more than 70 in width (from heel to toe).