Statistics Saturday: Ten Most Amazing Facts Of The Week

• Despite the name no so-called “universal remote” has ever in fact been remote from the universe.
• No United States president has ever been born in the future.
• The 100 pleats in a chef’s hat represent the 100 times that the guy who bought the hat-pleating mechanism insisted on showing this was too a good purchase and would pay for itself in time.
• In the Star Trek episode “Court Martial” Spock discusses what would happen “if I let go of a hammer on a planet that has a positive gravity”, implying there are enough zero- and negative-gravity planets around he needs to shut talk about them down before it even starts.
• There must always exist at least one breadbox that cannot be put inside another breadbox. However, if the universe were infinitely large, we could not count on this being true.
• No episode of the 1980s animated series of The Smurfs establishes that Gargamel knows of the Snorks.
• Those coworkers whose names you aren’t sure you have yet, and it’s too awkward now to ask about? Sara and Mike. If there’s a third, it’s Darryl or maybe Darren. Go confident on the “Darr” part and underplay the second syllable and you’ll get away with it.
• D is known as “the sunshine vitamin” because it was first discovered by spectral analysis of the sun. It would not be seen on Earth for nearly a generation after its detection.
• Not only could they make Blazing Saddles today, they did, which is where everybody was all day and why they’re all tuckered out. You should have come over and helped, you’d have had a great time. Maybe you can catch them next month when they hope to make Symbiopsychotaxiplasm: Take One.
• Despite every advance in the technology to write songs, they are likely to be outnumbered by unwritten songs through 2024 at the soonest.

Reference: A Diplomatic History Of Europe Since The Congress Of Vienna, René Albrecht-Carié.

Statistics Saturday: Several Fake Canadian Provinces Or Territories

• Upper Columbia
• Greater Toronto
• District of Skagway
• Breton
• Lesser Fromronto
• Mtigwaki
• South Brunswick
• Middling Threeronto
• Roberta
• Upper Saddle River
• Fouronto
• Adanac
• Manicotti
• Moosylvania
• Scottish Oregon
• Severaltoba
• Gogebic County, Michigan
• Territory of Sasquatch
• Shuswap Regional District Time
• Montreal Oblast
• Maplesota Territory
• Equatorial Labrador
• Saskatchemifyoucan
• Prince Rupert’s Nose

Note: Mooseapopalis is not named as it is, of course, a fictional city in Nova Carolus and not a fake province or territory of Canada. We weren’t born yesterday.

Fun Fact: I did not call this “Faux Canada” because the wordplay never crossed my mind, and don’t think I’m not all burnt up about that. I may never forgive myself. Well, it’s too late now. Too bad.

Another Fun Fact: I am completely incapable of telling whether a fact is, in fact, fun.

Source: History of the Space Shuttle, Volume 1: The Space Shuttle Decision, 1965 – 1972, T A Heppenheimer.

Finding the Fun: Caffeine Edition

I was hanging out online, since that’s easier than interacting with people, and the conversation turned to caffeine. One person piped up with this:

Fun fact, Red Bull actually has less caffiene than a regular cup of coffee.

While I was getting ready to have a reaction to that — don’t tell me you could respond to that without some warm-up first — someone else laid this on the group:

Fun fact: the lethal amount of caffeine is equal to 10,000 cups of coffee … at once.

OK, so, even if either or both of those are facts, this is fun? What kind of crowd am I moving in?

This is why I mostly drink coffee only when I misunderstood the question.